What started as a journaling exercise sitting in the ICU with my loved one, has now become a pretty big realization.
In my notebook, I stepped into the shoes of my future self. Octogenarian Paris. And I asked myself, if I’m ever hospitalized in old age, how will anyone know that I want ice water for my mouth swabs and not room temp?
How will they know that not only am I physically hurting but my identity just took a swift kick to the groin too??
How will they know how to help me with my grief, my preferences, all the things that make me feel like me??
As Kevin and I found humor in all my future, geriatric preferences, I realized so much of what I was talking about connects to my design.
From how I digest food and information, to how I need to release pent up energy. It’s all in my chart. Not to be confused with MyChart… iykyk.
So here’s my love letter to my future self, caregivers, family members, Kevin and hopefully Taylor Swift (if she is still doing surprise hospital visits).
Throughout this post, follow the crystal ball for Human Design insights. They might help you or a loved one navigate a medical crisis in the future.
🔮= Human Design ah-ha moment
This might sound morbid, but I want to make a list of all of my preferences if I were ever to be in the hospital, kind of like a guide for all my caregivers.
I’m not anticipating this happening until I’m 80 or 90 years old, hopefully. But an elderly loved one of mine has been in crisis mode recently, and I’ve been thinking about how much of who we are never makes it into a medical chart.
There are so many preferences, comforts, beliefs, and ways of operating that help me feel like myself, and nearly all of them are documented inside my Human Design chart.
Lucky for me, my partner Kevin (the love and light of my life) knows most of these things already. I’m incredibly grateful he has these hard conversations with me whenever my Eldest Daughter heart desires.
But in case any one else is at my bedside, here’s how to make me feel like me again.
🔮I want my caregivers to know that my Human Design type is Manifesting Generator.
Tell them that means I feel highly capable, and I have a strong need to move around, multitask, engage with life and be zesty. If I’m ever hospitalized, please know that lying in a bed all day is going to give me extreme agita.
If my body has limitations, my spirit will still want motion, options, and some sense of forward movement. Even if it’s a facade.
I want to still feel capable.
So here are some ideas to ensure I still feel like I am a sparkly, high achiever, despite needing a bedpan:
Give me fidget spinners or a stress ball
Help me brush my hair
Make my bed (ask me how I want it done so I feel like I’m delegating)
Remind me I am capable of so many things inside my beautiful mind
Give me a walkie talkie (that I will surely abuse)
Remind me to wiggle my toes as often as possible (small but powerful energy release)
🔮 I also have a defined root in Human Design, which means that if I’m ever immobile, I’m definitely going to need things that help me release internal pressure and the urge to move my body.
I might not be able to walk, but I need to simulate “making moves.”
I don’t necessarily want to watch a Peloton workout on Youtube, but watching a show (Suits, Royal Pains, White Collar) where the characters are witty and get more done before 9am than any real-life CEO, will soothe me.
The pressure of anxiety, fear, worry can be a very mental thing for most people. But for someone with a defined root, it builds up inside like a pressure cooker. That alone could drive me to insanity.
If you don’t want to hear me start cussin’, put on USA Network, stat.
If I’m ever injured or recovering from something serious, I want physical therapy and occupational therapy to be front and center. Largely because of my design, movement is life-force energy for me.
And I want to know the plan even if there is no plan.
🔮I have a left facing arrow in my design and structure can be the difference between good and poor mental health.
If you’re playing the waiting game, there’s doctor after doctor, nurse after nurse, every speciality weighing in and there’s no clear path forward, just tell me what the plan is for the current day. Document it somewhere because I’m gonna ask you 100 times.
🔮 With my defined root, anxiety builds up literally like pressure cooker inside me, and the thing that almost always helps is movement.
Walking helps. Stretching helps. Wiggling my toes helps.
Movement is both rehabilitation and emotional regulation.
Without it, I could see myself deteriorating so fast. And while I know that walking might not be possible, if you see me stretching and all my nurses THINK I’m trying to escape… reassure them I just need to move a little. I promise to follow the rules…mostly.
Bonus points to any caregiver who says “oooohhh big stretch!”
If there is a safe opportunity to move, walk, stand, stretch, wiggle, dance, or participate in therapy, I would like that prioritized whenever medically appropriate.
One of the things I’m noticing while supporting my loved one in the hospital is how discombobulating the whole situation feels.
Who have we already met with?
What tests have we already run?
Surgery is a go? Surgery is a no-go??
Did the doctor come? Is there a new doctor now?
Did the night nurse read all the Salesforce notes??
It’s disorienting for me and I am the college-educated, millennial matriarchy who is standing up right. So I KNOW it’s disorienting for my loved one.
If you’re caring for future me, please keep a visible to-do list or checklist somewhere in my room.
If you would be so kind, I would love to see the following:
Procedures we’ve completed
Tests we’ve run
Providers we’ve met with
Appointments we’ve had
Results we’ve received
Next steps that are still pending
How awesome I’m doing (feel free to give me a gold star sticker for every completed test)
And please let me check things off myself whenever possible.
Literally, I want to see a big ass check mark.
Better yet, let ME cross stuff off. Oooh yes. As I type that, I feel better about things already.
One of the ways I release anxiety is by feeling like progress is happening. Even if there are a million pivots.
I am a Mani Gen! I can roll with the punches. But I want to see what’s been accomplished up until this point because if Mani Gens know anything, we know NOTHING is linear. That healing compounds. No test is wasted. No lesson is wasted. No consult is wasted.
Just show me the zig zags.
Even if you think I can’t follow it, or I don’t know what’s going on… my higher self does. And she’s running this show so keep her involved.
If I’m uncomfortable, anxious, overwhelmed, terrified or all of the above, I would love for someone to offer me options as we make big decisions.
