Bog #498
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"Do you want to get well?" John 5:6 (NIV)

Ask anyone who's ill and they'll answer that question: Sure. I've give most anything to be well. But...do we really want to be well?

Getting well involves some sort of change, some sort of effort on our part. In this case, the man had to believe enough to pick up his mat and walk.

Now I absolutely believe in Divine Healing, that is, instantaneous miraculous healing. However, I also believe that God sometimes uses human hands and means to heal. When Naaman was healed of leprosy, he was required to take action, go to the dirty Jordan river and dip seven times. It went against the grain. His dignity was insulted. His position made no difference; he had to follow the prophet's instructions completely before healing could begin.

Now, I could go into current spiritual examples of how we (I!) don't want to do as God says, even though I'm SAYING that I want spiritual things. But let's just take a very human, everyday one. Admitting that one has an illness and must take pills. Anybody with me??? (You know. Any "AMEN's" out there?)

My blood pressure has been running high since after my liver surgery (2005). A doctor will say, do you have hypertension?

And I say, "no. My blood pressure is just a little high today." All through cancer treatment, it ran high.

Well, what do you expect?? You're poisoning my system! Of course my blood pressure is high. But chemo has been over for more than a year and a half now, and the pressure is still high. But I do NOT have hypertension. Not me!

Finally my primary care doctor insisted on Cholesterol tests in January. The results came back: high cholesterol. I did NOT want to take cholesterol pills.

At least, he says, get a blood pressure machine and check your blood pressure at different times of the day. See if it always runs this high.

Sure. I say. And I do. I go buy the machine. And I throw it in the corner of the girls' play room -- one end of which is our TV area too. And it lies there gathering dust on the cellophane wrapping all winter, spring and most of the summer. And I watch TV, ignoring it completely!

So this summer I do the rounds of doctors. Something else which I heartily resent. I see the oncologist, the reconstructive surgeon, the gynecologist, the rheumatologist. I take the tests: the mammogram and the pap smear. I'm resentful every step of the way.

But at every office, they ask? Do you have hypertension?

"No!" No, indeed. If I did would my blood pressure machine be registering zero every day there in the corner of the playroom?

My blood pressure is supposed to run 178/101! Don't you think? Now that's not poppin' a coronary range. But it sure isn't running a marathon range either.

So finally, I go back to the primary care guy. And I agree to try a cholesterol pill and something for the blood pressure. So to see if the blood pressure pill is working, he wants me to take my blood pressure a couple of times a day.

Finally I brush off the dust, cut the cellophane and manage after several tries to get the thing on my arm. After the first week, I'm getting a tad concerned. It is higher most mornings than it was at the doctor's office. And it's almost that high at night. After it climbs to 182/108 one morning, I decide I'd better tell him the pill isn't working.

So I go back in. He changes the pill. This time the top number moves down, but the bottom won't budge. Now I'm averaging 156/104. (Just for the record, in my younger days my pressure was always 120/80.) So I call again. This time he give me another pill. Another one??? I protest!! Are you sure? This is a beta blocker, he says. Try it.

Sure. Whatever.

See? I really WANT to be well! I just don't want to do what it takes to get there!!! It felt so good to say that I don't have to take any pills except for my sinus and myofacial disorder. Those conditions could happen an any age. But to admit to hypertension? That means I'm aging. Old people have to take their pills every day!

Okay. Finally. The Beta Blocker does the trick. Now I'm running 145/85 average. That's pretty good. If I take off another 20-30 pounds, I just might get back to that earlier number.

Guess what??? I actually FEEL better. I was beginning to believe that I would NEVER get back to the level of energy that I had in 2005, prior to liver surgery. I was actually ACCEPTING that it was just my fate. I was going to walk up stairs and stop and pant for a bit. My feet would swell and my legs would ache. It was my fate. And I would be ever so valiant and not complain. Not one bit.

Somehow accepting the fact that I HAD to take pills for cholesterol and hypertension was WORSE than having the illness.

So.. I wonder? What else am I just accepting? I don't have the time to write that book I've been daydreaming about for years. I don't have the energy to get myself organized enough to have time for exercise. I don't.....???

I'd like to soar with the eagles. But sometimes I just have to wallow in the mud with the hippopotamus!