Self-talk, prayer and the treadmill

I've been heading back to the gym with much more regularity since the worst of winter has passed. It's not like I workout outdoors, but there are times in the middle of winter when the days are so short and so darn cold that I will come up with a multitude of reasons why it's just smarter to go home to my warm living room. Frankly, it really doesn't feel great to emerge from the gym at 5:00 pm and see that it is pitch black outside. In the hour I spent on the treadmill, day turned into night. Oh yay!

Anyway, it's much easier these days. I'm even planning to do an outdoor evening walk on Wednesdays for the next few weeks.

While I'm on the treadmill, I spend a lot of time being my own coach. My inner self-talk elevates to a laughable point. I set my program at the beginning of my workout (usually after a short warm up on the elliptical) and off I go. My music is playing, feet are moving and after the first 20 minutes or so, I need some encouragement. Insert "Coach Voice" here.

"Sue - you set the program, so you have to finish it. If you didn't think you could possibly do it with that incline, speed and run intervals, you would have set the machine to an easier program. Now quit your whining and just do it."

And I do. Thank you Running Shoe With a Wave, for the slogan that plays in my head and gets the workout done. We will talk about your out-sourcing and labour practices another time.

It is Lent.

At the beginning of Lent, I set a program of spiritual discipline for myself that involved written prayer - every. single. day. Well, guess what? About halfway through Lent, my Inner Coach kicked in. It was on a busy morning at the office when I thought "Can't I just start my day as I always do, with prayers for the day and for people I know to be in need of God's healing presence? Isn't that enough? Do I really have to write it down?"

Yes. I had set the program. I have to see it through to the end. So I picked up the pen and continued my spiritual discipline.

When that happened, I thought about how small a thing that was to grow weary of doing. It is just another kind of prayer. It's not like I don't start my morning that way anyhow. And yet, I wanted off the Lenten treadmill. I was getting tired.

Lent is a long season. This year in particular has been filled with some especially challenging moments. But I have managed to maintain the discipline I set for myself. Instead of feeling puffed up about that, I feel quite humbled. I understand why the disciples fell asleep on the job when Jesus asked them to stay awake for one lousy hour. One hour! They were exhausted.

Jesus is exhausting. Especially when we make a deep spiritual committment to stay with him all the way to the cross. But as I have long believed, if we won't or don't do this, then it is really a form of cheap grace to show up for all the joy and celebration on Easter morning.

The first glimpse of a New Day on Easter morning is so much more meaningful when one has spent the last 40 days (plus Sundays) on the treadmill called Lent. When we have truly tasted, even a bit, of the arduous journey to the utter injustice of the cross, that open tomb all but shouts to us the sheer joy of having arrived at grace itself.

Hang in there friends. We're almost there.

I know it's an advertisement...

...but I do like the sentiment behind this ad. I respectfully disagree with the first part where she says "We are not peacekeeping, or insulin, or universal healthcare." I would instead say that we ARE all of those things, but we have the potential to be so much more. I think in the end, that *is* the message behind the ad, but I would approached it in a slightly different way.

Still, I do rather like it.

Just so you know...

.....not that I have to remind you, really.

Holding a newborn baby will clear your mind of any and all worries, concerns or troubles.

All of those worries and such are still there and still need to be attended to, but one look into that tiny face, and it can all wait.

Thanks be to God.

Today

Today is Suicide Prevention Day. Tough subject to be sure.

I come from a generation in which families experiencing a death in their family by suicide were not comforted; they were ignored. It was as if the horror of their grief were contagious. People did not know what they should say, so they said nothing and the family suffering the unthinkable horror of their loss were left on their own little island of pain. After the immediate loss, came the formation of a feasable "story" that would be shared with everyone except those closest to the reality that had shaken the bereaved to their very core. That story, if done "properly", would transform somehow into fact over the years, despite its odd feeling of being somehow "off", as in, missing something. People are much more intuitive than we give them credit for, but nonetheless, suicide has been surrounded by such deep stigma that even a flimsy shroud around its truth was felt to be good enough.

Has that stigma shifted?

My deep hope is that yes, it has, even if only by small measure. The family support group (for survivors of those who have completed suicide) is held regularly at our local mental health agency and is always full, with a waiting list for the next start-up. People WANT to talk about it. How it has affected them personally and how their family life has become something new and unrecognizable. Groups such as this one are a start.

Better yet, more and more care providers at all levels (health care, social work, clergy and more) are learning that all of the old avoidance tactics need to be tossed out the window.

For example: It was once thought that speaking openly about suicide to someone who even hinted at wishing to die would actually encourage them to carry through. WRONG. The person who is hinting wants to talk about it. If you can't do it, please, please, please, direct them to someone who can help.

