The Marvelous Transformation. Emily A. Filmore

      Caregiver Tips

      • Know that your loved one may have to make decisions that might seem “outside the plan” at first, but those decisions will greatly enhance health, and, therefore, daily life.

      • Be prepared for a loss of income. Spending adjustments will need to be made in order to support the necessary health-related decisions.

      • Assure your loved one that he or she need not feel guilty about any of this, and allow yourself to know that dealing with chronic disease is difficult enough, without feeling terrible about the effects it is having on your family.

      • Understand that just as your loved one’s life and physical reality has changed with autoimmunity, your life will change as well.

      • Be patient with your loved one; he or she is more frustrated with the changes than you are. With the loss of independence, dignity suffers.

      • You may be asked to take on more housework and more physical and emotional responsibility in your relationship. Are you ready and willing to do so? Just as your loved one might wish to seek professional support in dealing with the changes, it could be beneficial for you as well.

      • You may offer support through back rubs and foot and arm massage, which can be extremely comforting to your loved one.

      Create Your Own Marvelous Transformation

      Grab your journal and spend a few minutes contemplating what you just read. Use the following questions to guide you.

      1. What situation or example resonated most with you in this chapter?

      2. When faced with a similar situation, how do you feel, act, or think?

      3. What would you most like to remember from this chapter?

      Now we’re going to take this to the next level. You are going to make your own mind-over-matter decision, right here, right now. Follow these steps, and don’t skip any of the hard parts. The more thought, time, care, and attention you invest, the greater your rewards will be.

      1. Set aside an hour of uninterrupted time, where you can focus on yourself and don’t need to worry about any family, social, or work obligations. If you can do that right now, wonderful; if not, go ahead and mark a date in your calendar. Make any necessary arrangements (childcare, etc.), or simply let your partner and family members know that you will be unavailable at this specified time. Do not try to skip this step or squeeze it into a five minute window.

      2. Now that you have an hour scheduled for yourself, find a quiet place where you can be undisturbed for the duration of that time. Do whatever form of mental and spiritual preparation works best for you, and make sure you are in a centered, calm, and relaxed frame of mind. Now meditate, pray, or otherwise think deeply about the life you want to lead. Your ideal life. Let there be no boundaries, no limitations. No dream is too big. Allow your subconscious to put it all out there for your conscious self to see. Spend at least ten minutes thinking about the question. What is your ideal life? How do you feel there? What do you find yourself doing? Who are the people around you? What is the place or space around you? What are the activities you’re doing and the sights and sounds you’re absorbing? What does it feel like to be this happy? Let it resonate with you. Feel it in your body, in your gut, and in your cells. Let the sensations of living your ideal life wash over you.

      3. When you’re done glimpsing into your ideal life, “download” as much of what you’ve just seen onto paper. Spend a good twenty minutes on this. Write notes, draw pictures, or write a poem—anything to capture what your dream life looks and feels like. Take special note of anything related to the senses. What clothes were you wearing? What colors surrounded you? What was the weather like? What aromas and tastes made you happy? The activities you were enjoying: what did they feel like to the touch? Focusing on these elements helps you side-step the logical and limiting part of your mind, giving you greater and more unmediated access to the details of your ideal life.

      4. When you feel you’ve gotten the essence of your dream life captured on paper, sit back and take it all in. Which aspect of the dream—what real-life goal—can you identify that, if you pursued it successfully, would bring about the most elements of your ideal life with the least amount of time and effort? Allow another ten minutes for this thinking process. Don’t get overwhelmed with everything you think you could or should be doing; all you have to do right now is find and pick the one thing—that one activity, task, accomplishment, or change—that would get you closest to your dream in the shortest amount of time. For example, let’s say your dream is to own your own restaurant in an exotic location, where you spend your days cooking up exquisite five-star gala dinners for a glamorous clientele. For right now, your task would not be to find and apply for a program at a culinary school. Rather, you might simply make a commitment to cooking a festive meal for your family once a week and, perhaps, to challenge yourself to learn something new by using a new cookbook, looking up a new recipe online, or finding a magazine with five-star culinary ideas. The point is to hone in on what you can do in your life right now, realistically and attainably, to bring you closer to your ideal life. If you had more than one dream (and most of us do), focus on the one that makes you feel most alive. Then identify and formulate a realistic goal toward making that dream (the activities and experiences associated with the happiness you feel in the dream) a reality.

      5. Now, think about and list the steps it will take to accomplish your goal. This should take another ten minutes or so. If you pictured yourself running a marathon, outline what you might have to do to get there, such as taking medicines as prescribed, attending aquatic therapy to start building muscles, doing yoga, walking around the block, walking to the store, joining a gym and walking a track, completing a 5K, or completing a half marathon. If you saw yourself in a specific career, write down the steps to achieve it, such as going to school, getting an internship, or making connections in the field.

      6. Finally, for the remaining ten minutes, break down the steps you’ve listed and incorporate them into your daily life and schedule. Set dates, schedule appointments, make a to do list for today, tomorrow, next week, next month, and so on. Consider how this goal and your new commitment to it will affect your loved ones and your other existing commitments, and think of ways in which you can prepare and accommodate them. At the end of the hour, ground yourself again in whichever way works best for you, and close your mind-over-matter session with an expression of appreciation. Thank the universe for the inspiration and guidance you’ve received, and express your gratitude for all it is doing for you (whether fully realized or yet in process). You could say, “I am grateful for my health” (no matter what level of it you have right now), “I am grateful for my family,” “I love my home,” “I am excited to experience working toward my new goal,” “I look forward to that trip I am going to take” (even if it isn’t planned yet), or “Thank you (God, Universe, my self, etc.) for the financial security I am experiencing.”

      I’ve never run a marathon, but a few years ago I was able to work up to running six miles, from having trouble walking to the end of my driveway. It is one of the most fulfilling physical successes I’ve experienced in my life. It was short lived, but I did it! I wanted to run a marathon and was about to commit to training for it when one of my flares hit. I didn’t run the marathon, or even continue running six miles, but the accomplishments I had along the way made up for it.

      Ponder these words: “I have no attachment to results.” For me this means that I set goals, work at them, and appreciate the journey, knowing that sometimes the end result may look different from what I have envisioned. I have come to know that this is okay. I haven’t failed if I don’t reach my planned outcome because each step along the way has its own reward, and I often end up in places or situations I have never imagined.

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