Hope is a positive word, right? If we have hope for an outcome, then there's still a chance things will go our way. Yet, I read some time ago a comment about hope that suggested it isn't as positive a concept as we would like to think. If you are living in hope, the author argued, you are not accepting things as they are, and in that way hope could be seen to be counterproductive. Acceptance of what is happening right here, right now, is far more productive, it was postulated. This doesn't mean no action is taken, but one isn't wallowing in thoughts of a possible future outcome, in a hopeful frame of mind, if you see the difference. Staying in the present, acceptance of the situation, is what is advocated.
There is considerable dissatisfaction with the medical fraternity who take 'truth giving' a bit too far, advising patients with cancer perhaps that the prognosis is very grim; fundamentally that they should get their affairs in order because there is no hope, or next to no hope. There are just too many people who are taking their health into their own hands even at that late stage of the game and achieving outcomes considered impossible by the medical practitioners.
Hope for more life, a better life, is part of the positive approach to healing advocated by some people who consult with these marked people. They work with them on their nutrition - a plant based approach. They work with them on their state of mind, getting them well established in a meditative practice, and gentle exercise regimen, and as well, they encourage them to take each moment as it comes.
Perhaps, they don't encourage 'hope' so much as they encourage a positive state of mind and an acceptance of where they are right now, and why, and where they would like to go, all being well. And, if it should be that death comes, then let it a be a good death. It's a hopeful approach because previously they had reached a dead end, whereas now they have an approach that provides them with a healthy and enhanced way of life, for however long that is.
When I was younger and having my babies, I worked on the supposition that all would be well. I quite simply didn't allow for any other thought and I certainly was not prepared for any other outcome. I'm grateful to be married to someone who simply overrides those in authority when he needs to. When my obstetrician induced me at the time of my first pregnancy and promptly left for a birthday party it was my husband who told the staff not long after that if he didn't get his ass back there and assist with a birth that was fast spiraling out of control they'd all be very sorry. The doctor ran into the room and quickly delivered the baby with forceps, for the cord was around our baby's neck and he was starving of oxygen. Would I have hit the panic button? You know I'd have left it too late.
Over time, my husband who is very detail oriented and inclined to see down the road to potential disastrous outcomes, would proselytize as to a bad outcome. Something inside me usually told me not to buy into it, especially when it came to our children. On the flip side, he sometimes was able to balance me, when I was overly invested in a specialist's prediction, for example.
It was more than me just being hopeful when it came to my children. I made deals with God; deal along the lines that if he agreed to keep them safe, then he could take something else from me. I see now how ridiculous that was, that I have the power to adjust the way of the Universe, but at the time I would have done deals with the devil if I could be assured of a safe outcome for them all.
I'm very grateful that my husband is so prepared to act in a crisis, and to act to avoid a crisis. It balances out with my tendency to simply insist that the universe acknowledge my loved ones' rightful place on this Earth to live a healthy and happy long life. Only a day or two ago he seemed agitated about our eldest son's health. He has a very nasty bug. Of course, one keeps an eye out for symptoms that suggest bacterial meningitis that can happens within hours, as instructed by doctors.
Whilst my husband frets that he is not yet back to full health, ready to push the emergency button, I assure him that bugs play out the way his is playing out; that he is resting and eating well and soon he will be fine. I'm aware of my flawed thinking that nothing can happen to my babies at the same time as I struggle to go to that 'what if this bug doesn't pass?' mode of thought. I'm not so much hopeful as insistent. The Universe knows better than to fuck with me when it comes to my children.
But, the Universe always wins. In the end we have some control over little things, over the best path to take perhaps, but we have no control over what the Universe wants. It is in this way that I sit here awaiting the results of my daughter's test which will confirm or deny the sophisticated blood tests that indicate that her pregnancy should be terminated. Exuberant joy has turned to sorrow.
'I know it is such a narrow chance, Mum, but I still have hope that the blood test is some awful mistake', she wrote to me. And, some motherly instinct, some sense of what I would want to hear from my mother if in the same circumstance, had me writing, 'There is nothing wrong with hope, darling.'
To those people who have never carried life within their limbs it is impossible to explain the joy, the bliss; the hopes one has for this little life inside. The little man may not be fully formed and at risk, but still he is yours. What else is there to do but hope? What else is there to do right now? The die is cast and we have no control. We await the verdict.
Of course, my rational mind, and hers, tells me that we are unlikely to get a call saying, 'You're the one in a million. The blood test showed that the foetus was very high risk, but the CVS test has confirmed that he's fine'. She's prepared for, and I expect, to get the call to say that the diagnosis is now confirmed. In which case, we must accept that it wasn't meant to be, this time. She will grieve and she will heal, and then they will try again, because the human heart prevails. It is inspirational what the human mind and heart can endure and heal from.
