Need solutions for the medication, medical appliances and/or medical travel that you can't afford? READ EMPOWER Yourself.
A Health Information Management professional, I survived a life-threatening emergency with information that only a person of my professional experience would know. And I’m sharing it!
Showing posts with label chronic illness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chronic illness. Show all posts
B'SD I explain the title of It’s MY Crisis and I’ll Cry if I Need to: EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge in the preface: "One of the worst reactions people had to my news was
saying with a sense of fatalism and religious superiority over me, "You
shouldn't cry. GOD only gives people the challenges they can face." I disagree. Many a good person
has experienced a psychological or medical problem, and suffered terribly or
not survived it. Some medical and emotional challenges destroy no matter how
valiantly we fight to survive them. Other crises can be survived. It isn't fair
to lump them all in one "You can do it!" category. It blames the
patient, who is suffering already. No one on this planet is authorized to pass
judgment on another person's trials and tribulations. That's GOD's job."
Other selections in the book deal with the senses of trauma, of powerlessness. of emasculation, and more, which hit many normal people who are ill. When I coach people facing their illnesses, struggling to construct a plan for coping with the package, I long to find other models of how to gain healthy perspective about difficult situations. This paragraph from an online essay captures what I want perfectly: "I can’t believe I get to do this work. It keeps me focused not on how low and lonely a person can be when things seem dark and stormy, but how high you can soar if you let God lift you up. I have no shame that I doubted God’s plan, and I no longer wonder if feeling angry and questioning God meant I didn’t really trust Him. I know now that in reality, my personal dialogue with God removed the distance and the interruptions I experienced in our relationship. Dislodging those thoughts brought me closer to Him." Read the whole story at
Shattered and made whole. Learning to trust God with everything.
Buy the E-book or print edition ofEMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Learn of coping strategies to help you past rude people (including relatives!), financial problems, travel issues and much more. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your thoughts with focus and constructive perspective.
B'SD 28 Menachem Av, 5775 I hope that you'll find the scenario below worth waiting for. My week has been busy helping friends, working, and wearying under excessively high heat. I've needed lots of rest between errands. I experienced an insight that you might appreciate. I was caring for a friends' child as she met some conflicting schedule demands right after she'd moved to a new home. Boxes and bags of miscellaneous items were strewn across the floors, in easy reach of a curious two-year-old. Here's how things went:
Wednesday was Make a MESS Day as he proceeded to demonstrate that he can open anypkak aka bottle cap, including the ones on his bottle of formula plus his water bottle. He doused the contents everywhere before deftly reclosing the opened containers. We had a war of sorts as he protested my removal of his soaked clothing. Baby formula is so sticky that Doda Yochi (me, Aunt Yocheved) wanted to replace soaked clothing with fresh clean items after washing him clean.
Name the little boy who wants a bath. Get the picture?
We returned to the scene of the crime, boxes and bags galore outside the bathroom.
I tidied up the kitchen and realized that the baby was quiet. Too quiet. I turned around and found him headfirst inside a box. I peered inside.
His mood worsened when I took away the jar of liquid soap that he wanted to drink from!
It was purple.
It was shiny.
It made bubbles. And the cap had popped off just as I peeked in to see what was going on in there.
But I wiped the pretty goo off his lips and took away the bottle.
Same story on the tanning lotion, the skin softener, and each container of whatever liquid item the child could find. I was stacking boxes in a pile and dangerous contents on a table, out of childish reach.
Poor guy, he could not reason with me! Cute smiles, whimpers, even verbal requests for "Pkak, pkak. pkak!!!" made no difference. He could not reason with me, tease me nor con me out of my "No dangerous contents for you, fella" attitude. Even a hug and a kiss on my knees made no difference. I was one obstinate child minder. But, no matter. Lunchtime proved that we shared love. He fed me mashed hard boiled egg with minced cucumber and tomatoes during his meal. He ate a spoonful that I gave to him, then he dipped his hand in the bowl to smear the remaining contents on his palm. He fed me with his fingers, throughout the meal. He ate, I licked his hand, he ate, I kissed his fingers, and so it went. After each swallow I made he exclaimed "Did it!" He was so proud of me that he clapped with joy.
On Thursday we switched to "Aerobics Day!" He was determined to learn to climb the indoor staircase as his parents do - "Abba this. Ima!" ("Daddy does it, Mommy too") was the goal. So, I held him around his chest and prevented falls as we climbed up and down the stairs for over an hour. We took a break for snacks, and I washed his face and hands afterward despite the gratuitous grumbles that he offered. Then I set him on the floor. He pushed his hi-chair back, headed for the staircase and climbed 5 steps alone, unassisted. As if to demonstrate his prowess, he played with me on the colorful foam mat festooned with cartoon characters, imitating my push-ups and leg lifts as only a two-year old can; He fell on his tummy and giggled.
