Six months ago my son’s father-in-law suffered a massive heart attack requiring emergency intervention and four stents. Feeling short of breath a few weeks ago, he visited his Cardiologist and, within three days, had an urgent quadruple bypass. This man has a zest for life that I have personally never seen in another person. I happened to be with him and his family the night before surgery when his surgeon paid him a visit.

“When can I get back to work,” was the only question that my son’s father-in-law asked the surgeon.

The surgeon replied with a smile, “Many people take months; sometimes six months or more. You will be ready in four weeks.” We all laughed at the surgeon’s astute assessment of my son’s father-in-law.

I did the math. If a positive attitude can make that much difference to healing after major surgery, then the emphasis generally placed on emotion in medicine, is sadly lacking.

Some would say that when it comes to mental illness, we have come out of the dark ages. I would rephrase this and say: When it comes to mental illness, those suffering have begun to emerge from the dark ages. Speaking from my personal experience, and having suffered with depression and anxiety for most of my life, I now, at 54, am comfortable with who I am. The vast majority of people, and I include those that suffer and those that don’t, remain prisoners or gatekeepers. Either way, mental illness, or as I like to call it, humanness, remains compartmentalized within medicine.

My oldest son herniated a disc in his lower back three years ago. He had an MRI and a report was sent to his family doctor, stating that his herniation was mild to moderate. His doctor sent him for physiotherapy and when this didn’t alleviate the pain after some months, gave him painkillers and sent him for a series of nerve blocks. After eight months of suffering, both physically and mentally, his doctor became frustrated with my son and told him that he shouldn’t be feeling this much pain based on his MRI report and that he believed that the next step would be for my son to see a psychiatrist. My son felt helpless and desperate. A radiologist friend, who had himself suffered with chronic pain for years, decided to look at the original MRI. His conclusion was that the herniation was severe and that the nerve block that my son was receiving could not possibly reach my son’s problem area. My son had surgery and is doing well.

I tell this story for two reasons. Firstly, to demonstrate the either/or approach and the resulting separation of the physical and mental. Secondly, my son’s suffering was increased tremendously because of the lack of kindness and understanding that he received from his family doctor. My son wanted to feel understood and heard. He needed empathy.

Empathy is understanding how someone else feels and being able to put yourself in their shoes. Receiving empathy validates a person’s feelings and helps them feel understood and less alone. Empathy alone can diminish feelings of anxiety, fear or depression. You don’t have to have the same experience as someone else to have empathy. I explained it to my 12 year old daughter,who did not understand her friend’s fear of dogs, like this: “You love dogs so you can’t understand why someone would feel terrified. Are you afraid of something?” Of course the answer was yes. “Don’t look at what your friend is afraid of. Simply understand that she’s afraid. Think of your own fear to help you do this.”

Empathy in doctors is essential to effective medicine. It is not something that doctors should bring into play when they feel that a problem has become weighted on the side of mental illness. It must be in place during every interaction between a doctor and a patient. The absence of empathy makes doctors both less humane and less human. While the physical and emotional may be weighted differently in people, they are always integrally connected. To separate the two would be like severing your legs and believing that they could walk on their own. I find it so interesting that most of us understand that in everyday life, empathy is key. Our personal and professional relationships depend upon it. Why then does this knowledge not reflect the approach of many doctors? Could the fault lie in their training? Perhaps if they were giving the tools to incorporate their feelings and the feelings of their patients into their practice as doctors, things may be different. Without specific training in empathy, and appreciating the importance of emotions in healing, it is understandable why doctors would shy away from empathizing with their patients. No other profession carries the burdens that medicine does. Mistakes matter. Why would a doctor, even those with natural empathy, focus on anything other than what they have been trained to do? The consequences are too enormous.

The medical profession has assumed for too long that doctors will show empathy in their practice of medicine. It seems that there is a breakdown between this assumption and its translation into practice. The time taken to train doctors in empathy should reflect the value of empathy to a doctor’s ultimate goal – healing.

My final comment comes from a place of hope. My son was accepted this year into the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine at McMaster University. He began his year with some trepidation. He knew the school did not follow a traditional approach to medicine and was uncertain what to expect. He has enjoyed every moment but I believe of all the things that he has been exposed to thus far, the thing that has spoken directly to the heart of him, has been their human approach to medicine. The school’s emphasis on empathy, kindness and understanding in their future doctors define’s their difference from other schools. Hopefully this school will pioneer schools throughout the world. Hats off to them.

Many eons ago I dragged myself through a master’s degree in clinical psychology. There were six of us in the program and no one was happy. We were all at various stages of questioning our lives. For some of us it was life in general and it’s purpose and for others it was the ability to function in any way, shape or form going forward. Our times together were filled with intense, anxiety ridden and often frantic discussion. Life, from a depressed point of view seemed normal. Seemingly happy people made us feel jealous, which of course we covered up with a big dose of cynicism.

