Angry At Your Doctor Or Therapist

I see this time and time again and it breaks my heart.  While I realize there are some medical professionals that probably fail their patients, there are many patients who fail their medical professionals.  I'm not saying everyone is like that, but I've seen many situations where this is true.

Calling your doctor a nut or a stupid or making rude remarks at them is not going to help you or them get to a better situation.  If you hate the doctor or medical professional that much, maybe its time to find someone that you like.  Not all medical professionals match with patients because like anything in life, it is a relationship.  If the relationship doesn't work, the medical professional isn't going to be good for you.

One thing I've seen though is how people want to go into a doctor or therapist and expect them to do all the healing work for the person.  It is like, walk into their office and expect the doctor and therapist to magically make everything better.  If you view medical people in this way, you may want to rethink this approach.

Sometimes we only go part way...

They can only work with you to the extent that you are willing to work with them.  Too many people will only go part way or fail to do what is suggested after they leave the medical office.  It is like, great suggestion doc or therapist, but well, life got busy.  I forgot to do whatever it was you suggested that I do.  Please fix me though.  I may sound harsh to patients but it is sad when you see this.

Yes, I know that sometimes doctors and therapists don't work out either.  This is a discussion you need to have with your medical provider.  Be honest with them and let them be honest with you.  You're not going to get anywhere if you hate them and they are frustrated with you.

I went through Conversion Disorder and while I didn't have the internet to search and see what it was about, I learned that I had to trust my doctor in the beginning.  He wanted me to get better and he was applying his knowledge and training in the best way that he could.  In the very early days, I was not even aware of the actual diagnosis.  My doctor and I were more concerned about helping me get past the physical issues and enter life in the healthiest and most normal way that I could.

I learned to ask the right questions...

Some days it required me to have patience.  It often required that I learned to ask the questions that I needed to ask so that I understood what was going on.  It required me to not think that I knew it all, but open myself up to possibilities that may not be thoughts in my brain at that time.

Sometimes we are so busy fighting the doctor thinking we know it all, but we forget that we are in a physical situation that we cannot control.  This is why we have sought medical help and if we treat the medical professionals with contempt and in a rude way, how will this help us?

I feel for doctors and therapists because I have had the same thing happen to me in massage work.  I've had clients look at me like I was crazier than a looney nutcase!  Yet, I knew from experience that what I was trying to accomplish would work.  It would help.  If the patient fights you at every turn, there is only so much you can do.

Give up all that you know...

I have said this many times but in order to heal, you often have to give up all that you think you know and find out what it is that you don't know.  When we face physical situations, there is something that is missing and we can either fight against finding out what that is, or we can open our minds up to all possibilities.

The choice is for each person to make.  Some patients will gladly pursue the unknown possibilities and others will not.  At the end of the day, you can only hope that you have a qualified medical professional helping you and that your desire to want to get better is more than words.

This also requires the medical professionals to know when they are not making progress and either find a new course or bring in someone that maybe can help.  It requires medical professionals to step outside of their own paradigms because some effective form of healing may be just around the corner.

Find the right doctor or therapist for you...

At the end of the day, we all have to work together.  We need to form a good relationship between the patient and medical provider.  If that does not exist, then it is time to move on and find the right relationship that will help you heal.  It may also mean, changing your approach to the medical professional and surrendering to their assistance to follow their advice.

I don't write any of this out of malice because I know when you're in the middle of horrific, painful, and life-altering situations, there is no easy moment.  There is no moment that makes this clear.  I'm just asking you, the reader, to look at things differently.  See beyond what you see and know and feel to be true.  That's where you will find the answers!

You may want to check out a blog post I wrote last year on Challenge Your Healing Paradigm.

(click image to read)

Question Of The Day

Are you allowing yourself to see all possibilities in your own healing?  Leave a comment below to share your take on all of this or what you have learned.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2016 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Telling Others What To Do

All too often, the opinionated in our society feel that they have all the answers.  They think it is their job to tell others what to do.  I've seen it a million times, especially when it comes to life's challenges and mental health.  Often, the ones doing the telling have no clue what the individual is going through.