Anyway, the incident seems to present an example of how my protectiveness prevented falls, poisonings, and major messes, though the baby has no idea what motivates me to behave as I do. He grumbles on occasion, but loves me despite the hardships. He realizes that I keep him safe, fed, clothed, clean (albeit begrudgingly so) and very loved.
Think about it. That's how we go through life, wondering "What the heck?" when GOD intervenes in our lives. We have no clue as to what's behind the scenes aka on Her/His mind, to prevent damage to our souls or bodies. Somehow, we work past the problems we accuse GOD of causing to us (or not), then realize that we LUV Him/Her anyway as it dawns on us that somehow we were saved from a disaster we're not too sure about nor understand in retrospect.
Loving parents, grandparents and guardians, I'm sure that you can relate to the story above, and see yourselves in relationship to GOD with it. We're in GOD's role, so to speak, when it comes to child-minding. And that clues us in to our role as children of our Creator. Somehow it happens that though we pursue some goal or other, it seems that, at times, there is a conspiracy to prevent us from achieving it.
Illness, disability, the loss of loved ones, inner and outer pain, name the challenges. They hurt in agonizing ways. We have preferences not being met. And yet. And yet... Some things in life are so wonderful, reliable, and soothing. We can put life into perspective, focus on the richness, see the blessings despite the agonies, and go forward. Even if we need time to catch our breath or to rebuild our strength first, we can redirect our thoughts and perceptions in a pleasant, productive way.
What are your thoughts about that?
Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism.
Fill your heart with wonder. Work on the project if necessary. It can sweeten your life.
B'SD 21 Cheshvan, 5775 Sorry for my silence this week - I've spent lots of time connecting with interesting people and medical resources, plus traveling by train about the country. I've also invested time in learning some hi-tech techniques that I hope to use in the near future. But let's focus on you, again. One of the maddening, and terrifying, realities of medical treatment is that you, the patient, are left wondering why this doctor-recommended treatment or that would work, as if a One-Size-Fits-All solution is reliable.
The truth is, life does not have One-Size-Fits-All medical solutions.
Humanity comes with different genetic backgrounds and related medical realities. Some treatments will work, others not, with given populations. We're also different from each other because of what we do or do not eat, breathe and drink. Medical treatment is affected by that, too. There's more to the story, but I have a soothing resource to share with you. It was created by a man I know well and once worked with. And it solves the One-Size-Fits-All non-reality. It's called Adjuvant Medical Solutions. Doctors are awed by its effectiveness in fostering tailor-made medical treatments to people with cancer and other chronic diseases. Explore the site. Consider if it can help you, too.
And yes, it's featured in the Global Resources section of
Explore the healing possibilities.
Buy the E-book or print edition of EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism. Find the resources you or someone you love needs.
B'SD 19 Tamuz, 5773 Sometimes you wonder if you're ill, inconvenienced or vulnerable, and seriously in need of medical solutions - but that rich, famous and powerful people are not. The truth is, we're all fragile humans. Take a look at the reality with
Sigh if you need to, and stop punishing yourself with your mind.
Take life, including your diagnosis, emotions and more, one step at a time.
Ready to feel better? Read EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge today.. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism. Face reality. It's not just you who needs a medical miracle.
B'SD 17 Adar, 5773 Whew, I've been busy advocating for and otherwise assisting some people in very serious medical distress. I'm a bit tired from the efforts. The toughest cases are the people who did not heed the good medical advice they received before contacting me, plus people who've read EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge but failed to learn from it. You know the joke about "If you can't figure out how to assemble that whatever-it-is on your third or fourth try, then read the directions"? Some folks laugh, then forget the life lesson involved. It happens to all of us. If we're lucky, we eventually realize our error, slap our foreheads and exclaim "Hey, I knew that! OK, now I'll... (fill in the blank as necessary)." Care to share a life lesson with the wider world? Make a comment below this blogpost. Let me know:
Why you don't (or didn't) feel better despite having learned what to do to minimize or to prevent your problem.
How are you repairing the problem now?
If you took action some time ago, what did you to minimize or to end the problem?
What advice or insight would you like to share with readers of this blog?
What was the funniest part of your medical healing adventure?
No need to humiliate yourself publicly: All I ask is that you share a lighthearted look at how life can be lived much more easily with a bit of good sense ;^ D Buy the E-book or print edition today for a solid sense of direction for feeling and doing better! Click on the words EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge.
Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity.
Face Your Future with Optimism. Read the directions your medical professionals gave to you. And keep re-reading EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge! Both of them can dramatically reduce your emotional, physical and financial suffering.
B'SD 25 Tishrei, 5773 Sorry I haven't blogged much, lately. I'm preparing to relaunch the Refua Radio Show (Refua means "healing" in Hebrew), and it is one detail-oriented project!
