I knew on Wednesday, that although I may not have been firing on all cylinders, that my immune system was. Instantly I started a boosted course of cold and flu tablets to ward off the dreaded lurgy. Even when we are on a path of wellness, there are times when we stumble.
Have you ever noticed that when you are not paying proper attention to the most important things that other things in your life start going wrong? It was like that today, just small things and enough for me to pay attention. In the past, my stubbornness would kick in and I would persevere - squashing down the fatigue, swashbuckling the aches and pains away and forcing myself with false resolution to get through it until I had achieved whatever I felt I needed to achieve.
A sign of living with an attitude of wellness is how we deal with the times when we are not well. When my immune system is being bombarded, I am an increased and significant risk of also having to deal with a flare up or relapse in my Multiple Sclerosis. Research suggest that infections are the cause of about one-third of all flares of MS symptoms. From talking to others with similar invisible illnesses and auto-immune diseases like MS, this seems to be a similar trend. Over the years, it also seems that around this time of year, I am more likely to have a relapse than at other times in the year Sometimes I wonder, if my body has memory of the significant trauma when MS decided to present itself in my life in a dramatic fashion eleven years ago.
It is always a conundrum - whether to surrender to being unwell, or to push through with stubbornness. In many respects that conundrum is even more pronounced now that I am flying solo. If I am not working, there is no income to pay the bills ... a stressful situation. If I choose to continue working there is always the lurking fear of knowing that I am putting my health at risk. If I don't take care of myself, I am putting myself at greater health risk that can potentially result in permanent disability. If I choose to look after myself, there is the underlying fear of not being able to pay my weekly or monthly bills and the stress of letting down customers and not meeting commitments. As a workaholic, it is difficult for me to let go off the work commitments, so when I choose to do that (as I did), and to forego my commitments to this blog and other aspects of my life, I do have to give myself some credit for my courage to look after myself and be resolute in not stressing about the things that are not getting done while I do so.
In the final chapter of the book "When the Body Says No : the cost of hidden stress", Gabor Mate discusses the 7 A's of healing. These are :
Acceptance : Acceptance implies a compassionate relationship with oneself. It is the willingness to recognise how this are. It is the courage to permit negative thinking to inform our understanding, without allowing it to define our approach to the future.
Awareness : Awareness involves reclaiming our capacity for emotional intelligence by paying constant attention to our internal states and learning to trust those internal perceptions. We can learn to read the symptoms not only as problems to be overcome but as messages to be heeded.
Anger : The repression of anger and the unregulated acting out of anger are both examples of abnormal release of emotions that is at the root of disease. However it is critical to be able to express healthy anger. The difference between the healthy energy of anger and the hurtful energy of emotional or physical violence is that anger respects boundaries. Healthy anger is the natural response to give us the energy to stand forward on our own behalf and say "I matter".
Autonomy : Illness tells a history. It is the culmination of a lifelong history of struggle for self. People suffer when their boundaries are blurred. Since the immune confusion that leads to disease reflects a failure to distinguish self from non-self, healing has to involve establishing boundaries of an autonomous self.
Attachment : Attachment is our connection with the world. Connection is vital to healing. Healing both required and implies regaining the vulnerability that made us shut down emotionally in the first place.
Assertion : Assertion is the declaration to ourselves and to the world that "we are" and that "we are who we are". Assertion demands neither acting nor reacting. It is being, irrespective of action. It is the positive valuation of ourselves and challenges the core belief that we must somehow justify our existence.
Affirmation : When we make a positive statement, we move toward something of value. There are two basic values that assist us to heal if we honour them. The first is our own creative self, and to honour our creative urges. The second is our affirmation that each of us are connected with all that is. Health rests on three pillars - the body, the psyche and the spiritual connection. Sometimes that means not just looking in the easy places that are convenient, but my challenging our inner most ingrained patterns of thinking and feeling and behaving.
Flying Solo Tip 041365 : Healing involves re-establishing our boundaries of self mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually.