I have a condition called peripheral neuropathy – in both legs and some in my right arm. I have to wear braces to walk. This condition ‘came on’ in my late sixties. I am not diabetic. I was an outpatient at St. Luke’s Neurology in KC all summer (2019). After extensive testing from everything from Lymes disease to genetic markers they referred me to Kansas University Medical Center (KU). KU placed me in the Landon Center on Aging. WHAT!! Aging??

They use words like ‘geriatrics’. What do they mean by that? Are they suggesting I am old? I am being somewhat facetious – but I was surprised. I don’t feel old? I feel like I am perhaps 50 years old. How old am I? Central High School, Class of 1968. Not yet 70.

I don’t want to be old and I don’t want to be treated like I am old. I want to be treated as if I am young with an unusual malady. I feel offended by being classified as ‘aging’. The word ‘geriatric’ got to me. These are just words – but words have meaning, they have consequences, they establish prejudices, they direct – or misdirect.

Am I wrong to feel a sense of being discriminated against, or placed in an inappropriate category? It feels like I am being treated as “less than”. I feel my ‘condition’ is separate from aging.

I fear being seen by some doctor who has a preconceived idea about my condition based on me being placed in a center for old people. I don’t want to be patronized. I don’t need to be talked to as if I am deaf and cannot understand simple sentences. My mother is 97 and I know how people sometimes talk to her.

Actually, I think I am just afraid. There will be more testing. I am scheduled for an Electromyography. They are going to shock my legs to test the nerve conductivity. I guess I scheduled the appointment hoping they would search for a cause, and finding the cause they may be able to reverse or at least stop the progression of the offense to my nervous system.

Being relegated to an “aging clinic” felt like the medical community gave up on any hope of getting better.

When Does Someone Become Old from The Atlantic