I spent today having fun, meeting with fans of
and learned how the book helps readers with cancer, diabetes, fibromyalgia, brain tumors - and much more - in unexpected ways, as they dined on delicious food and spoke of the emotional and health challenges of holidays plus life in general. Here's a partial photo of some of who attended the event (see my other Facebook page for details!):
I'm in the orange sundress, holding one of the prayer booklets (tehilim mekhulak) the group used to ask The One Above for the healing and improved coping skills of ill people worldwide.
Buy the E-book or print edition today for a brighter holiday season: Click on the words EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity. Face Your Future with Optimism.
B'SD 6 Elul, 5772 Of the hardest challenges of illness and/or disabilities is to deal with a sense of disappointment. It feels like a growing pit in your stomach or high blood pressure and sadness. There are ways to override your sense of negativity.
One of the BIG, effective "Developing coping skills" suggestions in EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge is to develop a sense of gratitude for what IS going comfortably, "right" and easily in your medical or disability life.
My visual acuity literally changes each time I blink. Yes, I see differently with every wave of my eyelashes. That complicates things a bit. So I'm going to (alphabetically) model to you how I focus on what's going "right" in my life. I'm grateful for:
Books
Fresh air
Friends
Good food filled with nutrition and flavors I enjoy
Knowing that my vision is improving over time (the evidence is in the "Blink of my eyes" phenom)
Music
My garden of flowers and veggies
PAID bills (in today's wobbling global economy that's a BIG blessing)
Social time with people I value
Spiritual insights
That I can communicate in writing (that takes me a while but thank GOD I can persevere)
That I can do favors for other people
That people appreciate my input in their healing efforts
The ability to laugh
I'm grateful for far more but you don't have all day to read about it ;^ D
Start listing the stuff that makes you smile. Consider what else goes well in your life and helps you along. Sometimes we mortals overlook those realities. LIST THEM in some sort of journal each day. When you're feeling down and defeated, those reminders can make a mighty big difference in your life. Don't believe me? Listen to this shrink explain The Secret to Better (and BEYOND Average)...
Change the lens through which you view your realities. Start your weekend getting your grin back. Click on the title to buy the E-book or print edition to EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge today. And let me know how the book helps you. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity. Face Your Future with Optimism.
B'SD 2 Elul, 5772 One of those most difficult things about facing a medical or disability challenge is the utter humorlessness of the situation: anger, fear, frustration, embarrassment, hard work, PAIN, just name the complication!
But there are ways to deal with all that
so that you do not fall apart.
Sounds preachy and goody-goody silly, right?
Oscar Wilde taught an important lesson: "If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh. Otherwise, they'll kill you." Suppose a former English major who actually studied Oscar Wilde had considered his advice when writing
Yes, I'm that writer. Here's an outtake of some of the humor in the book, about how to change the way you did things before your diagnosis and after learning it: Organization Doctors appointments, insurance papers, calls to make, child care issues, nosy neighbors, relatives who just don’t "Get it," have you seen the baby, meals to prepare, pills and potions to swallow or shots to inject, omigawd we need a really BIG bank account, where are my keys, did anyone see the remote and why is the dog making noise like that? Ever feel as if your inner PC and its memory banks just went and shut down on you? Read on and find some solutions to the problem. Many people facing medical crises have so much to remember that their inner filing cabinets overflow. They reach a point where they wonder if they’re losing their minds! Know the feeling? You forget almost everything? Even how old you are? As you read earlier, I experienced no less than five benign brain tumors and their surgical removal. A human head does not have much space for tolerating all that intrusion and banging around upon soft brains. People who’ve experienced brain injury often suffer memory problems. So can anyone facing any type medical crisis. Stress hurts. And medical intervention messes up the insides of your body even more! I lost some memorization ability after my treatments. I benefited from a rehabilitation program for the brain injured. Students of every age in my program learned many tips for vastly improving our memory power. Here are a few tips I'll share with you: Keep a reasonably sized notebook or day-planner with you all the time. Record upcoming: appointments, social events, PTA meetings and other important scheduled stuff as soon as you commit to it or even hear of it. Keep repeating a person's name in the conversation as normally as possible when you first meet. Collect business cards when offered to you. On the back, make notes of where you met and what they look like, your 1st impressions of the person, anything remarkable they said, e.g., Redhead, skinny, laughs a lot. Met at Joe's celebration dinner Put your stuff away in the same place all the time. NO LAZY SHORTCUTS! Shoes and clothes go in closets, not in chairs, the wrong room or atop doors. Kitchenware gets washed, dried and immediately put away. When you're cooking, ALWAYS use a timer to alert you to shut off the heat. Me, I keep my keys in the front door once I lock it from inside. I wear them on a cloth strap, a key strip around my neck, when I leave home. I never lose keys anymore. Ever seen the funky new chains for holding your glasses around your neck? Use the one of your affordable choice. No need to feel like a moth-eaten relic. The new styles are super-trendy. And you won't lose your glasses. Using the above techniques jogs the memory cells. Watch. You'll end up teaching folks who never had tumors, brain injuries or any sort of medical stress how improve THEIR memories! The human body is full of quirky surprises. Some of them are quite interesting and not life-threatening. Follow the suggestions above and good advice from your therapists and medical team. Not every forgotten thought is a danger sign. Now, on to some techniques for straightening out that mother lode of medical and insurance paperwork… As you make your way through your medical crisis or that of your loved one, the pile of papers with important phone numbers, addresses and other information will grow. If you fail to organize it, the mess can make a wreck of your get-well efforts. If you're the sort of person who hasn't yet succeeded at organizing your life, I offer sweet solace with simple advice: “Habit is habit, and not to be flung out the window but coaxed downstairs one step at a time.” – Mark Twain... So much for that (I hope you giggled or at least smiled a bit as you read the above) ;^ D
Buy the E-book or print edition today for a brighter future. Click on the words EMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge. Face Your Medical Problems with Dignity. Face Your Future with Optimism.
