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Introduction
Before
I became sick, I worked as a producer of films and
videos. I was able to set my own agenda ... to hire
crews, manage budgets and set time tables to meet
the demands of my projects and the needs of my clients.
If you had asked me then, I would have said that
"I was in control of my life."
Towards the end of an intense two-year project,
I was gifted with an illness. An illness that became
an invaluable teacher, who invited me to integrate
myself into a larger picture of life. To be a part
of something bigger than my "to do" list.
It has taught me to feel at peace with wherever
I am in this process of living; even if I am dying.
It felt as if I had been thrown into the fury of
a storm, navigating rough waters ... waters that
I didn't control. And in my giving up control, I
have found control. I have learned to slow down
and walk with nature ... to recognize the
small signs of how healing works and what my role
is in this process.
I have learned that within each level of healing,
it has presented itself as a cycle. Like the seasons
... the sunrise and sunset. It's a balance of light
and dark. I've had to learn the timing of healing;
when to accept things and lie still ... and when
to get up and try again.
Lying
Still: Relapses
After
surgery, the pain was so intense and my life had
been thrown into such turmoil that I desperately
wanted to hurry along the process of healing. I
wanted this all to be over. Like an animal caught
in a steel trap, I wanted a way out. I now understood
why animals in traps had been known to chew off
their leg, just to get away.
I hated living in this body ... I wanted to feel
"normal" again, even for a minute ...
but I didn't know how to escape ... there was no
obvious trap causing my pain, no limb to chew off.
All I had was drugs or sleep, if I was lucky.
In the early stages, I had had several relapses
occurring on a monthly basis, each more serious
than the one before it. Relapse number 4, returned
me to bed for more than a year and somewhere around
number 16, I found myself in the ambulance, dying.
Destitute and feeling very alone, I had no way of
knowing that healing was actually happening. Things
just didn't seem like they were progressing at all.
At the time, I didn't know that there was another
plan for me ... it was like a shellfish shedding
its outer skeleton to move into a larger home, healing
was working underneath my experience with pain.
I just couldn't understand it, yet.
At first, the physical repercussions of each relapse
were hard enough, but the toll they took on me emotionally
were devastating; it was like facing a huge wave
in the ocean ... looking up as it starts to break
over on top of me ... while petrified, I stood waiting
to be crushed by its force and weight.
In particular, those moments of waking up in the
morning and realizing that it's dawn seemed more
than I could bare. The light would slowly fill my
bedroom and I'd think that there is a full day ahead
... and I'm trapped in this body, wracked with pain
again. As I moved from sleep into consciousness,
I'd have a horrible realization and wonder, "How
am I going to face this day? Oh God, please, how
do I get through another day?"
I'd feel torn apart. I'd lose my will power, my
sense of hope, my whole being was smothered in fear
and desperation. It was like a house of cards, collapsing
in on itself. My thoughts were like dark arrows
shooting towards me and they would go something
like this: "My body will be like this forever.
I will never get well again. There is no future
for me. I will be abandoned and die alone. This
is too hard for me to overcome again. But, yesterday
was better ... what happened to today? What did
I do to cause this relapse? What will happen to
me?"
Then, one day, during a relapse, I was crying when
my husband came into the room ... I hated to give
into fear and sadness, but I couldn't keep it in
any longer. I told him that I wasn't making any
progress and he was silent for a moment, then he
turned to me and gently said, "Yes you are
... think back to where you were a year ago".
A year ago? Let's see ... the same family gathering
was coming around again ... and he was right. Last
year, I couldn't even get out of bed to go and he
had to go alone. The year before, I was too sick
for him to leave me. But, this year ... I can at
least get out of bed, get dressed, walk out the
front door with him to the car and THEN turn around
and go back to bed!
He showed me that I'd been measuring my progress
in too short a time span and expecting too much,
too soon. I had to step back and see the bigger
picture.
The miracle of healing was happening in spite of
my perceptions of it. And in thinking back about
earlier times, I suddenly realized that I had had
several relapses and yet where I was that day was
noticeably stronger than where I was the year before.
Wisdom
of Relapses
For
me, relapses mean that I have exerted myself beyond
my energy reserves and my body, in her wisdom, is
telling me I need to back off life for a while and
allow her to regain some ground. It's like she's
climbing a mountain and sometimes, she has to back
down the slope so she can get a running start at
climbing it once again.
My
early expectation of healing was that it happened
in a straight line on the chart: like on the X-Y
axis in math class, starting in the bottom left
corner and shooting up to the top right corner.
Instead, it's happened in cycles with relapses as
a PART of healing. It's more like looking at the
stock market over time. There are peaks and valleys,
dips and plateaus, but over its lifetime, it has
steadily edged upwards.
Each low point is a necessary part of my learning
how to BE well - not just get well, but how to grow
into my new skin, my new identity. A part of that
is learning how to be kinder to myself ... how to
enjoy life as it is and not continue forcing myself
into what I've been told a "good life"
should look like. How to let things that no longer
serve my greater good, fall away and be OK with
that. And sometimes, that's some people who have
not been where I've been and they just don't understand
pain and healing.
Relapses
offer me the challenge of learning to move into
the wave I am facing; to ride it no matter where
it takes me, instead of opposing it. I am learning
to put my worrying mind aside and trust this process
... I have no choice, since I don't control this
power anyway. This is when I learn to lie still.
