Survival

I was at the book store this past weekend having coffee with my sisters and on my way in to the restroom there was a rack that held a few different free magazines. One that caught my eye was called Natural Nutmeg so I picked it up and brought it home. I was reading it the other night and was so incredibly moved by one of the articles that I wanted to talk a little bit about it today. As I started to write I quickly realized that taking various quotes from the article to share was not going to accurately convey the power of what was being said so I've decided to share the entire article. It's a bit lengthy so you might want to read this when you have some free time to ponder it's message. I think it's a vitally important one and maybe another day this week we can talk about that message.

Let me just say that my take on this article is that it is not intended soley for people who are dealing with a diagnosis of disease. I believe it's message is intended for each and every one of us who must choose how to deal with life and our own individual journeys. Anything written in a parenthesis is my thought.

SECRETS OF SURVIVAL by Bernie Siegel, MD

Most medical school applications of today state that the candidate for admission is interested in and fascinated by the human body. The problem is that often, physicians have been given medical information, but not a true medical education. An education teaches you how to deal with and care for the human experience of illness and not just treat the diagnosis. A medical education would also teach the skill of communication so that we do not kill with our words, but heal with them just as we heal with a scalpel and do not wound with it.

What I have found is that information does not change people. The obese, alcoholics, smokers, and nonconforming patients all know their behavior is not good for them. So why do they do it? It gets back to the lack of messages of love for the individual from parents, teachers, clergy and other authority figures. Ugly ducklings rarely find out on their own that they are swans. In one study a loved child had one fourth the illness rate of an unloved child by middle age (how powerful a statement is that?). I see pet owners who have lung cancer or asthma smoke outdoors to save their beloved pets. Killing yourself is not questioned. Nine hundred years ago Maimonides stated, "People would suffer fewer illnesses if they took as good care of themselves as they do their animals." Times haven't changed.

I have found that approximately 20% of patients are what I call respants: responsible participants who display and are interested in learning survival behavior. What I do for the other 80% is love them and give them return appointments no matter what they do. With time and love some begin to care for themselves. Then the information I present to them is utilized to achieve better health and survival statistics.

I can't sell them the idea of being a respant or cite better statistics because they aren't interested in working at living. They have grown up hearing there is something wrong with them. So guilt, shame and blame are what they are dealing with and if you ask them to fight for their lives it is one more thing they won't get right. Sad but true. I often ask people to answer questions, join support groups and draw pictures of themselves, their treatment and disease. That eliminates many patients because they are not artists - could do it wrong or don't want to work at surviving.

If I can inspire them and breathe life into them, then changes will occur. Now they are waking up to life and what makes them happy. This is not about self interest but paying attention to their bodies and what feels good for them to do. I help people reclaim their lives and be reborn so every cell in their body is given a message about the joys of life each day. Have I seen people expected to die in months cured of their disease by living this way? Yes. Do I recommend it as the sole treatment? No, because I know how hard it is to 'live in your heart and have magic happen' and 'leave all your troubles to God.'

I do, however, point out the benefits of love to the individual and those they are in contact with. When people are unwilling to do this I let their families know that they need to take care of themselves too. Why? Because there is something called Siegel's Sign in physical diagnosis. When a family walks into my office and everyone looks sick except one person, you can be sure the one who looks well is the one with the illness and is using it to manipulate everyone else in the family. I always guarantee them a cure on their next visit. They never come back to that office again and always arrange future meetings in the ER or other safe places where a cure is not available.

What do respants do that represents survival behavior? They take action, seek wisdom, perform meditation and imagery and have spiritual support. Spiritual support may come from a religion but some religions have regulations that create guilt and lead to feelings that one deserves God's punishment. Disease is no different than when one loses one's car keys. You don't say God wants you to walk home; you look for your keys. When you are ill you have lost your health and respants look for it to be restored.

They live a life with meaning, express their feelings and appropriate anger, ask for help when it is needed, learn to say no to things they do not want to do, make their own decisions about treatment, bring play into their lives, deal with feelings of depression and learn from them and they live an authentic life.

In essence life becomes a labor pain in which we birth ourselves and because we are making the choices the delivery has less pain, complications and side effects.

About thirty years ago I met Susan Duffy who had developed scleroderma and was not given much time to live. She was an enraged lady over her illness and her difficult life. Her parents and sister were alcoholics who committed suicide and were angry at her for not doing so. When I met her all I could do was listen and it turned out to be what Helen Keller advises since 'deafness is darker by far than blindness.' When she emptied out her rage in 1987 she wrote me a letter telling me that she had let love into her prison and it had touched every negative item in it and transformed them into something meaningful. She is alive today and a member of our support group and one of my teachers. I will present her list for survivors at the end of this article.

We each need to find our path and way to healing. The messages are age old and can be found in the literature of great spiritual leaders, the US Marines training manual, the writings of children with cancer and others. Two things are key elements. One is the inspiration I discuss, and the other is one's behavior. Just as multiple personalities disassociate so one must disassociate with the old self and BEHAVE as if you were the person you want to be. You rehearse and practice and find the coaches to help guide you. That is the role I see myself in today: a coach for the inspired respant who wants to learn survival behavior. How will you know one when you meet them? Ask them these questions:

1. I am taking you to dinner what do you want?
2. How would you introduce yourself to God?
3. What should I hang in the lobby of a public building with a sign above it that says, come and see how beautiful and meaningful life is?
(Take a minute to answer those questions for yourself before going on)

The correct answers are:
1. Any response within 15-20 seconds demonstrating they are in touch with their feelings and not thinking about fat content, cost, or what you want.
2. The introduction is that you and God don't need an introduction. You are a child of God.
3. And last (this is my favorite answer and the one that blew me away), you hang up not a picture of a baby, rainbow or flower, but a mirror.

Now let me close with a list from Susan Duffy:

SECRETS OF LIVING FOR SURVIVORS

Trust yourself enough to become your own teacher
Cultivate your own sense of being and spirituality
Trust in your own instincts, intuitions and leadings
Learn to flow with your own ideas concerning searching and seeking answers
Choose to have faith in yourself and your place in life
Discipline yourself to love the positive more than the negative (This one is HUGE)
Let go of everything that you can't change
Change yourself through self-acceptance and love; then what happens around you won't matter
Learn to forgive the unforgivable - you will become free
Forgive God, others and yourself
Allow yourself to feel anger, pain, joy and sadness
Express your feelings and don't feel so alone
Realize that everything changes
Look to other people for guidance and inspiration but not answers
Other people don't have all the answers, they are learning too
Nothing so bad ever happened to you that didn't happen to someone else
No one is unique we all suffer the same joys and pains of life
Our problems may come in different shapes and sizes but the solutions are the same
Embrace life and it will hug you back
Don't have a need to control
Allow the order of things to take place
Enjoy the peace, knowing someone bigger and stronger is in charge
Don't make too many schedules - you will go crazy
You can't fix everything

xo,
Carrie