Headaches
I love blogging, and have plans to do so much more with my blogs than I have. The only thing holding me back is headaches. Yes, we’ve all had them (or the majority of us have) and I was lucky enough for most of my life to not have any problem with them. Lately though, they have been a constant, daily reminder of my human frailty. Our bodies are not indestructible, as we wish they could be (why else would we have Superman/woman, X-Men, Iron-Man, Hulk, She-Hulk, Spiderman, and on and on), and with all the chemicals, pollutants, and pills they are exposed to, how could they be? As someone who has been “blessed” with a genetic form of depression, I have to say that some of the medicines for my condition have saved my life, and the lives of my children by extension. What is questionable is the daily bombardment of substances we may not even know we’re coming into contact with. The primordial “goo” that allowed life to develop on this planet is no more. The mutations that make the X-Men so special are not the mutations our children are inheriting. What they are inheriting makes them weaker, more vulnerable. Growing up between two nuclear power plants who dumped who knows what into the lake, how do I know my headaches that make me barely able to function aren’t a result of eating lake fish saturated with radiation?
I attended a Seventh Day Adventist nursing school, and I marveled at how healthy all my fellow students seemed. They were vegetarian, always had been. They had immeasurable compassion for human suffering, and we prayed before every class for guidance, and to use out knowledge for good works. Since the majority of professors ate from their own gardens, I think they were healthier than the community they resided in. I remember marveling at a young man who talked about his lack of use for caffeine. He said, “If I am that tired, then I need to rest. Why would I use some artificial substance to keep me awake and ignore my body’s own signals for rest?” So true, so simple and so completely foreign to my experience of using coffee and other substances to “control” my body’s “weaknesses.” Unlike my fellow student, I had and have continued to forget how to listen to my body for what it needs.
Headaches. Right now they rule my life. Whether they have come from genetics or environment doesn’t really matter. What matters is, they have taken over my daily existence, and I want them gone – so I can blog, so I can empathize, share compassion with my fellow humans who are either going through something similar, or just need help. The headache has taken over now and my brain cannot put intelligible sentences together. I hope you all have a wonderful day, and rejoice in your good fortune if you feel good and your body is your friend. This day is precious, use it in celebration of who and how you are. I will be in my bed in the dark, trying to let the pain flow through me rather than fighting it, which never helps anyway. Namaste’!!
