I remember years ago when I jogged at the oval of the Cebu City Sports Center. One time, the late Cebu Daily News (CDN) fotog Tonee Despojo approached me while I was doing the rounds. I was surprised by his presence and he told me his friends and he would be using the football field for a bit of an exercise. He said he did not want to grow old with any physical disability, so he had to do some exercises to improve his physical health. Yet, Tonee died relatively young nevertheless, succumbing to a cardiovascular ailment.
When you get old, you have to take good care of the organs of your body, like the heart. Another CDN fotog, Junjie Mendoza, suffered from a heart attack recently, but he is on the road to recovery. Former SunStar Cebu reporter Elias Baquero suffered from heart problems also -- before he retired a few years ago. He told me about how his friend Augusto Go of the Chong Hua Hospital, saved him from expensive heart bypass surgery, which was recommended by his doctor, by advising him to get a second opinion on the matter. He got well without surgery, but when he went back to normal living, a heart attack soon felled him. He died.
And who would have thought that another friend, Art Barrit of the Associated Labor Unions, and a seemingly healthy Cebu City Sports Center top gun Ricky Ballesteros, would succumb to cardiovascular ailments? This is the reason heart attacks and strokes are considered “traitor diseases.” You feel healthy enough not to watch what you are eating -- and then when the body already has enough, the attack comes. Often, it is already too late.
I used to joke about how people who grew up in poverty are malnourished because of the lack of resources while growing up. They strive and get rich -- and just when they already have the money to buy food, the doctor tells them to slow down on the food and go on a diet. That’s what life is sometimes: ironic.
I was hospitalized recently when my blood pressure shot up and refused to go down despite medication. I had to act before another stroke would hit me after the mild stroke I suffered a couple of years ago. At the hospital, I was fed with food that had less salt while a dietitian had to lecture me about the benefits of going on a diet. What we eat makes us what we are. My blood pressure shot up because I loosened up on what I ate. And I didn’t exercise much.
Disciplining oneself is among the difficult parts of living. There are even some religions that spend a good deal of time discussing the virtues of eating the right food and at the right amount. But practicing what is preached is difficult. So some people hold on to the opposite. We Cebuanos have a word for that: “pamahala.” We close our eyes, live the life that we want to and forge ahead. If we die in the process, at least we enjoyed life. And if we survive, well and good.
By the way, I would dedicate this column to Landring, a friend when I was growing up spending vacation time in the hometown of my father, Tudela. Landring succumbed to a heart attack recently. May his soul rest in peace.