Deena BinghamIn my last post I discussed again, as I have many times about taking control of your life, no matter your circumstance. Unfortunately, when we have a chronic condition or disease we can go down the road of acquiring an unhealthy need for control; there is a fine line between being purposeful, to being fanatical and having a constant need to control your entire environment. That balance is very hard to find.
This is an area of my life that I am seriously working on right now. I went from trying to control parts of my life, environment and health, to trying to control all aspects of it! This my friends can have a deleterious affect on our physical and mental health; when we go from one extreme to the other, we eventually arrive on a path of an overwhelming need for complete control! Some sort of middle ground would be nice!
In all human being
s there is an innate need for some sense of control. For those of us with a chronic condition, mental or physical control over our lives, bodies and or our mind is taken away from us. We
feel powerless to do anything about our condition, which in turns leads us into feeling like we are completely spinning out of control!
I spent years in and out of the hospital with Lupus Meningitis, never really recuperating from the last flare, before the next one began. Not to mention the years of trying to gain control of my mental health as well before the physical health journey even began, never realizing how closely the two were connected. This roller coaster of flaring, recovery and not knowing my triggers, or not being able to control those triggers, being powerless and subconsciously feeling like I was truly going to die from this disease, mentally and physically, led me into an internal response of constantly being in fight or flight mode. That innate, primal sense that all humans have when we are confronted with danger. The response of kill or be killed, fight or flee, our brain pumping huge amounts of adrenaline into our body! I was unable to get out of this mode, my mind and body never fully relaxing. The toll that this constant response took on me physically and mentally was not good! It led me on a path, as mentioned above, to having an unhealthy need to control everything! I felt if I could control my entire environment, I could control the Lupus, my mental state and everything in between and this in turn would give me a much better chance of survival.
As my husband can attest, I not only starting controlling my health, diet, exercise, medications & supplements, I went into the mode of needing to control everything! Finances, house, cleaning, etc. I would go into panic mode if we ran out of anything! It didn’t matter if it was milk, ketchup, gas for my car or toilet paper, I needed to always fill up or buy two or three because panic would set in at the thought of running out. I panicked that if I didn’t take a particular supplement, or even was a little bit lazy I would spiral! I panicked when I didn’t sleep well, thinking I was going to end up in the hospital. I panicked when I was even a little bit depressed or anxious, thinking I was going to spiral back into that darkness, I began to worry I wasn’t a good enough mother, wife, goat owner, friend, Christian or even a patient! Silly, I know, I wanted to be the perfect patient! I felt if I wasn’t then no one would truly take my journey seriously. Like I have said before, my balance was a little off. This is just a little synopsis of me shifting into the fanatical, too much control mode.
The “sense of control” is really the middle ground here, as long as we sense that we do have control over our life, then we won’t move into the unhealthy fanatical phase of control, or the feeling of free-falling 5000 feet without a parachute!
My journey that I have taken in the last ten years has led me to a much better place, and continues to do so. There is a difference between fanatical and purposeful, it just took me awhile to find that balance (I am still trying to find it). 🙂
That being said, I share this part of my life with you because I want you to know that you are not alone. It may look like I, or other people have it together from the outside looking in, but from the inside out this is not always the case. We all struggle with finding balance in our lives! This post is about finding that balance between too much and too little control. My advice to you when you are shifting from spinning out of control to find your “sense of it”, remember to always keep it in perspective. You will not always do it right, it will take time to find your balance and once you do find it, you will occasionally tilter and fall off. Always find the joy in your journey and celebrate when you do find balance in the different aspects of your life. Remember this whole process and life itself is a constant journey, we live and learn during the process and we will continue to learn and grow through out our entire lives (I hope I will)! Learn to recognize what works for you and what doesn’t, but most of all congratulate yourself for even trying,
I pray you find that balance and I hope that my journey has helped in some small way and I thank you for being a part of it.
Your Friend, Deena