In life there is suffering. There is no two ways about it. It is our search for happiness that identifies us, however. I simply hate novels that end without some sense of hope for the protagonist because if we hang in with him or her for 300 pages of conflicts, issues and problems, we'd be mad to want less than at least some hope for his or her future when we turn the last page and must leave them behind. Where there is life, there is hope.
There is considerable dissatisfaction with the medical fraternity who take 'truth giving' a bit too far, advising patients with cancer perhaps that the prognosis is very grim; fundamentally that they should get their affairs in order because there is no hope, or next to no hope. There are just too many people who are taking their health into their own hands even at that late stage of the game and achieving outcomes considered impossible by the medical practitioners.
Hope for more life, a better life, is part of the positive approach to healing advocated by some people who consult with these marked people. They work with them on their nutrition - a plant based approach. They work with them on their state of mind, getting them well established in a meditative practice, and gentle exercise regimen, and as well, they encourage them to take each moment as it comes.
Perhaps, they don't encourage 'hope' so much as they encourage a positive state of mind and an acceptance of where they are right now, and why, and where they would like to go, all being well. And, if it should be that death comes, then let it a be a good death. It's a hopeful approach because previously they had reached a dead end, whereas now they have an approach that provides them with a healthy and enhanced way of life, for however long that is.
When I was younger and having my babies, I worked on the supposition that all would be well. I quite simply didn't allow for any other thought and I certainly was not prepared for any other outcome. I'm grateful to be married to someone who simply overrides those in authority when he needs to. When my obstetrician induced me at the time of my first pregnancy and promptly left for a birthday party it was my husband who told the staff not long after that if he didn't get his ass back there and assist with a birth that was fast spiraling out of control they'd all be very sorry. The doctor ran into the room and quickly delivered the baby with forceps, for the cord was around our baby's neck and he was starving of oxygen. Would I have hit the panic button? You know I'd have left it too late.
Over time, my husband who is very detail oriented and inclined to see down the road to potential disastrous outcomes, would proselytize as to a bad outcome. Something inside me usually told me not to buy into it, especially when it came to our children. On the flip side, he sometimes was able to balance me, when I was overly invested in a specialist's prediction, for example.
It was more than me just being hopeful when it came to my children. I made deals with God; deal along the lines that if he agreed to keep them safe, then he could take something else from me. I see now how ridiculous that was, that I have the power to adjust the way of the Universe, but at the time I would have done deals with the devil if I could be assured of a safe outcome for them all.
I'm very grateful that my husband is so prepared to act in a crisis, and to act to avoid a crisis. It balances out with my tendency to simply insist that the universe acknowledge my loved ones' rightful place on this Earth to live a healthy and happy long life. Only a day or two ago he seemed agitated about our eldest son's health. He has a very nasty bug. Of course, one keeps an eye out for symptoms that suggest bacterial meningitis that can happens within hours, as instructed by doctors.
Whilst my husband frets that he is not yet back to full health, ready to push the emergency button, I assure him that bugs play out the way his is playing out; that he is resting and eating well and soon he will be fine. I'm aware of my flawed thinking that nothing can happen to my babies at the same time as I struggle to go to that 'what if this bug doesn't pass?' mode of thought. I'm not so much hopeful as insistent. The Universe knows better than to fuck with me when it comes to my children.
But, the Universe always wins. In the end we have some control over little things, over the best path to take perhaps, but we have no control over what the Universe wants. It is in this way that I sit here awaiting the results of my daughter's test which will confirm or deny the sophisticated blood tests that indicate that her pregnancy should be terminated. Exuberant joy has turned to sorrow.
'I know it is such a narrow chance, Mum, but I still have hope that the blood test is some awful mistake', she wrote to me. And, some motherly instinct, some sense of what I would want to hear from my mother if in the same circumstance, had me writing, 'There is nothing wrong with hope, darling.'
To those people who have never carried life within their limbs it is impossible to explain the joy, the bliss; the hopes one has for this little life inside. The little man may not be fully formed and at risk, but still he is yours. What else is there to do but hope? What else is there to do right now? The die is cast and we have no control. We await the verdict.
Of course, my rational mind, and hers, tells me that we are unlikely to get a call saying, 'You're the one in a million. The blood test showed that the foetus was very high risk, but the CVS test has confirmed that he's fine'. She's prepared for, and I expect, to get the call to say that the diagnosis is now confirmed. In which case, we must accept that it wasn't meant to be, this time. She will grieve and she will heal, and then they will try again, because the human heart prevails. It is inspirational what the human mind and heart can endure and heal from.
In life there is suffering. There is no two ways about it. It is our search for happiness that identifies us, however. I simply hate novels that end without some sense of hope for the protagonist because if we hang in with him or her for 300 pages of conflicts, issues and problems, we'd be mad to want less than at least some hope for his or her future when we turn the last page and must leave them behind. Where there is life, there is hope.
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