The Healing Place

Vicki Williams

Until My friends and I were in our early 70's I was the healthiest one of the bunch. This is so even though Brenda worked out and relentlessly maintained her weight.....even though LeAnn was a speed walker.....even though Blythe walked, swam and biked. LeAnn and Blythe have never smoked; Brenda quit 30 years ago.

Meanwhile, there is me – a plump, mostly sedentary, self-indulgent smoker. I took fewer medicines than them. I had fewer aches and pains than them. I went to the doctor less often than them. (Not to say, I couldn’t keel over tomorrow....)

About 3 years ago, I was diagnosed with lung cancer and congestive heart failure and chose to have no treatment but actually I am still healthier than them and all of the above still applies. I'm not on oxygen, I'm not short of breath, I don't cough. I'm not in any pain. 

I’ve always had a Healing Place and I assumed everyone did until I came to realize that most people appear to be unaware of the vital link between mind and body and the ways they cooperate for good health. It seems most people suffer through an ailment or turn themselves over to a doctor. Either/or.

When I go to bed at night, I count backwards from 21 (which is simply a relaxation technique). At one, I ask to go to the Healing Place. (It doesn’t matter whom you ask, it could be your God or simply the Life Force within all of us).

The Healing Place isn’t always the same. I don’t control the scene with my conscious mind. Instead I have an attitude of curiosity about where I will find myself. The visual starts with something small, like the single blossom of a flower. As I focus on its colors and the shape of its petals, the view expands. I see the flower is blooming on a sand dune. Off to one side is a palmetto. I feel the warmth of the sand on my feet. I hear the soft rush of waves. As I mentally turn, the ocean is before me. A pelican is flying across the horizon. There is a sea-salt tang in the air.

Another night might begin with a cardinal in a tree growing in what becomes a green alpine valley, its floor starred with wildflowers, geese landing on a crystal clear lake, the fragrance of pines. I rest my hand against the bark of a towering tree.

Wherever the Healing Place turns out to be, it is surrounded by a clear gold light...the healing light. It bathes me. I can feel it penetrating my body to wash bones and organs and blood with its curative properties. I call on it to especially concentrate on any particular area of pain or disease.

I think all the senses must be engaged at the Healing Place. You must see, feel, smell, hear and touch to ensure you have brought your total being there. I think the Healing Place is a way of freeing your subconscious to assist in your own health.

The Healing Place doesn’t replace traditional medicine. I would never advocate not going to a doctor for a serious situation, rather it supplements your treatment by giving it an additional boost. I truly believe it can help you find wellness more quickly. I thought the Salmonella I recently had was going to kill me. I assume the 6 days in the hospital hooked up to an i.v. was probably the determining factor but I also believe the healing place played its part in my recovery. 

When it comes your time to die, the Healing Place won't save you. I think that is predetermined but it can help you cope more easily  with less pain and less anxiety. 

Perhaps it is New Age nonsense. Or maybe it is something you’d like to try if you have a throbbing shoulder or aching knee. It certainly can do no harm and it relieves stress if nothing else. I always fall asleep to the smell of roses or the sounds of birds singing. It’s fun to find out where you are as the scene unfolds. My Healing Place is always nature-oriented but wherever it is, it must be safe, serene and beautiful. For you, that might be a cathedral or it might be a sailboat.

Do I think rhe Healing Place is the sole reason I seem to be healthier than my friends? No, I’m sure genes play a large part. But do I think it is a contributing factor? Absolutely.

If you set your subconscious free, do you wonder where would it take you?

Lizards, Frogs, Turtles and Snakes!

I think I am finally completely over my Salmonella. It is rather ironic that for all the worrying (not that I worry all that much) about lung cancer and congestive heart failure, it was Salmonella that almost killed me off. I honestly thought I was dying when I came home from the hospital. I didn't call any of my friends because I assumed they'd over-react and want to call an ambulance. I figured I'd rather just die at home.

I got well oh-so-gradually. One day, there was the tiniest bit of light at the end of the tunnel. Day by day, it got larger until I'm back to normal (whatever "normal" is!)

The Health Department takes Salmonella very seriously and I had to do a lengthy interview about where I might have got mine. It turned out I hadn't done any of the things that usually cause it - no restaurant food, no handling raw chicken, no salad fixings in a sack, no pre-cut-up melon (and wash melons first even when you buy them whole as if there is Salmonella on the outside, the knife can carry it inside) So maybe it could have been eggs or perhaps leftovers kept too long.

