#We The People | Owls and Orchids

Posts Tagged ‘#We The People’

What a lot of Hokum.

Posted in Challenges, Coping Skills, Depression, Gratitude, Health, Identity, Life, Lyme Disease, Philosophy, Psychology, Self Development, Spirituality, Uncategorized, tagged # X Files, #babesiosis, #being presnent, #elf development, #Imperfectly Perfect, #ME/CFS, #Star Trek, #We The People, acceptance, Bartonella, coping skills, frustration, Living from the heart, Lyme disease, Mindfulness, pain, self acceptance, Soul Growth, Spirituality, Susan Jamieson, unconditional love on January 17, 2014| 4 Comments »

image from http://www.josephinewallart.co.uk

“The purpose of government is to enable the people of a nation to live in safety and happiness. Government exists for the interests of the governed, not for the governors.”
― Thomas Jefferson

What a lot of Hokum for We The People.

~~~~~

I had originally decided to do a short blog and call it ‘The Spirit is willing but the flesh is Weak”. Yet the more I thought about it the more I realised it simply was a hoax. Most importantly I was simply fooling myself. It sounds so pathetic to continually say, “It’s been a bad week” or “I’ve had a rough couple of days” or any number of other platitudes.

That’s not to say that they aren’t true, it’s just that I’m tired of using the same statements as if I trot out one after the other when things are… challenging. I’m not sure quite where I am on this sliding spectrum which I use to gauge how well I’m travelling. Truthfully, I’m feeling more than a little sick and tired with being sick and tired and not really knowing if I’m on the right track.

image from http://www.pcuseful.com Train track leading where?

For so long I dragged myself to the doctors and presented the same old symptoms, tiredness, aches in joints and muscles, my motivation slowly drained away as it became more and more difficult to do things. I’m a perfectionist. I’m also a control freak. I like things to be neat and tidy. I can find nothing wrong with being able to tell anyone exactly where to go to find anything they need in my home. At least I could do that a couple of years ago.

There are my detractors who accused me of OCD, but heck, at least I didn’t need to upend my home to locate a letter I need. I revel in my individuality and I don’t expect anyone else to follow suit – each to his own.

image from frommylivingroom.blogspot.com Everything in it’s pace and a place for everything.

Then I was told about Lyme disease. It seemed to fit so many of the anomalies in the symptoms I had. The medication protocols are – unpleasant. If Fibromyalgia causes Brain fog then Lyme – its co-infections and the medication to ‘treat’ it definitely increases it exponentially. But I’m no quitter. I’ve gone through the protocols, dragged myself in ever decreasing circles of confusion and despair trying to determine if I’m simply grasping at straws. And I’m still not finished.

I’ve blogged about it because I’ve struggled to find support groups or people who are willing to share information. How odd. Here is a disease the AMA refuse to accept is in Australia, penalise doctors who treat it and we cannot find anyone to give us recommendations to people who are helping the ‘sufferers’. Those who find these people, usually friends, or friends or friends, keep that information to themselves. Why? Is getting well to be a hoarded treasure? Bygone days of the privileged living and the disadvantaged fading away unnoticed.

image from alternews.com – Where did the floor come from?

I’m not simply tired, I’m exhausted. My arms scream at me in pain for typing, but this is my only outside contact. It’s lonely not being able to see or speak with people. One more day of crawling up the hallway is making me shake uncontrollably. Is this Lyme disease, Bartonella or Babesiosis or some other confounded co-infection I’ve yet to be advised of; or is it Fibromyalgia, ME/CFS or one of its familiars?

I was feeling blah this morning. I had several appointments and I’d had a rough night. In fact I crawled up to the bathroom and cried for about an hour. I’m not giving in, but where the hell do I go? How do I persuade my GP to look at my symptoms differently – not simply hand out stronger pain meds that leave me FOGGY!!!

To be able to think is such a gift. To know you are making sense and perhaps helping someone who needs to read this… that is my impetus for continuing. I have no answers, just a zillion questions. I want answers because I feel the medical establishment owe us that much – and then decent treatment. I have a right to a quality of life that is good enough to let me do what I’d like without crippling me. There is no need for it. If the damned doctors and insurance companies had done their due diligence when I had my accident, my simple accident, I wouldn’t be in this predicament now. I truly believe so. I wish I could sue the bejaysus out of them.

image from http://www.ehow.com How can I help you?

For the first time today, I ‘listened’ to someone who had always presented a positive push for the treatments they were given, the illness that accompanied them and was able to do so many physical activities I dream of doing’. Today I listened to them bemoaning their shuffling gait to reach the beach, crying because of the brain fog, the inability to raise your head from wherever it lays, and not be able to DO anything. I admire this person, but here they are, for the first time in my space.

I want to offer advice but I am unable since no-one shared advice with me, I have none to offer except to say, I understand, I am there still, drowning in this misery but determined not to let it win.

image from http://www.bannerhealth.com I’m right here, You are not Alone!

I am going to search for these mysterious support forums and try to find out if these diseases have the same symptoms or not and what works for them. I have a few answers from dear people today. Yoga terrifies me because the pain is well established but I’ll try. I may not have an answer, but by heavens, I will control my environment as much as I can so I can enjoy, to the fullest extent, the life I have been handed. I will also pass on any information I uncover – as a reference only, to be talked over with your doctors so that perhaps, in the fullness of time, we can beat these blasted torturous diseases. Such is my hope. Such is my prayer for all of us.

image from childrensbookshop.circlesoft.net Here come the answers!

As human beings, as Spirits having a human existence we search for answers. This is a prime directive so that we can learn. There is “a strange new world” out there, “new life and new civilisations” and, even more important, “The Truth is Out There”.

image from aliens.wikia.com

What more could we ask for? Who was right, Spock or Kirk? Does “The good of the many outweigh the good of the few” or Does “The good of the one outweigh the good of the many?

