Chronic Wellness

How do we navigate chronic illness and long-term relationships? If I am well enough to do *something,* how do I decide how to spend that time? My formula: prioritizing myself, prioritizing her, prioritizing others. What are the ways those can overlap and intertwine? How do I plan for this? By staying in the moment -- by avoiding my desire to disconnect, by checking in with body scan. I cannot capi...

If my time and energy are my most precious natural resources, how do I make decisions about how to spend them? How does that impact my partner? If I prioritize housework, vs friendship, vs sex, what are the impacts on my significant other? How do we parse these nuances within the context of our illnesses and our relationships?

Those of us fortunate enough to be in long term relationships are blessed to be saddled with the question - "how do you manage your chronic illness your long term relationship?" Having been with my wife for almost 24 years, I consider myself unbelievably blessed and fortunate to have her on my side. What does "in sickness and in health" mean when it comes early in life? What does that promise mean...

How does resistance fuel my illness? How does acceptance make healing more possible? Acceptance does not mean making illness my identity. When I resist my illness, there isn't room for anything new to be true. I am locked into the struggle. That's why I think acceptance is paramount. These are the ideas I'm unpacking in today's video.

Acceptance is a practice. What happens when my illness worsens? What about when I'm resisting my illness? Turning back to gratitude is the way forward. Why is this a continual process? Why is this practice worth it? These are some of the questions and topics I discuss today.

What if we cannot transform what we do not accept? I cannot change a behavior until I accept it. While illness is not a behavior, there are behaviors that further contribute to making it worse. What things CAN I change, to help improve my ability to heal? How does acceptance get bound up with grief? When we accept, we must acknowledge loss. These are some of the subjects I touch on in today's vide...

How does an adversarial relationship with my illness impact my self-talk? When I believe, trust, and accept my diagnosis, what becomes possible? How can I cheer on what my body IS capable of? When I tune in to gratitude, I am building my parasympathetic nervous system. These are the thoughts and questions I'm building on in today's episode.

If "that which we resist, persists," what implications does that have for my chronic illness? If I want to diminish my resistance to my illness, acceptance is the way home. How can I engage my parasympathetic nervous system? How can I partner with my illness? Acceptance is not the same thing as giving up. These are some of the themes and questions I explore in today's video episode.

In today's video I'm talking about: How can I work toward accepting my chronic illness? Is acceptance the same thing as giving up or giving in? Why has acceptance has increased my quality of life? These are some of the questions I'm examining in this and upcoming episodes on the topic.

Here's the wrap-up to the series about weight management. How do I navigate the ongoing saga of managing my weight? How often am I tracking and restricting my calories these days? What happens when I preach the gospel of portion control and I don't practice it? What do I do when I go off the dietary rails?

How was I going to lose 70 pounds while on prednisone? What was my caloric intake at the time? What was my method of tracking calories? What was the breakdown of how I spent my calories in order to lose weight? Going to bed hungry was necessary in order to save my life.

What happens when lung disease shows up? The transplant list required me to loose weight. How could I loose 70 pounds when I couldn't roll over in bed without assistance? How was weight loss possible when high dose prednisone meant I was still packing on pounds?

What happened when high-dose steroids and a drug that stimulated my own steroid production came on line? Unable to move because of muscle-wasting, I was trapped by illness and size. When I went from underweight to obese in a matter of months, neither my glasses shoes even fit. Loaded up with others' judgement about my size, my inability to move on my own, I was feeling despondent. How does our siz...

When muscle-wasting disease showed up - I dropped an alarming amount of weight in a short amount of time. This was not healthy weight loss, this was muscle dissolving off bone. In addition to the weight loss, I lost function. I was the lightest I'd ever been and, yet, was unable to shift my tiny self in even the smallest ways.

Have you been overwhelmed by people's suggestions about how you can "get healed?" Being desperate, and being a people-pleaser, made me buy into this phenomenon hard core. Have you tried all of the cleanses and elimination diets, herbs, and alternate ways of eating? I did, and in the process, I did lose some weight.

Do you remember the Huskies section at Sears? I have been plus-sized most of my life. Isn't it remarkable that people seem to think your weight is up for comment in our society, particularly if you're overweight?

Disappointments rock our lives with chronic illness. What can the writing of Viktor Frankl teach us about surviving chronic illness? How can our search for meaning pull us out of disappointment? Unable to control so much of my circumstances, I can control my response. The power to choose is mine.

What happens when we do all the right things; we manage our time, energy, diet, inputs, and outputs, and yet we still don't feel well enough to do that thing we were hoping and looking forward to doing? When disappointments happen -- how do we roll with them? When we don't get to attend the weddings, the holiday gatherings, when we don't get to say goodbye to a loved one? What then? In order to pr...

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How can Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way" be instructive in cultivating an inner life? What might a virtual artist date look like? What sources of online inspiration can I find to feed me? How do I use magazines and periodicals to seed and feed my inner life? I can visit the MOMA from my couch, which is a fortunate thing about being sick in the digital age.

When external markers of worth, as well as the difficulties of living with chronic illness are pulling at our spirit, some of the way to restore ourselves is by developing a rich inner life. Whether or not you are an artist, Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way," can feed our creator-selves. What are you doing to feed your creative-self? How can morning pages unlock our inner life? What possibilities...

As my energy and capacity are decreased, developing a rich inner life has become much more important. What role can podcasts and audio books play in seeding my imagination? What ideas excite you? How can you tap into resources that will spark inspiration in you? *RadioLab is the podcast name I couldn't remember in the video*

How do we more actively engage our mind, spirit, and heart space? If this is all I have to look forward to -- do I want to keep living? These are some of the questions I'm examining today as I start to consider the question: How do we cultivate a rich inner life? How does our life pre-illness impact our ability to re-define ourselves in chronic illness? These are among the questions I'm looking at...

Do you feel trapped in a prison of your own body? How do you find something rich and meaningful in the midst of your suffering? What is the "life of the mind?" and how do we generate that? Can I generate a place that provides me refuge and solace? With so much that is out of my control -- what is under my control? These are some of the questions I'm examining today as I start to consider the quest...

Today I'm concluding my look at how I got diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). After taking short-term disability and staying home for more than a month to try and recover I was ill equipped to be still sick and returning to work full-time. Thus began my quest to find bodily healing. The idea that something could transform my disease state kept me fueled initially and led me to big quest...