"Good morning. My name is John and we're from the funeral home."

I watched as two men in dark suits entered the house, walked down the hall, and went into the back bedroom.

My grandfather had been in a coma for days.

Now he was gone from his worn out body.

Cancer and Chemotherapy

Grandad had been diagnosed with lung cancer eight months earlier. However, he had been sick for quite some time.

My grandfather did not want to spend his last days in a hospital, so my mother, along with a few relatives and Hospice, cared for him in his Taylor Street home.

At the time, I was in college, so I would drive an hour home to help my mother care for him.

After the doctors started chemotherapy, my grandfather became very weak and stayed in bed most of the time.

When he needed to use the restroom, I would help him to his feet, put my arms under him, and walk him to the bathroom.

While he stood there, I held him up, pulled down his pajama pants, and made sure he did not fall.

Eventually, my grandfather became too sick to get out of bed.

I began using hospital gloves and a plastic urinal to help him while he remained in bed.

"I Don't Want To End Up Like This"

After watching what happened to my grandad, I thought, "I don't want to end up like this."

He slept more and more, waking only briefly to drink water. His body was slowly shutting down.

One bright summer morning, we entered his bedroom and could see that he was no longer breathing.

His eyes were closed, his mouth was open, and his body had become cold and rigid.

I watched as the men from the funeral home carefully placed my grandfather on a stretcher and wheeled him out the front door.

The eight month battle Tom O. Smith had with cancer was over.

He was now holding hands once again with his beloved Mary Sellars Smith.

P.S. What about you?

Do you believe that no matter what you do, you will become sick and disabled as you get older?

Or are there things you can do to put the odds for good health in your favor?