Hi everyone. I'm Rincey and this is Rincey
Reads. Today I'm going to be talking about
Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. The subtitle
to this book is medicine and what matters
in the end. This is a non-fiction book that
talks about healthcare and the way that we
treat people who are getting towards the end
of their life, whether it be they're getting
older and so they're going to be passing away
soon or if they're getting sicker and so they're
going to be passing away soon. And it's about
the difficulties that we have as people confronting
the fact that we're going to die. Especially
as we get older and we see people around us
starting to get sicker, we don't necessarily
always know how to confront those things.
Um. A lot of times in the healthcare industry
especially, we try to deal with just cures,
we want to cure whatever sickness or ailment
we're dealing with, which is obviously a noble
thing. But at a certain point in time, you
can't cure anymore and it's just about what's
important when you can't cure. Is it about
people's comfort, people's safety, people's
happiness, things like that. These are all
different factors that kind of conflict. It
seems like they wouldn't conflict but when
you think about the things that keep people
safe and the things that keep people happy,
they're not always the same thing. And Atul
Gawande does a really, really fantastic job
of exploring those ideas and exploring those
facets. He is a doctor himself, his parents
are doctors and he talks to a lot of different
doctors and specialists around the country
as well as patients to try to understand better
what people want out of life, what's most
important to their healthcare. How the idea
of healthcare is also changing and evolving
to be more than just curing but also about
being more, I don't want to say holistic but
being about the whole person. How it's about,
again, more than just curing the disease.
I loved this book. This book was one that
I didn't know exactly what to expect out of
it. Like I knew it was very good and I knew
it dealt with the end of life, but I was still
very surprised at how good this book is. Atul
Gawande does such a great job of breaking
down the ideas into a very understandable
way so that even if you don't work in the
industry, you can still very much access the
things that he's talking about. We all have
experiences with people getting older, people
getting sick, things like that. So he sort
of confronts that head on. He has a lot of
personal examples that he uses in this book
that allow the reader to see that he not only
has the knowledge behind what he's talking
about being a doctor, but he also has the
experience to know what he's talking about.
The thing with people getting older, the thing
with death is that mentally you may have an
idea of what it's going to be like but you
really don't know what it's like until you're
in the experience and you're forced to sort
of confront those difficult questions and
those difficult situations. I mentioned this
once on a Goodreads status and I think I mentioned
this in my Friday Reads where I talked about
this book, but this book made me cry multiple
times. Like I'm pretty sure at least once
a chapter I was crying over this book. This
was a book that I had to read very slowly.
It could be a potentially quick read. Like
it's very readable and I was flying through
the chapters, but after every chapter I had
to take a break because it would make my heart
a little bit heavy. Because I have sort of
personal experience dealing with this, my
dad was sick for quite some time and then
he eventually passed away, and so the things
that he was talking about in this book hit
really, really close to home. He hit a lot
of points that I had to deal with personally
and so I was like crying every chapter just
thinking about the things that I had to deal
with. I can say for fact that, at least for
me personally, this book is very, very accurate
in terms of the questions that you're forced
to face. You start to wonder whether or not
you're making the right decisions in terms
of someone's health and well-being. I think
well-being is a very broad term and it's also
a term that's very unique to each person.
What's important to some people is not important
to other people is not important to other
people. I think this is one of those books
that should be required reading for people.
Because no matter where you are in life, if
you are living in this world, there's going
to be a point where you are going to confront
death. I remember seeing one time a friend
mentioned something about how no one really
warns you when you get into your 20s that
the most difficult thing about being older
is that you see your parents getting older.
And it was one of those things that always
stuck in my brain because I was like, yeah
it's true. No one really does warn you about
that. But I think that's also because as a
society, we haven't really been forced to
confront that until recently. It's mentioned
in this book but, you know, the way that science
and medicine has advanced, people are living
significantly longer than they ever have before.
Most people weren't expected to live to like
80, let alone 90 years old and now I feel
like being 80 years old isn't even that bad
anymore. Because science and technology has
advanced so much that it's easier to take
care of ourselves. We don't get sick as easily
or the things that made us sick before don't
make us sick anymore. We just take a couple
pills and we're over it, you know. But at
the same time our bodies are still deteriorating
as we get older. And there's only so much
that our bodies can do at this time to keep
our bodies strong and able. Yeah, when you
hit 80 you might not be suffering from sicknesses
the way that you did before but your muscles
are still deteriorating, your brain is still
you know losing some connections, things like
that. And your nerves in your fingers and
your feet are starting to go. And these aren't
problems that we had to deal with before because
when you were younger you would die from sicknesses
and diseases that would take you quicker and
at a younger age. So no one really knows what
to do when we reach those stages in life and
we don't really know the best way to sort
of move forward in those stages in life. And
so I think this book does a really great job
of just discussing that fact and discussing
some of the alternatives that are starting
to pop up around the country at least in the
United States and talking about whether or
not they work or they don't work and how we
need to move forward as a society and sort
of confront the fact that we're getting older,
um, we're staying older longer. And we need
to learn how to, I don't want to say handle
people who are older, but we need to know
how to best serve them and how it's going
to change from individual to individual. There
isn't going to be just one solid solution
that works for everybody. Different people
want different things out of life. That's
why we have like different career paths and
different types of housing situations. Not
every person who's over the age of like 70
is going to fit into a nursing home very well
or an assisted living home very or live home
in their own home very well, you know, it's
going to vary from person to person. And we
need to learn as a society not to just simply
automate everything that's happening, to look
at every individual case as to assess it,
which is difficult. And that's something that
as a country we need to learn and we need
to get to that point and as a healthcare industry,
they need to learn to adapt to those situations.
So yeah, this is just such a great book. I
think that, again, it should be required reading
for everyone. I gave this a 4.5 out of 5 stars.
I think the only reason why I didn't give
it 5 stars is cause I kind of wanted more.
Um. This book is less than 300 pages and I
kind of wish this book was a little bit longer
cause I think that there's a lot that can
still be discussed in this book. But I thoroughly,
thoroughly enjoyed it and I cannot recommend
it highly enough. So yeah those are my thoughts
on Being Mortal. If you've read this book,
feel free to leave a comment down below letting
me know what you guys thought of it. I know
a bunch of you guys said that you've read
it and really enjoyed it so I'd love to talk
about it down in the comment section with
you guys. Or if you have any questions feel
free to leave that down in the comment section
as well. So yeah, that's all I have for now
and thanks for watching.
