I recently had a minor health scare — not unusual when you’re pushing 80. Everything is fine, at least for now.
But it got me thinking.
Trump is 10 days older than me. He doesn’t look the model of robust health.
Even though we’re almost the same age, Trump has one big health problem I don’t have: his hatefulness.
“I hate my opponents,” he says.
Hate is a corrosive. It eats away at one’s health. It attacks a hater’s central nervous system by releasing stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. It compromises a hater’s cardiovascular system with high blood pressure and heart disease. It weakens immune systems, making the hater more vulnerable to all sorts of illnesses. It weakens gastro-intestinal systems, causing stomachaches, nausea, and other digestive problems. It leads to difficulties falling and staying asleep. It causes muscle tensions that harm the jaw and neck, such as clenching and teeth grinding, and contributes to headaches and migraines.
On Friday, Trump spent roughly three hours at the Bethesda Naval Hospital for what his doctor, Navy Capt. Sean Barbabella, called a “scheduled follow-up evaluation.” (While there, anti-vaxxers please note, Trump also got his yearly flu shot, as well as a COVID-19 booster.)
The White House initially described Trump’s Walter Reed visit as a “routine yearly checkup,” although Trump had his annual physical in April. The White House then called the Walter Reed visit a “semiannual physical.”
Even without hate, a body nearing 80 suffers from the wear and tear that accompany aging.
When I get together with old friends, our first ritual is an “organ recital” — how’s your back? Knee? Heart? Hip? Shoulder? Hearing? Prostate? Hemorrhoids? Digestion?
The recital can run — and ruin — an entire lunch.
I doubt Trump does organ recitals with old friends. That’s because I don’t think he has old friends.
When it comes to other people, Trump isn’t relational. He’s transactional. Every interaction is a deal. Transactions don’t foster friendships.
Yet as gerontologists will tell you, one of the most important ways of keeping healthy in later years is through good friendships.
Another thing I’ve been noticing when I get together with old friends is the subtle and awkward issue of mental decline.
It doesn’t arise directly. We don’t ask each other, “So, how’s the dementia coming along?” Instead, we quietly listen and notice: Are words garbled? Thoughts coherent? Syntax reasonable?
I’m becoming more forgetful. I make long lists trying to coax myself into remembering what I’m supposed to. Then I forget where I put the lists.
Inevitably, minds begin to go. Trump’s seems to be disappearing at a particularly rapid rate. Just get a transcript of the full remarks he made several weeks ago to the military top brass. It has dementia written all across it.
At Trump’s April physical, he passed a short screening test to assess brain functions. Beforehand, Trump bragged about how well he had done on his last cognitive test. “I had a perfect score. And one of the doctors said he’s almost never seen a perfect score. I had a, had a perfect score. I had the highest score. And that made me feel good.”
Let me ask you: Do you consider someone mentally healthy who needs to constantly and continuously brag about himself?
Another important way of measuring mental health is one’s sense of humor — especially of the self-deprecating sort. As I age, I’ve found that the sharpest of my friends have retained great capacities to laugh at themselves.
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen or heard Trump make a joke at his own expense. In fact, as far as I can tell, he has no sense of humor.
Probably the best predictor of how long you’ll live is how long your parents lived. Genes aren’t everything, but they’re almost everything.
My mother died at the age of 86. She was unwell for the last two years of her life. My father stuck around until two weeks before his 102nd birthday, and his mind remained sharp as a tack.
Trump’s mother died at the age of 88; his father at 93. Fred Trump was diagnosed with Alzheimers at the age of 86.
Three score and ten is the number of years of life set out in the Bible. Modern technology and Big Pharma should add at least a decade and a half, unless RFK Jr. has his way. It’s now thought a bit disappointing if a person dies before 85.
But as one approaches 80, it’s not just lifespan that looms. It’s also health span — how many years you feel good, feel able, have your wits about you.
If Trump can cause as much mayhem and suffering as he’s doing every day, I can at least keep writing and talking about how horrific he is, every day.
After all, I’m 10 days younger than him.
Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/.