Instead of: what would you like to do right now?
Try: Do you want to listen to music, watch a show, be left alone or hear more options?
But please don’t ask me an open-ended question. Like, ever.
If I agree to music, don’t say, “What would you like to listen to?” because my brain will unironically explode.
🔮 I’m a Manifesting Generator. I do much better with options (and so does 60% of the population).
Instead, ask me like this:
“Would you like to listen to music? Yes or no?”
And if I say yes, offer me one of these:
Maren Morris’s Hero album
888 Hz frequencies for abundance, healing, and detox
Michael Bublé (then proceed to give me album options—I’ll probably opt for Christmas no matter what season it is)
If I am completely incapacitated and unresponsive, please play Mary Did You Know by Pentatonix. It’s the song I played for my Mom the night she died. It was her favorite.
If things are looking really grim, play Time to Say Goodbye by Sara Brightman, and Andrea Bochelli. It’s a song my angel Mom has put on the radio every time I’ve gone through a major transition in my life. It was one of her favorites when she was on Earth.
To recap, options are important.
Giving me a few choices is much easier than an entirely open-ended question, especially as an octogenarian with lots going on at the moment!
I would like someone to ask me regularly whether I would like Reiki or energy work. Or if I am responsive and awake, this is something I can do on myself!! As a certified Reiki healer, I know the power of the mind. I might just need the reminder. 🤲🏻
If nobody can physically come to the hospital, I am completely comfortable receiving remote Reiki
However, I don’t want just anyone off the streets coming in and sticking their hands in my field. Nah.
I would prefer recommendations from my current medium bestie, Kristen. I’d also love as many sessions with Kristen as possible.
If I am unresponsive, please ask her to connect with my Mom and my higher self. Those are the only people allowed in the group chat.
Oh, and ideally, I would love energy work or medium sessions daily. Please and thank you.
I request that rose quartz and amethyst crystals be in my room at all times.
Rose quartz supports self-love and I NEED to be saying nice things to my body at this point.
Amethyst supports grief and life after loss. And I’m not necessarily saying death has to be imminent for this purple rock to be needed. But perhaps what I’m going through is death of an identity—like not being able to move is a huge identity shift.
If someone is visiting regularly, I would love for them to place the crystals in sunlight to charge them whenever possible and then bring them back to me later. You probably should have at least two crystals so we can be rotating, as one charges, the other stays with me.
Whether or not anyone else believes in crystals isn’t important to me.
What matters is that they bring me comfort, familiarity, and a sense of “productivity” because at least I know something in that room is working on me.
Bonus points if you keep reminding me: “the angels know what they’re doing.”
Believe it or not, that is extremely comforting to me. My bestie said in a text recently when I told her what was going on with my family. I felt relief wash over me like oh, I don’t have to control every aspect of this situation.
🔮 I know that my digestion in Human Design is direct light (some charts don’t tell you this but this one does).
That means I am basically solar-powered.
If you’re managing my care, could I trouble you to ask for these things:
Have a room with windows
Sit near sunlight
Eat meals in sunlight
Spend time outside (safely and with supervision aka Kevin)
Take walks outdoors when medically appropriate (and sunny but not humid, obvi)
Have a red-light
Have a sleep mask for night time (so the blue light doesn’t disturb my healing process)
Those options would be strongly preferred.
Because Direct Light is my design digestion, sunlight helps me feel regulated, grounded, and connected to myself and to the universe. It also literally helps me digest both food and information.
If I’m ever showing signs of delirium or confusion, get me into the sun as best you can.
My future self thanks you many.
🔮 One of the things that helps me feel grounded in life is innocence. You can find out what keeps YOU grounded by looking at your unconscious and conscious Earth on your human design chart.
Because of that, I want childlike things around me. I don’t care if I’m lizard-wrinkly and have to make big girl decisions.
I want permission to be playful.
Treat me like a little kid that you adore.
Because as I look at my octogenarian Mani Gen best friend, all I see is a little kid who is scared. 🥺
They are just trying to make sense of the world as much as they did when they were ten years old. But now there’s lots of tubes and iridescent lights.
I’ve been reading to my loved one at night but ONLY after I ask if they want a story. Then I give them two options to choose from because they are also a Mani Gen.
(Side Note: please send all your prayers, we’re gonna need them!)
So, my future self asks you to put these things in your hospital bag:
Storybooks read to me at night (Good Night Moon, Better Move on Frog, Princess Chamomile’s Garden, Frederick, Are You My Mother)
Bubbles, if that’s somehow an option
Stuffed animals
Soft blankets with cute things on them
Little reminders of wonder, imagination, and joy
When life gets serious, innocence helps me feel grounded. My inner child deserves that.
If I want television, my first choices should be obvious.
Friends
Gilmore Girls
Beyond that, I would happily watch other shows that have storylines that aren’t too loud or dramatic but are still engaging— largely for the background noise.
Royal Pains
Suits
White Collar
Psyche
I’ve realized that active shows about people solving problems somehow make me feel productive. It’s how I self-soothe now but what’s interesting is that this is ALSO part of my design.
🔮 My design environment is Valleys which means I thrive in spaces that feel spacious, clean, and have great acoustics. Something about hearing people chat, work through problems, and banter together makes me feel productive and engaged without HAVING to engage or be in anyone else’s energy.
Because of this family crisis, I’ve limited my 1:1 sessions.
But paid subscribers can comment below to get Human Design support as they navigate a big transition.
If you or a loved one is going through a major change, comment your question below and I’ll reply with some ideas!
You can find out your loved one’s human design here.
And to all the caregivers out there, you’re doing the lord’s work. Sending you all my love.
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