I have learned that relapses will automatically
paint my world darker than it is. It's like looking
through dark-tinted glasses where things look depressing,
but I am learning to have a sense of mastery over
this.
I now see the fear that accompanies my relapses,
like a dragon made of smoke. It looks really big
and scary, but I've learned over time, that it isn't
real. I get rid of the dragon by acknowledging that
it's here again. I ask it what it has come to tell
me ... (usually, it's scary, depressing thoughts!)
I thank it for coming and for delivering its message
to me and then I dismiss the dragon. I not only
tell it to leave me, but I do it with as much respect
and kindness as I can.
Once the dragon is gone, I immediately focus my
mind on a positive statement that takes back my
power. Then I look for the new lesson I am being
offered. Each lesson, seems geared to return me
closer to my true self. And because the truer me
feels like a stronger place to live my life from,
I've learned that it's better to "remain calm
in the chaos" and that relapses aren't bad.
Relapses have taught me to be patient. They have
taught me that my body knows exactly what she's
doing and I just need to manage her care, present
her to healers as they are needed, pray and stay
out of her way.
Timelines from Others
It's
really important to me that I KEEP my power in this
process. I don't give it up to anyone outside of
myself.
As a part of that, I've learned not to ask doctors
"How long before I'm better?" Since healing
is a power that no one really controls, how can
any physician really know that answer? More importantly,
by believing in a time limit that someone else outlined
for me, I just gave my power away to that belief
and I am now hanging all my hopes on that magic
date.
I remember when healing didn't occur when they said
it would, I had to face the agony of waking up that
morning ... and not only was the pain still with
me, but now I was struggling with feeling like a
failure that I didn't heal on schedule. I didn't
"make it" and what does that mean now?
It was a gentle touch from one of my physicians, two years after my surgery
who allowed me to cry as she sat beside me and rested her hand on my shoulder.
She said that it was OK to be right where I was at this moment. This was
what healing looks like. It cycles ... and, it takes time.
Plateauing
From time to time, I would just get well enough
so that I could stop and "plateau" for
a while. I'd just get tired of working on getting
well and I found that I would heal just enough to
tolerate the pain and maybe reclaim some basic daily
functions ... and then I would stay there for months.
Once for almost a year.
To me, this is just as important as the "dips"
in healing cycles. Even though friends and family
may have other expectations of me ... sometimes,
I need to back away from dealing with this in an
active way. Healing had become a full time job and
I needed a vacation from it's demands. So, I'd stabilize
for a while and plateau.
Recently I was talking with a friend who is dealing
with intense, chronic pain. She has been angry and
feeling abandoned by traditional medicine that hasn't
worked for her for over nine years. She's afraid
that so much time has passed since her surgery with
no relief that it may be too late now. I looked
at her and said, "That doesn't matter ... you've
just been on a plateau. And when you're ready to
get back to work on healing, it's OK. The amount
of time that has passed, has passed. Just start
with wherever your body is today ... start again,
right here and right now. It's OK."
Getting
Up and Trying Again
After a while, I would regain the energy to go back
to work on myself. "Getting up and trying again"
may trigger a relapse, but without approaching the
things that I used to do, it's hard for me to gage
how well I'm healing. So, I have to try ... even
if it brings on another relapse, even if it upsets
my friends and family. I have to try.
In the course of this, I would revisit healing modalities
that had made even a small headway in the past.
I'd ask for guidance to find new healing modalities
... and then I'd watch for what revealed itself
to me.
Sometimes it was in a conversation with a friend,
sometimes I'd see something in a flyer at the doctor's
office, or hear something on the radio. Everything
was open to me and I learned to become open to learning
more about anything that had helped anyone crawl
out of the hole of pain.
It became important for me to revisit things I might
have written off as ineffective in the past. I used
to dismiss whole healing professions because I'd
try it and think, "Well, that didn't work".
Then one day, my pain physician used a Electrical
Stimulation unit (like a TENS unit), to precisely
locate where to deliver each injection. I was amazed
that it worked more efficiently than I expected.
So, I came home and pulled out my TENS unit that
I had tucked away and to my surprise, it helped!
I started revisiting other tools given to me. I'd
try a medication I found earlier, or pain patches,
or anything that I had set aside ... and most of
to time, they were more effective the second time
around.
I realized that the success or failure of each healing
modality is dependent on the set of circumstances
in play at the time they are used. Things change,
I learned to try them again, to keep my mind open.
It's a process I call "wiggling my grounded
boat off the sandbar." I keep moving one way
and then another until it dislodges and sets itself
free.
Closing Thoughts to Date
I no longer try to put healing into a time frame.
The truth for me, is that there is no time limit
on healing. Healing will take as long as it takes.
Wherever I am today, is just where I am for
today.
If am doing the best that I can at any moment ...
and that may be barely breathing while lying in
bed ... then that's all I can do ... and it's the
perfect thing to do. That's where I am today. I
don't know about tomorrow, yet.
As I look back and see where I am now and more importantly,
who I've become today, I am very grateful that I
was not allowed to navigate these raging waters
too quickly. I am grateful that I have had to face
them, one rapid at a time. I am grateful that I
am learning when to accept things and lie still
... and when to get up and try again.
© Sterling, 2007
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Introduction