When I’ve been sick, people have offered me every kind of healing intervention. My night table has been heaped with articles, reports, books, recipes, and talismans. “Mayo Clinic,” advised one friend.
“UCSF,” said another. “This cutting-edge hospital in St. Moritz.
” Read this, they say. Eat this. Recite these affirmations.
Try ozone, rescue remedy, shark cartilage, hypnosis, aromatherapy, acupuncture, meditation, Dr. Neckerpeck’s dark field method. People have told me a mosaic of successes and failures with virtually every approach.
So instead of talking about suggested remedies, let’s talk about us: in particular, our need to offer fixes. I’ve certainly offered my share. I don’t enjoy watching others suffer.
In fact, it literally hurts me. So to diminish my own pain I suggest some solution. There, I’ve done something.
I care about you, but in offering a fix I’ve actually treated myself. In addition, I can quietly claim a compassion star. In an ideal world, you would thank me, arrange an appointment with Dr.
Neckerpeck, and get cured. In this world, though, that rarely happens because my fix has addressed only your diagnosis--cancer, Covid, ALS--and strangely enough, that’s not the problem. We don’t suffer from viruses or tumors, but from the feelings they invoke: fear, depression, anger, frustration, confusion.
Presumably you’ve already asked someone to intervene at the physical level, where fixing is possible. But how can we treat emotions? Not an easy task, as our culture resists even revealing intimate feelings. In fact, we consider public emoting either abnormal or the style of spirited foreigners.
Asking “How are you doing?” falls short, then, because the reply will inevitably be a polite “hanging in there” or “fine.” (By the way, see “fine” as an acronym for “Feelings I’m Not Expressing.”) Given our emotive restriction, a deeper level of communication requires trust and time, which together compose what we call the “healing relationship.
” Of course, we need fixes, too. It won’t hurt to ask friends--not what they heard online, but their own personal experiences. That will help, but our most effective assistance to the sick consists of our time, attention, and honesty.
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