Another myth is that someone who is talking about suicide is just looking for attention. WRONG. They are not looking for attention, they are looking for help. There is a huge difference.

Another myth is that those who take their own lives don't care about their families. WRONG. In the mind of someone experiencing suicidal ideation, there is absolutely perfect logic to their thinking. To them, it makes perfect sense to make their exit. They truly believe that all the people they love the most will be better without them. As difficult as that may be to understand, a person's mind does not work in its usual way when these frightening thoughts play like a broken record in the mind.

This is why it is so important to intervene. Even if you are wrong about what you suspect may be happening, the worst that can happen is that you ask someone "Are you thinking about taking your life?" and they answer "No." And life goes on. If the answer is "Yes" you may just save someone's life.

You won't know unless you ask.

Here are some links:


To Write Love On Her Arms.

World Suicide Prevention Day.

Take Five to Save Lives.

New Year Friday Five: 2010 Edition

Sally over at the RevGal and Pal site says:

It is at this time of year that many (British) Methodist Churches celebrate their Annual Covenant Service, a service that will include this prayer:

I am no longer my own but yours,
Put me to what you will,
rank me with whom you will;
put me to doing,
put me to suffering;
let me be employed for you,
or laid aside for you,
exalted for you,
or brought low for you;
let me be full,
let me be empty,
let me have all things,
let me have nothing:
I freely and wholeheartedly yield all things
to your pleasure and disposal.
And now glorious and blessed God,
Father , Son and Holy Spirit,
you are mine and I am yours.
May it be so forever.
Let this covenant now made on earth
be fulfilled in heaven. AMEN

This prayer is said every year, and offers every member an opportunity to renew their covenant with God. This is no soft or easy prayer, it states in the company of others our willingness to worship God come what may, not that we should become doormats, but that we place God above all else. ( And every year if we are honest we have to acknowledge that we fail).

With this prayer in mind I bring you this Friday Five:

1. What will you gladly leave behind in 2009?
Head pain. Whether it's a 4/10 or an 8/10, it may leave now. I've. Had. Enough.

2. What is the biggest challenge of 2010 for you?
Finding and living in that tender balance between taking on and accomplishing all that my work goals place in front of me, and the self-care that will make it possible for me to reach those goals. No easy task. Trust me on that one. I know I started September with a "damn the torpedoes" attitude that was more or less a stubborn refusal to let pain get in the way of anything - life, work, happiness, you name it. That only takes a person so far until reality hits hard and once again that old Pain Monster laughs in your face again. I'm working really hard to find out what will appease the Monster and still allow me an abundance of living.

3. Is there anything that you simply need to hand to God and say "all will be well, for you are with me"? That would be pretty much everything.

4. If you could only achieve one thing in 2010 what would it be? I would really like to run a 5K. I think that's achievable. World peace would be nice too, but that may have to carry over into 2011.

5. Post a picture, poem or song that sums up your prayer for the year ahead....

The end of this:


The beginning of this:

How can you go wrong with a guy named Zamboni?

An Italian neurologist named Dr.Paolo Zamboni has some really promising research ongoing that could change the way we look at Multiple Sclerosis entirely. You can read all about it here. The research was based on Zamboni's evidence that the brains of MS patients had higher levels of toxic iron build up in their brains than is found in Non-MS patients. This led him to wonder why these iron stores were not being flushed from the brain in the same way that they would be in normal brains. (Young Frankenstein fans: feel free to remember the scene with the jar labeled "Abby Normal".....)

Anyway, here's what he said:

Dr. Zamboni wondered if the iron came from blood improperly collecting in the brain. Using Doppler ultrasound, he began examining the necks of MS patients and made an extraordinary finding. Almost 100 per cent of the patients had a narrowing, twisting or outright blockage of the veins that are supposed to flush blood from the brain. He then checked these veins in healthy people, and found none of these malformations. Nor did he find these blockages in those with other neurological conditions.

"In my mind, this was unbelievable evidence that further study was necessary to understand the link between venous function and iron deposits on the other," Zamboni told W5 from his research lab in Ferrara.

The above picture shows some of that narrowing...



The yellow deposits on the picture are the iron deposits. A simple operation to open up the jugular veins that essentially "clean out" the blood flowing from the brain has had remarkable results in Italy. Studies are now starting in both Boston and at McMaster University here in Canada (Hamilton, Ontario). As scientists are wont to do, they don't encourage people to become too hopeful too soon, but really, how can you mandate a lack of hope when you see something so positive on the horizon?

Pillar will be calling our doc for an MRI appointment asap, as the McMaster docs are asking MS patients with recent MRIs to send them in for his study.

Good stuff! At this point, let's just say we're both cautiously optimistic.