“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul, and sings the tunes without words, and never stops at all”, Emily Dickinson
I have been reading the several contrary views on the issue of gratitude, that is, should a person feel gratitude for what is good in one’s life or does that turn into complacency? If I express gratitude for having an adequate income, for example, does that preclude me from understanding that being financially stable is everyone’s right and should be fought for just as the ‘occupiers’ are doing? So, in the list of my gratitudes I do not express gratitude that I have a home, supportive spouse and enough money to seek help while living with fibromyalgia. Instead I feel pain that fellow suffers are not given those same privileges. Yet, many researchers suggest that when one feels gratitude hope and a sense of well being should accompany that emotion. Still, I feel uncomfortable saying I am gratitude for what every human being should have access to…good medical care, healthy food, housing, clean water, and an income that sustains comfortable living. But, I do feel hopeful that the big 3 of fibromyalgia treatment: meditation, light exercise/movement and diet will change many people’s lives, so for that I am indeed grateful. Recognizing the past traumas that have led to our condition and finding ways to change our brain pathways and calm our overstimulated nervous system is part of this process that leads to hope for a better life.
I am not sure that I know all that hope encompasses…I do know that as I grow older the issues that we people with fibromyalgia deal with seem to have become more complex and I can easily begin to feel hopeless if I am not careful. So, I do feel hope as I approach a new year. The fMRI brain research has shown the impact meditation and light exercise have had on those with many conditions like chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia. Brain imaging has become the most impressive way to determine how change can be brought about as we deal with pain and the brain. If we lose hope we will continue to try medication after medication, go from one health care professional to another and not realize that we are the person we have been looking for and that with diligence and discipline we can take charge of our own lives (and with very little expense!).
Here is hoping that 2012 is a better year for those of us with fibromyalgia! Move and meditate!
Hello Barbara and a belated Happy New Year to you!
“…I feel uncomfortable saying I am grateful for what every human being should have access to…good medical care, healthy food, housing, clean water, and an income that sustains comfortable living…”
It sounds like a double-edged sword, doesn’t it? Glad to have it, slightly embarrassed to have it if others don’t. It’s like what psychologists call “survivor guilt” following a devastating natural disaster, plane crash or fire.
After my heart attack, I too felt guilty, but not about having survived what many do not. I felt that I SHOULD be very happy and grateful and relieved to have survived (which I was, on some level) but I also felt very anxious and guilty that I wasn’t somehow happy ENOUGH. In fact, I now know that I was suffering at the time from a deeply profound depression (Mayo Clinic cardiologists estimate that up to 65% of women heart patients are depressed, yet fewer than 10% are appropriately identified).
Dr. Stephen Parker, a cardiac psychologist from Alaska and more importantly, a heart attack survivor himself, writes that a heart attack is a “deeply wounding event”, adding:
““I think the depression and anxiety following a heart attack are a bit different than the depression and anxiety that most therapists encounter, and both are going to be more resistant to treat because there are damn good reasons to feel anxious and depressed.”
Sorry to get sidetracked onto heart disease, but I believe that this reality may also be true for all chronic diagnoses, as we come to grips with the reality that life as we have known it all our lives is now over. Welcome to the ‘new normal’, as we say.
And hope changes over time. We used to see this when I worked in hospice palliative care, where all patients start off with a hope that the diagnosis might be wrong (hey! it could happen!) and then progress to the hope for a cure with this new drug/procedure/treatment/intervention, then to the hope that symptoms can be adequately managed to prevent suffering, to the hope that I will not become a burden to my loved ones during this difficult time, to the hope that my family will be okay after I’m gone, to the hope that death will be easy and peaceful.
On a good day with fewer ongoing cardiac symptoms than yesterday, my hopes tend to shrink – to cover small moments of joy, to a walk in the fresh air, to a lovely visit with friends, to finishing a blog article I’m writing or the last chapter of a good book I’m reading, to a nice nap snuggled warmly on the couch, to dinner with my family, to surviving one more night.
Best wishes to you, dear Barbara. “Move and meditate!” Love that….
cheers,
C.
Thank you, dear Carolyn. Your comments are always welcome and I look forward to them!
We share many responses to our conditions as they are chronic and we certainly feel losses the same way. Some good days and some bad days. I hope you are having a good today!
Barbara
Thank you for sharing your info.Excellent work!
Thank you for the nice compliment!Barbara