Recently I spent a week in hospital for pneumonia. It wasn’t fun.
It began about two and a half weeks prior, initially as a cold, then flu-like symptoms and finally pneumonia. For nine days, I struggled to breathe properly. I went from being a fit and healthy 48-year-old to one that struggled to do basic chores like hanging out the laundry without running out of breath.
During that time, I went to the local GP three times, and on each occasion, it seemed like a herculean effort to get to the doctors’ clinic and wait for my appointment. I had to get various tests done – blood tests, chest x-rays, and nasal and mouth swabs.
It didn’t help that I was home alone as my family had to go interstate for my son’s soccer tournament. It also didn’t help that I lost my appetite and didn’t eat for six days. Sleeping was a challenge and I had to resort to a sitting position to get rest. Oddly, I gained a heightened sense of smell, yet it made food and other things like deodorant quite off-putting.
In hindsight, I should have gone to hospital during those nine days. However, I thought that I wasn’t dying, and I didn’t want to burden an emergency department with my non-life-threatening illness.
On day five of nine, I got confirmation that I did have pneumonia. It was the common mycoplasma infection, otherwise known as walking pneumonia. The problem was that antibiotics to treat the infection weren’t working. I was put on steroids which gave me a minor boost for a few days, before I went downhill again.
Eventually, the doctor said I needed to go to hospital immediately.
I went to St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney, and I must have got lucky by going on Friday afternoon before the weekend rush, because I went almost straight through to the emergency department.
After the first night (a noisy affair!), I was put in an isolation ward because I was highly contagious. I was on a ventilation machine from minute one, but after 24 hours, they increased the dose to maximum levels because my oxygen levels were so low. It would remain that way for six days. After 36 hours, I got moved to the respiratory ward, and ended up with a nice, large room probably because they needed to keep me far away from other patients.
Hospitals aren’t enjoyable. They see people often at the lowest point, as it was with me.
The food wasn’t too bad, though Wi-Fi was non-existent, and the free-to-air television was truly horrific. I hadn’t watched free-to-air for many years, and didn’t realise how bad it had become, with a plethora of reality shows that were 20 or even 30 years old, and endless remakes of other old shows that were terrible. It made me think of youngsters today who’ve never watched free-to-air and almost certainly never will.
It left a lot of time for reading and keeping my own company.
What does and doesn’t matter
During the long days and nights in hospital, two things struck me. First, I yearned to connect with family and friends. I’ve got many good friends interstate and overseas, yet what surprised me is that I wanted to connect more with those closer to home. It reminded me of evolutionary psychologist, Robin Dunbar’s theory that people need friends close to home because it builds deeper connections.
The other thing that struck me was how irrelevant news is to our daily lives. During the week in hospital, Trump’s assassination attempt and the CFMEU shenanigans were the lead stories. And my immediate and ongoing reaction to these news items was that I couldn’t care less.
Perhaps being unhealthy makes us selfish, but my wish to connect with those close to me took overwhelming precedence.
News seemed irrelevant. Hobbies like sport seemed irrelevant. Social media seemed irrelevant. And, yes, even work seemed irrelevant.
Suddenly, life’s priorities were remarkably clear and simple.
Falling back into bad habits
Eventually, after a cocktail of antibiotics and steroids, I was able to go off the ventilation machine. My oxygen levels were still not great, though I was intent on going home and the doctors finally agreed.
Apparently, it would be 4-6 weeks before my energy levels would return to normal. Thankfully, though, it happened much faster, and I now feel back to my former self.
I’ve noticed that I’ve already started to revert to old habits. As I’m writing this article, an email comes in and I’ll automatically check it. Or a Teams message. Or my Twitter feed. Or anything else that comes along to distract me from finishing the article. “Just do the work, nothing else matters right now”, I plead to myself.
I worry about my son and whether he’ll get into an advanced soccer squad and have to remind myself that it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. The same goes for my daughter’s grades in her first year of high school. “It’s early days”, I tell myself.
And I’m still trying to make good on the promise to connect more deeply with those close to me.
Changing investment priorities
By now, you might be asking: what the heck does this have to do with investing? My thoughts on priorities did naturally switch to the world of investing. What stands out to me is the ratio of how much information that we read daily versus that which will make us successful long-term investors.
You could invest in a portfolio of ETFs to suit your goals and risk profile, and not read anything about investing, and you’ll probably come out ahead of most investors over a long-term timeframe of, say, 10 years.
You could invest in solid, growing businesses, and ignore all information on the economy and politics, and you’re likely to do just fine.
Prioritising a simple portfolio with realistic goals means most investors can largely ignore a lot of the day-to-day market noise.
Saving versus spending
We get taught about how to save money in investing, but not how to spend it. Obviously, one is needed to do the other. Yet how and when to spend money is rarely discussed.
With my health scare, I started to think more about the here and now. The overseas holiday that I’d like to do may be more difficult in 10-20 years’ time.
I’ve even given thought to purchasing silly consumer items I’d like to have. I’ve always loved watches yet have held off buying one for years because I wanted to save the money rather than spend it. Now, I’m willing to splurge, albeit on one that’s not flashy or expensive.
This switch in thinking reminds me of the book that I once reviewed in Firstlinks called Die with Zero. While the book overstates its point, a better balance between saving and spending makes more sense to me now.
James Gruber is Editor at Firstlinks.