In the end, she simply told me to keep my fridge between 3.5 and 4. And not to eat at buffets. And to not let foods touch each other. And  not to refill plastic water bottles more than once. She told me to always use a mask and gloves when changing the cat's litter boxes or touching bird feeders. And finally, she said not to handle turtles, frogs, snakes and lizards.

I told her I thought I could promise that last one pretty easily!

As for the rest, I started out being extremely cautious and following all her advice but gradually, I have gotten more lax. I don't eat cut up fruit or lettuce or handle raw chicken but I don't worry with masks and gloves. I'd eat at a buffet. I do look at the sell-by date on eggs but you never really know how long they may have set out in a store or warehouse. I only keep leftovers two days.

If you're a healthy adult, you probably don't have to worry. If you do get Salmonella, you'll probably just get well with time. But it can be deadly for the elderly and children. In my case, by the time I went to the Emergency Room my kidneys were in urgent crisis and I was completely dehydrated.

So if your elderly parent or child gets what seems like the flu and it goes on longer than a couple days, make sure to have it checked. I am here to tell you, Salmonella is wicked stuff!

On the other hand, you can't go through life being anal about protecting yourself from every possibility. Like most things, it's mostly a matter of commonsense.

I Just Wanna' Go Home!

                                                     

(Repeat of my Logansport column to explain why I haven't been here for so long)

I haven't been around for a while because I've been sick...probably as sick as I've ever been in my life. I thought I had the flu. I thought it would run it's course but six days later, there was no improvement. I had constant diarrhea, vomiting, aching, felt as if I was freezing. So I took myself to the emergency room, thinking I'd get a shot and a prescription and be on my way.

All the people at the Wabash Parkview Hospital were great but having said that, I had a few complaints. I spent six hours in the emergency room. No one’s fault. The hospital was full. They had to discharge patients to make room for new patients.

I tried to look at the bright side. At least, the bed in my room would be soft unlike the ER cot. Ho. Ho. Ho. How wrong I was. A modern hospital bed looks like a marvel of modern technology. It has enough bells and buttons and whistles to be the control panel for the Starship Enterprise. The head goes up; the feet go down. You can twist your body into a donut. You can summon nurses. You can turn lights off and on. The one thing you can’t do is lay flat no matter how you play with the icons. If you’re short, like me, your feet don’t touch the mattress. They hang out into space.

And there is a drop off in the middle where the bed bends. It exactly fits the shape of your derriere. No matter how I moved in the bed, I fell into this hole. My posterior was already rather sensitive after six days of “flu-like symptoms” (to be politically correct about it). The last thing I wanted was to concentrate on that part of my anatomy but there it fell, inevitably, nestling into its slot.

Because of various humps in various places, you cannot lay on your side in a hospital bed.

Honestly, I believe, with only slight modifications, this apparatus could be used as a means of enhanced interrogation.

To make matters worse, I could only move a few feet from the dreaded bed because of the intravenous pole. They didn’t want me to go to the bathroom by myself but they were too busy, so I didn’t even bother them, I just went. But my i.v. lines kept getting tangled so that I could barely reach the stool. There I’d be, perched on the very edge, hoping I was hitting the mark, with my arm extended to its maximum length in order not to pull out my i.v.

Lastly, of course, was not smoking. They applied nicotine patches. Someone asked me if they helped and I said, “I guess they must, I haven’t killed anyone, have I?”

The non-smoking Vicki exerted iron self-control in order not to take my stress out on the staff. (I think my nurses would agree that over all, I was a cooperative patient) but I dreamed of doing harm to others in order to steal their cigarettes.

I loved my doctor, Dr. Gupta. I begged him to let me go home. He said he would not release me until he thought I was ready to go.

He told me that, of course, I had the option of checking myself out against his strong recommendation and then he said, “and when you come back in two days, sicker than before, we’ll welcome you back.”

I told him, “well, Doc, when you put it like that, I guess I’ll stay.”

He nodded. “Good thinking.”

I’m home now. with a new appreciation for coffee, cigarettes, computers, long soaky baths and the freedom to move freely.

Update: the following week, I had to go to the lab for some tests. My clinic almost immediately called back and said my magnesium levels were dangerously low. Magnesium? Who knew it was so important. They told me to go to ER a.s.a.p..

They first said they’d have to admit me overnight because it took several hours for a magnesium infusion but I refused. Finally, they agreed to do it my way and hooked me up in the Emergency Room. Four hours later, I went home.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate the hospital and the hospital staff. I hope they didn’t think I was just being a witch but I feel so strongly that if I’m going to die (and I don’t know that that’s imminent), I want it to be at home....in my own bed, not in the hospital.