One day one of the six did not show up for class. (let’s call him Bill) After a couple of days, his closest friend (also in the program) swung by his apartment to investigate. He found him unbathed, unfed and suicidal. This friend stayed with him, day and night, for three days, while we all waited in silence born from the most extreme kind of worry. Finally, the feedback we received was that Bill was going to be okay. Bill had chosen life. At the time I joined my friends in relieved chatter, faking that I understood what “choosing life” actually meant. I had suffered with depression from the age of thirteen but even in my darkest moments, I had not contemplated suicide. I was doing my masters in psychology. How could I let anyone know that I didn’t quite grasp the depth of this experience?

More than three decades later I think I understand. All those years ago I thought that somehow I had to “choose life” when I had already chosen it. The human experience is so complicated and at some point I had bought the belief that for me, suicide was not an option. It could have been something I heard  or simply the fact that my anxiety about dying was always greater than my possible desire for it.  For some though, like my friend, it has to be a conscious decision. If you belong to the human race, life is hard. I am no longer conned into believing that life is a piece of cake for some people. I know that if I was given the opportunity to dig deeper that the icing on any person’s cake would be covering some form of angst. When I look for mental health in another person, I don’t look for the presence or absence of anxiety, depression or even psychosis, but instead I look at their attitude towards life and openness to change. Our successful recovery from despair correlates to commitment to life and conversely to our belief that suicide is not an option.

When the possibility of suicide is removed from our belief system, we are able to resolve issues more positively and with greater strength. The idea that suicide could be a solution can immobilize one from moving forward even if the actuality of suicide never occurs. For some people thoughts of suicide are almost comforting and give them a reason for genuine apathy towards their lives. Finding ways to overcome despair, depression or anxiety is extremely difficult and often requires that we dig deep to find resources that seem at times to not be present. If we have not chosen at some point, with total commitment, to live, then I can understand why overcoming these hardships can be impossible.

Choosing life must be at the very core of a person’s existence. Only from that point can one hope to attain a life of personal fulfilment and peace.

Has anyone noticed how parenting ideas swing back and forth over the generations, but when we’re in it, we somehow fail to recognize this fact? Take independence for example. In my grandparents’ day, children of five were expected to pull their weight with responsibilities that would make us gasp today. The generation after that seemed to mollycoddle their young. My mother was brought, daily, a hot lunch to school. I grew up thinking that parenting meant taking care of children as much as possible, for as long as possible. But of course, the trend has transitioned during my parenting lifetime. Terms like “helicopter parents” are thrown out smirkily by those who feel that they are raising their children to be strong independent human beings, while the rest of us feel a little guilty every time we edit our child’s essay or do their laundry, but we do it anyway.

I feel like taking a stand on this. Is independence really so wonderful? Don’t we also, at the same time, value our children’s ability to be in touch with their emotions and their capacity to connect with others? I believe that a certain amount of dependence is natural and necessary in all of us. In our world today, it scares me to think how easy it is for any of us to become lost in cyberspace, connecting with others by BBM, Facebook or email. In relation to this dependence, is not our hovering over our children at least of the human kind?

I think that a lot of people believe that children who are overly dependent on their parents/families will achieve less, think less critically and have less successful relationships. Is this really true? Speaking personally, and as a definite “helicopter parent,” I can say with conviction, that my children, at least, have proved this premise wrong. From my perspective, the only thing that has resulted from “dependence” has been family cohesiveness, a sense of security and an overall happiness with what we all share.

I believe in moderation. I’m not suggesting that I want to live my children’s lives for them, but I will continue to, happily and guilt-free, take their outstretched arms when they are offered.

Yikes! Has it been this long since I blogged?! With four children, my husband (sometimes as demanding!), a dog and a guinea pig, I find I am constantly putting off my stuff. I was determined to blog, meditate and work on my book today but once again I had to reorganize my plans to make room for Dustin’s essay which needs to be edited before tomorrow! So I chose blogging and sigh a little as the other two are put off until tomorrow (hopefully). Enough whining! I have and hour and fifteen minutes to finish this and the essay before I leave to pick up my nephews for our weekly play date. I’m taking my baby nephew for the first time today so I’m pretty excited.

About a month ago I was going to full up with gas knowing full well that I had let the gauge dip dangerously low. “So what’s new?” said my son. Anyway, with the gas station in clear view my car putted to an embarrassing halt, not giving two hoots that we were almost there. I rocked back and forth, begging, “Come on, a hundred meters. That’s all I’m asking of you!” It wasn’t going to happen. Of course this had to happen during peak traffic so within a minute I had a line of cars behind me even though I had put  my hazard lights on. I heard a couple of honks and felt my menopausal hot flush kick in.