When I got out of the hospital after going through Conversion Disorder, there was no shortage of people telling me what I should do.  In fact, it just got to be a normal thing to endure.  One lady in particular told me that I didn't need those doctors.  All I needed was to pray.  Whatever your view of prayer is, I responded to her that day, "if you broke your arm, would you just pray about it or would you go find a doctor?"  Of course, she did not have much to say to that one.

Sometimes when you're going through rough moments and patches where it seems dark, the last thing you need is 50 million people telling you what to do.  Most of the time they do not even know the full circumstances of what you are experiencing, but it doesn't stop them from being the authority.  Sometimes their "quick fix" is more harmful than if they just let you be.  Sometimes you just need to wallow in the mud pit to cool off like a pig wallowing in mud.

None of us truly know what the other person is going through.  For us to be telling others what to do is really more about our own ego or being uncomfortable with the subject and issue in our life.

I remember one guy that got so upset with me one time.  Here he was beloved by all and always portrayed to the "organization followers" that he was some great person with love in his heart.  However, when I came around and was sharing briefly what I had been learning in life, he thought I was going to mention that gawd-awful subject, child sexual abuse.  I had not even planned on saying that, but he made me so uncomfortable with his bully attitude just because it was an issue had had not dealt with in his life.

When you send memes to people thinking that a sentence or two will solve all their problems, you're really not helping.  You are just pushing the individual deeper into the cave of their despair.  If they could see the way forward, they would be taking the steps.  Sometimes the meme is one of most dangerous bullets that people fire at one another on social media.

Telling others what to do is not really what people surviving trauma and despair really need.  They need an ear to listen to them.  They need to know someone is sitting close by just being there with them if they falter when taking a step.  Sometimes your presence without judgement is more valuable than any word you can utter.

Telling others what to do is a horrible way for humans to interact.  It is far more helpful to people if you can share an experience you've been through - IF THEY ARE READY FOR THAT.  Have compassion by keeping your beliefs and opinions to yourself and just being there for someone.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2016 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Masking The Healing

We all have times when we come up against physical situations that challenge us to the core of our being. It may be anything from hip pain, back pain to a rash, headache, allergies or any condition you can name. Sometimes these conditions are debilitating and leave us screaming beside the road of life.

The strange thing that we as a culture subscribe to is we just want to flee the pain. The pain or difficulty of the situation is more than we can take in our lives. While this is understandable, we are often misled by the treatment options available to us. We just look for any way possible to get rid of or mask the pain as if it is no longer present in our lives.

We actually go to great lengths in our lives to flee pain. Through visits to the doctor, test and procedures, surgeries and medications, we beg for someone to alleviate our pain, heal our symptoms and fix us. We beg for someone to give a name to the condition that we are experiencing so we'll be able to know without a doubt, just what it is we are dealing with.

As much as we try to convince ourselves that we have somehow helped our situation, we are not curing ourselves of the conditions we face. There is much profit and power derived from these pains and conditions and so the illusions are propagated throughout our culture and society. In fact, they have become the norm in every day life and anything outside of these advertised healing methods give the appearance that they will not help.

Even though we spend billions of dollars each year on health care and healing, diseases and suffering are still present. It almost seems that new medical conditions are showing up every time we turn around. No matter how much money we pump into the health care system or how much we spend on doctor visits, medications and procedures, we are not necessarily a healthier people.

A long time ago, our culture and many others found more natural ways to heal the body. If someone was sick, we were not pushing ourselves to continue our life without interruption. We knew how to take time and rest and relax so that our body could heal itself. Today, we take numerous meds convincing ourselves that we are somehow treating and curing our illness.

If these medications and medical procedures are really curing us, then why are these health situations still around? I am not convinced anyone could argue successfully that we are truly healing people from all these medical conditions.

While I am aware you can mask the pain, this is not healing. Most in our society do not believe these words. Even if they give lip service that they do, just take notice of where an individual turns when the pain gets rough. We cling to what the medical establishment and our families tell us, acting as if it is the only hope we have. We completely disregard that which is within us as we give away our power to someone else. We fail to see just how powerful a role that we play in healing our own lives.