Of Bucket Lists and Fair Trades

                                               

Here's the thing about bucket lists: they don't always stay the same. When you get older and not in such good health and low on energy, you remove some things. Reality is that you're never going to accomplish them and they don't mean as much as they once did. I have taken seeing Ireland and living in the country from my bucket list. Those were great passions when I was younger but not anymore.

But what is so cool about life is that it puts new items in your bucket, retroactively. You are delighted to find things you never even knew you desired.

For instance, in the last two weeks, I have seen two birds I'd never seen before in my 72 years. The first appeared at my bird feeder, dramatically black and white and red. I hurried to Google to describe him and discovered that he was a Rosy-Throated Grosbeak (also called Rosy-Breasted Grosbeak). Google told me that he was most likely just passing through on his trip farther north for the summer. He came every day for about a week and then he was gone but oh, my Gosh, how grateful I was that he chose to spend his layover with me!

My second bird is a Baltimore Oriole (now known as an American Oriole). LeAnn told me her mother put out grape jam to attract orioles. I'd never heard of such a thing but I bought some raspberry jam (grape jam is strangely difficult to find around here). About a week later, there was my oriole. I recognized this one right away because I'd seen so many pictures of his distinctive orange and black colors. He's come almost every day since.

So my Grosbeak and my Oriole were two surprise additions to my bucket list.

Susan Stewart brought me me a mess of mushrooms (already cooked and warm) and a vase of lilacs and bleeding heart for Mother's Day, not to mention that my daughter-in-law sent me a huge bouquet of flowers. My kitchen looks and smells of pure spring but the mushrooms were the bucket list item for this season. Some people laud the "land of milk and honey" but I'll take the "land of mushrooms and blue gill", thank you very much!

Jan brought me a new cat. He wasn't exactly a bucket list item. He's feral. I'll keep him in the garage for a while with food and water and hope he starts to feel that this place is his home base. Then I'll let him out and what happens next will be on him. Jan wanted rid of him because he picks on the other young cat that hangs out at her house. So maybe I saved the littler cat from being a victim of thugism. The one here, I named him Coal, is gorgeous with long black-hair. Perhaps I'll introduce some new blood into the feral cat population around here.  (It would take too long to explain why I didn't have him neutered).

See how easy it is to justify putting something in your bucket list that you didn't even want?

Out come Ireland and the country, in go Grosbeaks and wild cats. At this stage of my life, I consider it a fair trade.

A Charm Bracelet of Small Pleasures

                                  

My mother always used to say: "when you're feeling down, think of five good things about your life." Of course, those were the bigger things - your children, your health, your friends, your job, your faith. But there are small pleasures too....not as important individually but, collectively, they can mean a lot. Sort of like a charm bracelet of joy.

1) One example for me recently is the pot of spring flowers my friend, Jan, brought me. They were like a little daily miracle.  At first, the daffodil buds only had a tiny spot of bright yellow on the tips but within a couple of days, the whole bud was yellow. The next day, they opened into bright bits of sunshine in the house.

Meanwhile, the tulip bulbs fattened, then bloomed. They too were butter yellow. Finally, the mauve hyacinths opened with the additional pleasure of their sweet fragrance that perfumed the whole room.

Since this has been a rather dreary spring outside, every day I looked forward to the pot of spring on the kitchen table.

2) Birds - Speaking of spring, the goldfinches are now truly gold again....and next month the hummingbirds will return, both adding charms to my bracelet of small good things..

3) I'm now addicted to shortbread cookies. It was actually the hospital Oncology Department that got me started. They offered me a snack to while away the time during my transfusion. They had Oreos and shortbread cookies. I took them only because I was bored. I sort of forgot how much I enjoyed them when I left the hospital, then LeAnn brought me some when she visited from Iowa and LeAnn, being LeAnn, these were much higher quality than the commercial grade from the hospital (not that I'm above eating plain old Lorna Doone's).

LeAnn has sent me more since. Shortbreads are the perfect nibbling cookie. Bite off the teddy bear's toe, then his belly, then his head. So satisfying with coffee or tea. I'm only sorry I didn't discover them before I was 72 years old!

