1. Face your
mortality. If you have a GOD, reinvent your relationship with your
GOD. If you do not have a GOD or believe in GOD, reference your logic
of life. Either way search for purpose. Sometimes the purpose requires
faith that there is a purpose. Other times opening your eyes and simply
looking around with an unselfish loving outlook is all that is required
to see purpose. Purpose can be small, it is not always huge, but it
is always magnificent when you see it.
2. If the
stats are bad in your particular case, say to yourself over and over
“I am not a statistic, I am an individual. My recovery is not bound
by statistics. Everyone is different”.
3. Learn
to love yourself if you do not already and reach out to all your friends,
including those you have not had contact with for a great while. Do
not be reluctant to receive help from other people, blessings or anything
that might help. Hint: You have to love yourself before you can truly
accept love as a gift.
4. If you
are blessed to have a soul mate as I have been, have your soul mate
keep a journal of everyone and everything that happens to you. If
nothing else it will keep your soul mate involved and give them purpose,
and a unique way to help you. Audrey has a calendar where she records
all the events of our journey, day by day. Whenever a nurse would
enter our hospital room, Audrey would record their name, purpose for
their visit, any medications dispensed or procedures performed. Even
those simply taking vital signs get recorded. Audrey would learn each
nurse by name and try to take a personal interest in their lives.
For example, “Do you have any kids? How old are they?” We would ALWAYS
say “Thank You” when the nurses left our room. Audrey kept a bowl
of candy for the nurses. She would always offer a piece of candy to
each nurse. Sometimes a nurse would come into our room just to say
HI and tell Audrey and I about their life’s problems, or sometimes
just to get a piece of candy. We even had nurses come by on shift
change to announce they were leaving or just arriving. The hospital
mgmt could have kept the time clock in our room. Soon it was not the
patient in room 215, it was Morris and Audrey in room 215. I was actually
telling someone the other day about the hospital stay and I referred
to the hospital as a hotel. Because of Audrey and her interaction
with people, we always felt loved and special.
5. Do not
be embarrassed of your body. I always say I may die of a lot of things,
but embarrassment will not be of them.
6. Learn
to laugh at yourself. I have a funny story I love to tell even though
it is at my expense. It puts people at ease. I have even gotten requests
from one friend to share it with other friends.
7. Do not
obsess over your mortality or your sickness or your symptoms. It is
very easy to do so. Like my friend Wayne always says, “Don’t think
too much”. All medicines have side effects. Do not be quick to blame
a symptom on the worse thing you can think of.
8. Learn
as much as possible about your medications and treatment options.
You can be a member of your medical team and help choose the best
treatment protocols for you. Accept help from your soul mate, your
family, whoever in this regard.
9. When someone
asks “How are you doing?”, never say “Fine” because rarely will you
be telling the truth. Instead answer with a letter grade A-F. For
example, explain the grading system and then answer “I am having an
A day or a C day. If the person wants details they will ask. In addition
you can always upgrade or degrade your grade as the day progresses.
10. Last,
but not least, as Bernie Siegel, MD would say, “Love yourself. You
are a gift.”