Creation Calls is one such outlet. I hope it helps you past an unhappy moment or two.
I sympathize with your tears and heavy hearts over medical problems. And I know what you can tell to critics who insult your honest emotions: "A medical crisis - you'd cry too, if it happened to you."
Use your tissues and handkerchiefs with my blessings borne of experience. GOD gives you Permission to Weep. You can say that to any critics after explaining, "It's MY Crisis! And I'll Cry if I Need To. GOD said I could. Read page 5 of the book. See?"
Today's the anniversary of Moses' birthday and death. You just know I had something special coming up for the occasion ;^ D
Consider what a captive Jewish child - taken from mommy, raised in the palace of an oligarch dedicated to enslaving, then wiping out the nascent Jewish people, and a stutterer - could accomplish against BIG odds.
Watch this and take on your world!
Go ahead, think of the possibilities and see what it does for you. BE the Possible YOU!
I have much to share with you, today. First is this lovely message from the administrator for the Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel (AACI) Netanya location where I interacted with audience members this past Sunday. She responds to my thank you remarks for letting me appear on her stage with the words:
On Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 10:25 AM, Rachel Rubin Hirsch of Netanyaaaci.org.il wrote:
Thank you- it us who should be giving you the thanks.
We really appreciate you making the effort to come through and talk to us.
I will pass your details on to our Jerusalem and Tel Aviv offices – your talk is excellent and I hope they will get back to you and arrange a program with you.
Not all of us are this humorous, dignified or courageous about illness. Some of us simply weep. That's normal, at times. AsEMPOWER Yourself to Cope with a Medical Challenge and I teach our readers, "A medical crisis - you'd cry too, if it happened to you. Use your tissues and handkerchiefs with my blessings borne of experience. GOD gives you Permission to Weep. And you can say that to any critics after explaining that "It's MY Crisis! And I'll Cry if I Need To."
Whew! I'm having a busy week, let alone a busy month. Tonight I'll be moderating a "Meet the Authors" evening. It's designed to give that much-needed break to new writers.
Tomorrow night I head up not one but TWO community-oriented discussions about cultural needs in my town. I'll be part of a round-robin of conversations dedicated to raising the quality of life in my local and greater neighborhood.
I'm booking ever-more engagements to speak about
on the radio, in libraries and elsewhere.
My daily activities continue as I write feature stories, prepare book reviews and tend the garden (peas are growing fast, as are my flowering vines, turmeric, marigolds (in three different colors!), beets, garlic, parsley, ivies (two kinds), aloe vera and more. The dog already took me for our morning walk ;^ D
Though I remain certifiably disabled, I do what I can to enjoy life. It's all about pacing and choosing to be cheerful. Let me know how you manage with your disability or medical challenge.
Speeding along the Jewish and worldwide calendar, it's time to notice that October is National Book Month.
Heading into Jewish and non-Jewish holiday seasons, you know it's a bummer to be stuck with emotional, physical, disability or financial setbacks. They make the future seem so glum.
Want to lower lower your stress and cut your medical costs, worldwide?
Here's a solution:
Check out what one highly respected psychiatrist says of the book: "A wonderful book! Golani challenges & energizes us all to seek and savor life to the fullest for our mental and physical health. ...EMPOWER Yourself is lifesaving, emotionally rewarding, spiritual, funny and helpful."
Judith Guedalia, PhD. Director Neuropsychology Unit, Chief Medical Psychologist ER TraumaShaare Zedek Medical Center