It was at this moment that a truck with gardening equipment pulled up alongside me and the driver gestured, “what’s up?”

I responded, also with gestures and a tad aggressively (and to my shame now), “I’m stuck! What do you expect me to do about it!” With that, the guy pulled up in front of me, stopped his truck and got out. As he was walking towards me, my initial reaction turned to major embarrassment as he asked me what was wrong. “I’ve run out of gas.” I replied, wanting to climb under my chair. Without a word, he went to his vehicle, grabbed a container full of gas, walked to my car and asked me if I wouldn’t mind popping the lid to the gas. I did, (not minding at all) and he emptied his can into my car.  By this time I had managed to form the words to thank him profusely and of course offer to pay for the gas. “Don’t worry, my pleasure.” he replied, and simply walked off. He had no sign on his truck so I had no way of even knowing who he was.

I’ve run out of gas before (maybe more than once) and it is a royal inconvenience. This entire “pit stop” took no more than 5 minutes.

One of the delights of children is that they say it like it is. As an adult, before kids, I thought I had a good handle on my life and a fairly accurate understanding of human functioning. What I had was a story of how I believed things should be. There were right ways to behave and think and these had been filed away in that part of me that thought that there was no need for further examination. It served a purpose. To constantly question everything you believe can drive you crazy. So, apart from the obvious, I think that one of the reasons we have children is to re-question the unquestioned. And to point out our inconsistencies. And to make us practice what we preach.

I had (rather piously) brought my kids up to be true to themselves. What I actually meant was to be true unless it conflicts with what I think you should be doing. One of my sons doesn’t spend his life worrying about how he comes across to people, like I do. For many years this was a problem for me. One day, once again, I was telling him that he should have behaved differently to someone who in fact had treated him critically and judgmentally. I found myself saying “two wrongs don’t….” I don’t remember his exact words but they went something like this. “Mom, I’m not going to do something just because you want me to. I am being who I am and truthfully, I’m OK with it. I know some people will not like me but I can live with that.” His words that day had a huge impact on me. I realized that being true to one’s self doesn’t always make friends but if my son had the guts to live his life like this then good luck to him. I felt, acutely, my own limitations from being a well-established people pleaser and just a tad envious.

There have been many times over the years that my children have unintentionally questioned my integrity. One called me out once because I was being mean about someone. He said that it was to make me feel better about my life because it wasn’t serving any other purpose. Another, because of the unbelievable way that he accepts his anxiety disorder, has made it so much easier to accept my own.

A couple of weeks ago, I arrived to pick up my daughter from school about 30 seconds late. She suffers from anxiety and in particular, in this instance, a fear of being forgotten at school (not that it’s ever happened). I always make an effort to be waiting for her at the door so that she can see me as she’s packing her backpack. I was not without some anxiety because I was a tad late and broke into a run as I tried to make up lost time. Unfortunately, as I rounded the last turn before I reached her door, she had walked out and was looking around, visibly anxious. “Gabs!” I called.

She ran to me. “Why are you late?” she asked. “I was freaking out!”

I had spent some years telling my daughter to acknowledge and accept her feelings. I also understood anxiety and how overwhelming and irrational it can feel, so of course I replied, in a less than kind voice: “But Gabs, you saw me one second after you walked out the door!”

“Mom, it only takes me a second to freak out.” she said.

Yet another life lesson.

For a long time now I have understood that I am not one whole person but rather a sum of many. I’ve learned to listen to my inner voices and to recognize who’s making the most noise. I know how to take my “prophet of doom,” or as I fondly call him, my “grim reaper,” and send him to positivity school for the day. I’m also adept at conversing with Mrs. critical and even sometimes emerging strong from the interaction. From necessity, I have added to my existing group by creating my kind and nurturing Aunt to take care of everyone and make sure that they exist in a somewhat peaceful cohabitation. You get the picture?

It struck me the other day that I could have fun with this and help myself to boot! So I created a new part who I’ve named OMG (Don’t let it be said that I don’t move with the times). I am more than willing to share this person with all those who feel, at times, unappreciated. Let me explain by example: I’ve dropped my daughter at school, done a quick shop at the grocery store and filled up with gas. I arrive home with the groceries and unpack. I quickly check my emails and get in a 30 minute run on the treadmill. I write a blog and work for an hour on my book. I realize the time and rush out to pick up my daughter from school and take her to the orthodontist, and then to dance. Grabbing odd minutes during the day, I’ve also edited one of my son’s essays and dropped off a shirt to be mended at the cleaners. Did I mention showering? When my family waltz in one at a time at the end of the day, I very often hear, “I’m exhausted, what’s for dinner?” or “There’s no food in the house!” or “Can you massage my neck.” It is at this point that my OMG person springs to life.