It has been said that our cells have the genetic cod for replication of normal and healthy cells. yet, we see just the opposite of that. Of course, when stress and trauma are allowed to reside within the body, our normal cell functions are disrupted. The stored energy of past events alter how the cell replicates and functions. If we release the trauma, we unleash the cells and the body to function in the way they are intended. If we hide ourselves from the trauma and stress, they we alter our biology.

By introducing some outside agent to mask the condition in our body, we are not healing ourselves. We are simply putting a mask over our eyes in hopes we will not notice the pain. We are hoping the pain will disappear. In the short term, the pain may disappear. However, if you give it some time, it will find a way to show up again. The next time it comes knocking in life, it may be much more difficult than it was before.

As hard as it is to believe, healing does not come from outside sources. There may be individuals and procedures that helps us connect with healing within our bodies but they do not heal us. For true healing, either on our own or with the help of a safe person, we need to connect with the source of pain in our lives. When we connect with the source of pain, only then will we find the way back to health. We can mask this, avoid it, explain it and try to believe that these connections do not exist. Of course, in the end, we will most likely learn we are just fooling ourselves. To make these connections does offer ourselves so much more freedom than we can imagine.

*Read other articles on Mind Body Thoughts Blog

Pain, It Does A Body Good

Pain.. ahh yes, you might be saying. I've got pains here and there and in places I didn't even know could hurt. Then you might go on to tell me that you've been to the doctor and the doctor has all kinds of fancy names for your pain as well as medications to take to "rid" your body of the pain (also known as numbing the body from the pain).

But.. that's a loaded word and I would agree. Have you ever stopped to consider what's behind the pain? I mean, it is usually there for a reason. Sure we tend to know that but do we really know that that means. Come on be honest. Be totally 100% honest now.

You see, our bodies are made up of a lot of sensory nerves and tissue that brings information back to the brain. For the sake of an example, let's say you smash your thumb with a hammer. Now most of us realize that this hurts like everything and most of us would know that the pain information gets sent back to the brain and then the mouth usually goes "OUCH THAT HURT". In a simplistic way, that's how our body works. The pain is there to tell us something is wrong and it needs attention or correction pretty darn quickly.

Of course though, in our modern times, we're too busy or too preoccupied or have a zillion and one other reasons why we just want this pain to go away that invades our body. Some of it may be conscious and most likely a fair share of it is unconscious. That is, we really don't know why we have the pains we do. And while people may want to attach all kinds of reasons for what this pain or that pain means, it is much more deep than that.

So let's get back to the pain we feel and what's the first reaction we have: how do I make this pain go away. You reach for the meds or the aspirin and hope that it will make the pain disappear. If that doesn't work, you try and live with it hoping it will go away. And if all else fails, you make an appointment with a doctor to get some more meds and find a way to attach a cutesy little label to your condition. So now you've got it all taken care of right? Well as long as you take your meds and remember to tell everyone what cutesy name is attached to your condition.

What if there would be another way to deal with the pain. One that you might not have thought about before. And yet, it is one that is built in to our biological systems we call our body. What is this other way, you ask? It's all about going into the pain and letting your body feel it. But not just feeling the pain and stopping there. Letting it go all the way through until you've reached the dark side so to speak. When you can allow yourself to push through any fears that may arise and go into the pain, you will have much greater awareness of yourself and your body, thereby giving you the opportunity of making new choices to free yourself from the pain. I'm not saying this is easy for most people to do but with a little training and support, this is not some pie in the sky concept. It is a very viable way to give freedom to yourself.

You know, there are times when medications and doctors and surgeries are necessary. I'm not saying that it is all one way or the other. What I am trying to say is that all too often, we as a society tend to focus on masking the pain instead of truly going in and freeing ourselves from the pain. It is a choice that we make every day we are alive. While we may not fully understand how this process can unfold, we do make a conscious choice of what information we allow into our lives and what we allow ourselves to experience.

So the next time you have pains or you feel sick or whatever is going on, try to take a moment and see what's behind the pain. Maybe it is something in your current situation that if you made a change, the pain would go away. Sometimes just stopping and listening to our bodies can be one of the best gifts that we could ever give ourselves. It is in that moment, that we allow ourselves to become so much more unified and have greater awareness. The more awareness we have, the more information we can access to make much more informed decisions about our lives.

What are the possibilities?