4) When I retired, of course, my income plunged so I shut off almost all the automatic payments that came out of my bank account, like Ancestry which I'd paid for but never used, and Sirius Radio, because I didn't figure I'd be in the car that much. I belong to a site called Webshots. They feature different photos every day. It's pretty cheap - $20 for a year. Picking out my daily photo is something I look forward to every morning. Some days, it is kittens or wolves or spring flowers or snowy woods. There are beaches and sunsets and castles. I love seeing different places. I never knew Romania was so gorgeous! I decided I got enough daily enjoyment out of the anticipation of beautiful pictures that it was worth $25 so I made the choice to keep it.

5) When Brenda cleans my house, she leaves behind the spicy, fresh scent of Pinesol. That aroma make me feel so good. It is the epitome of clean.

Maybe these are all small in and of themselves but string them all together and they make life more joyful. 

Cheerleading for Heart Failure

                                                       

You have to have a somewhat morbid sense of humor to cope with illness. When I went to the emergency room, the doctor said - "I have bad news. The spot on your lung is cancer." Then he went on to say: "And...."

"Wait," I asked, "you mean there's more?"

"Yep," he told me, "you also have some congestive heart failure going on."

When I left, I had to chuckle a little at the irony of having two diseases and having to root for one or the other.

"Come on, heart failure!"

After all, who wouldn't rather die in their own bed of a massive heart attack than to linger painfully on while cancer drags you down and down? If that's the way it happened, of course, quickly and suddenly. But no strokes that propel you into a nursing home, please.

Because that is my biggest fear. I'm not afraid to die but I'm terrified of helplessness. I have the best friends in the world but I don't want to have to depend on them anymore than I already do.

And hospice? Oh, God, I have an absolute horror of hospice. I don't want strangers coming to my house to feed or bathe me or even just to pat me on the hand in an effort to comfort me. My prayer has always been - "go away and let me do this on my own."

So that's why I root for heart failure to prevail over cancer in the end.

It's strange too because sometimes the different things you need collide with one another.  I'm anemic and so I take iron pills, iron deficiency being the main cause of anemia. Iron pills lead to constipation. When I read up on anemia, the website said to be sure to take a Probiotic because keeping your colon healthy is very important. Probiotics work in the opposite direction as iron. So you take these two pills and you have to wonder if your body is saying, "make up your damn mind." To go or not to go?

Plenty of food, the anemia website says, is essential.  I hate most of what you're supposed to eat - chard, spinach, beets, liver. Yuck! But one of my two diseases has taken my appetite. I don't know which one to blame. I eat but it is now more of a chore than a pleasure. So, on the one hand your metabolism says, "food, I need food!" and on the other hand, it says, "nothing really sounds good." I remember when I would have given anything to voluntarily curb my appetite. Another irony.

Just for my own curiosity, I'd like to know how many of a certain kind of pill you'd have to take to end things yourself but how do you Google that question? Would anyone answer? Would you get turned and have Adult Protective Services make an emergency welfare check? I have two loaded guns but I'm pretty sure I'd never have guts enough to pull the trigger.

If all this makes me sound depressed, I'm not. I have a rather black sense of humor and if anything, I find the oddnesses life puts in front of you amusing.

Opioids - The Solution May Be as Bad as the Problem.

                                               
                                             

Being a terminal lung cancer patient, I am probably one of a minority of people who could get a prescription for pain-killing opioids (like hydrocodone, oxycodone, being two of the most frequently precribed), without much hassle. But I've never had to take pain pills because I'm not in any pain.

There is no doubt that America has an opioid crisis on its hands. In 2015, overdoses were the leading causes of accidental death in the U.S. with 52,404 deaths.

Twenty and a half million Americans over the age of 20 had prescriptions for opioids while 591,000 used heroin. It is estimated that four out of every five heroin users first used prescription opioids When asked why, they said heroin was easier to get and cheaper.

So, yes opioids are definitely a problem. But there is another side to the story. Ironically,  I have friends who actually do have chronic, severe pain due to various conditions. Because we are making opioids so difficult to obtain,  people with legitimate constant pain are finding it difficult to receive relief.

Doctors, generally, have over-prescribed opioids over the last several years but now they are under-prescribing them in order to stay out of possible legal jeopardy. You now have to sign a contract with your doctor stating that you will not try to receive a prescription from any doctor but him or her, on pain of being fired.

Even in cases of serious injury, the protocol is to only allow patients to take opioids for a week, although the pain may still be severe in that period of time.

So, we are in danger of creating a huge new problem in trying to solve an old one. People in constant pain have a low quality of life. Is it any wonder, many of them go outside the law to try to find an help?

There has to be a better way.