“What! You did what today??” That’s not even possible for a single human to achieve! You must be a super-woman, super-mom and super-wife!! OMG, I am so impressed by your amazing achievements!! OMG!! You’re incredible!!! (The use of multiple exclamations is recommended)

Forms! I hate them! My husband cannot understand my reticence to fill out forms. I’ve never really understood it until recently. While I have only called myself a “writer” in recent years, I think I have always thought like one. I’ve never been one to put into written words, thoughtless material. I contemplate and often agonize. This is not to say that everything I write is a gem. Far from it, but it is thoughtful. So filling out forms, which often requires doing them there and then, drives me crazy. I particularly hate the occupation question and I think I know why. It would be easy to say “writer” but is that my primary occupation? No, it is not. I have figured this out by assessing situations when I have a choice. For example, when I sit down to write and I get a call from my son asking me to edit an essay, I put the writing aside and edit the essay. This also happens with school shopping, meal making, dance schlepping, wedding venue searching, backgammon playing, hugging and talking, to mention a few off the top of my head. So if I always choose the demands, requests and needs of my children over my writing then I guess my primary occupation is “Mom.” At least I know how to fill in that part of the form now!

After 4 days of bat terror, we finally felt safe and convinced that said bat had left the premises. Last night during America’s got talent, right in the middle of a particularly high rendition of operatic singing, the black terror of the night appeared (from nowhere), sending Russ and I under the covers and Adam screaming from the room in a pitch to further incite the bat! Said bat now escapes our room to the rest of the house. Once again Adam and Dustin swat viciously, missing by miles due mainly to their own terror. So, once again we lost the bat!!!! No pest company will come because they said that it’s like finding a needle in a haystack. And now we’ve been advised to either catch it somehow and check it for rabies or go for rabies injections because people often do not even feel bat bites if they’re sleeping! My usual amount of barely manageable free-floating anxiety has reached new heights. Any advice or help (preferably physical) would be greatly appreciated! (possibly even to the end of my days)

Usually, when I sit down to write something, I have been inspired to do so. Today, not so. My son is going in tomorrow for a second back surgery. Since the last one some five months ago, he has not been pain free. However, a few weeks ago his bearable pain crossed the line into unbearable. Convinced he had re-herniated he managed to get a quick MRI (thanks Pete) and a quick appointment with his Ortho surgeon. He was right and very luckily his surgeon agreed to perform surgery almost immediately.

We grow and learn from suffering. Period. So what lessons have we all learned so far through this painful experience.

My son has learned who his “bad time” friends are. They know who they are. He has learned just how much his family loves him. He has also learned that he truly has a wonderful wife with incredible patience and understanding. He has learned that he can bear things that he would have previously thought unbearable. We have all learned that people who understand pain are more compassionate. We have learned that those who don’t understand will often diminish the experience of others so that they might feel better about their own helplessness. We have all learned that the most dangerous people are those who believe that they know everything. This kind of arrogance creates the greatest weakness in human beings.

My husband and I have sadly learned that the professions that we believed to be the most caring are the ones where we sometimes find the least. We have learned to advocate. We have learned to stand strong from a weakened state. We have learned that we can’t fix all of our children’s pain but that we can do our best to hear them. We have learned to take one day at a time. We have learned that even with our history of people pleasing, we have limits. We have learned that our son’s happiness and our loyalty to that is more important than any social embarrassment that we may ever feel.

With experience, I do not see things more simply but realize that they are more complex than we can grasp. My growth as a human being is often more about understanding what things aren’t rather than what they are. For example, I choose a more holistic approach towards my body because I realize that no single discipline can explain it all. So yes, I am that “go to” person if you want to be put in contact with an Acupuncturist, Homeopath, Naturopath, Nutritionist, Psychologist or Chinese doctor or if you want to know about various forms of meditation – traditional or alternative. I believe that when I visit my doctor (because of course western medicine has a place in the scheme of everything), I have the right to be a part of the process. So when I stepped on a rusty nail the other day and paid a visit to the doctor’s office for a tetanus update, I was horrified to read a sign that read: PLEASE LIMIT YOUR COMPLAINTS TO ONE PER VISIT. Wow, just how far have we not come! Aren’t doctors themselves trained to view many symptoms in order to make a diagnosis. How do I know that the pain in my left toe is not related to the nausea that I feel. I simply don’t understand this policy. Can anyone? Have I misunderstood something? I feel, sadly, that this is more a sign of the general state of medicine in Canada and overworked (and underpaid) general practitioners than a reflection of the attitudes of doctors who have worked long and hard to understand their patients as whole human beings.