We all deserve a better future.

Blessings, Susan x

We The People

Imperfectly Perfect

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We The People

Posted in Coping Skills, Gratitude, Health, Identity, Life, Philosophy, Psychology, Uncategorized, tagged #affordable healthcare, #chronic ill health, #Doctors Without Borders, #equality of the people, #Government Health Policies, #healthcare, #illness doesn't discriminate, #We The People, Chronic pain, Gratitude, health on January 8, 2014| 39 Comments »

image from http://www.josephinewallart.co.uk

We the People.

I am going to be critical of our respective health care systems and patient treatment, so if you will be offended, skip this post.

I have read posts from friends I care about, posts which have reduced me to despair. I wonder where we are all going and what the purpose behind this is. It seems almost too much to ask a person to accept and yet that is what we are being asked to do – but by whom?

In my heart I see the suffering of my friends and search my heart, my soul, for some way to help them and stop this insidious separation of healthy people from those who are struggling with theirs. Why has this treatment of the ill as an unwelcome burden on society resurfaced with such callous indifference?

This reminds me of the days of biblical times where the lepers were isolated because they believed all forms of leprosy were a curse from the gods and contagious. It reminds me of more civilised days where the ill and infirm were locked way as an embarrassment. The improvements in our healthcare systems, in the knowledge of our doctors and specialists were supposed to bring better healthcare to the sick.

image from http://www.leprosymission.org.uk Spinalonga, off the north-east coast of Crete operated until 1957

It appears from changes that are occurring that this is now in decline. The day may come, sooner than we wish, when only those with money are able to have good healthcare, good doctors. I am at a loss to understand the thinking behind these changes.

As part of the “first world” countries, we send doctors, nurses and billions in healthcare to “third world” countries whilst at the same time we fail to offer the same degree of care, the duty of care, the Hippocratic oath doctors must swear, in the care of people in our own countries.

I am truly grateful that we have “Doctors without Borders” and other groups. I admire and respect their dedication and service. I would like to say the same thing about the service offered at home.

image from hellaheaven-ana.blogspot.com

The reality is apparent. Politicians, doctors, specialists, have the financial means to see the best person to attend to their needs in hospitals or otherwise. OK, they have earned it. I do not believe the rest of society, because they are not as financially independent, should be denied the same level of care. I am grateful for their abilities, I am grateful they are successful, yet I fail to see why these abilities should be the privilege of the wealthy.

Recently I read a letter from a doctor who said he was only responsible for diagnosing the problem and ‘ordering’ the medication for the patient. Any ancillary care was up to the patient to arrange, if they could afford it (detoxing, herbs, massage, science, food as medicine, meditation, alternative therapiesor physiotherapy etc.). Is this a case of Russian Roulette?

image from http://www.nnym.org – Which one today? Red and Yellow and Pink and Blue, Purple and Orange and Green..…

Things in Australia are different from in America or Britain. I understand the new ‘Obama-care’ is reviled for disenfranchising people. In Australia, if you are ill and are unable to afford private health insurance you may as well forget care at all because by the time the public system gets to you, you are probably too ill to benefit from it.

It is the usual case, if you cannot afford to pay for private health cover (I did until recently) then you are out of luck. You cannot see a specialist, go to a private hospital or get any assistance from any source. You go on a never-ending waiting list. Yet the doctor says: go to your local hospital. But, whatever you do, do not go via a friend’s car or you will sit in the waiting room forever. As unpalatable as it sounds, and as much as you wish to be “independent”, take the ambulance. At least you will be in the emergency room; probably in a hall, but there none the less.

image from http://www.australiandoctor.com.au

You see, here in Australia, unfortunately I cannot speak for America or Britain, we have a dire shortage of doctors, even if the Government and AMA disagree. We accept overseas students to train to be doctors and specialists, who then, instead of returning home afterwards and thus saving every country the need to send OUR doctors there to treat their people (remember “Doctors without Borders”), they remain here for a much better lifestyle and pay. We cannot even afford to see these doctors. We therefore accept trainee doctors in hospitals from overseas and the commentary of that defies logic.

Why can they not allow our children who want to be doctors and specialists to train in our Universities and then treat us? Why? Because all the places are taken by these overseas students who amazingly cannot speak English and need translators when they get into difficulty. I beg your pardon? They cannot speak English? How can they study or treat patients later? It’s a miracle; they develop the ability by osmosis the moment they graduate.

image from http://www.placidarabic.com

I am told we need the overseas students to help pay for our Universities. What is our damned Government doing, in fact what is every damned Government doing? My friends, and countless others who are ill and in pain, who need to see doctors, specialists or have hospital care, are being manipulated by the various systems being underhandedly put in place to see that they are not cared for.

If ‘we’ as a global society can spend billions on overseas healthcare in aid programs, then it behoves us to ensure that at home, our own people are given the best healthcare possible. After all, each “first world” country accepts hundreds, if not thousands, of refugees each year. Each person is given free healthcare – but the tax payers of the country are treated with less dignity and respect than the refugees.

image from http://www.news.com.au Just swimming in cash

I do not begrudge anyone healthcare, irrespective of who they are or where they hail from. I simply believe that, as the Americans would say, “We the people” are entitled to the best care possible without gouging our pockets to receive it. I’m sorry, but I have yet to see any healthcare professional walking around in pain and not able to obtain assistance. We should also be able to.