tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post4479979215557209762..comments2024-02-16T21:23:06.989-05:00Comments on ksquest: Being Disabled is Not a Character Flawkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06430423256832961746noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-9752304131213906982008-05-05T01:28:00.000-04:002008-05-05T01:28:00.000-04:00Wow, thanks for this. I was indeed too young to h...Wow, thanks for this. I was indeed too young to have any direct perception of how Reagan's ideas and policies were affecting people. I was wholly sheltered from them. My parents have always been the kind of people who are judgmental in theory but compassionate in practice; my mother makes disparaging comments about 'those people,' but when one of 'those people' runs across her lawn in tears, she brings them indoors, installs them in the guest room and takes care of them until they feel better. Dad too. <BR/><BR/>I suppose that's why I'm so inclined to give right-wing blowhards the benefit of the doubt.Pretty Ladyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00342833918614545778noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-9248211118007840942008-04-30T21:51:00.000-04:002008-04-30T21:51:00.000-04:00Please excuse me, any lingering readers. I'm goin...Please excuse me, any lingering readers. I'm going to step on some toes here, which I'd always rather not. I like you and your toes too, and don't wish to cause you any hurt.<BR/><BR/>Many of you have great respect for former President Reagan. I do not.<BR/><BR/>Of course, I believe I have extremely good reasons for this. I request you do me the courtesy of simply taking that as given, okay? I worked for his administration as a federal banking officer, and personally saw things you could not be aware of.<BR/><BR/>OTOH: I have little respect for most any politician, ever. So it may not be as personal to Reagan as it sounds.<BR/><BR/>Pretty Lady - IMO? Yes, it did, but that's only part of the story. It started way before the New Agers gathered force. It began, vaguely, in the late 1970's. It took off hugely in the Reagan administration.<BR/><BR/>I found this interesting, so I paid attention as it unfolded. I was born in 1958, and Reagan's first presidency was in 1980, when I was 22 and a real estate broker in Chicago. Interest rates were around 22% at the time, and Carter had recently appointed Paul Volker to head the Fed, where he promptly instituted monetary policy in order to control rampant inflation. In 1983 I went to college; in 1985 I graduated with my magna c. l. degree in Finance and in Real Estate. Later I worked for FSLIC and the FDIC, among others, during Reagan and Bush I, liquidating failed banks, primarily in the commercial loan workout area.<BR/><BR/>Just a little background to explain my own perspective on this. (It really does have to do with health in the end!)<BR/><BR/>As part of the great De-Federalizing of the Federal Government, Reagan helped make it extremely fashionable to blame the sick for their sicknesses, the poor for their poverty, and the mentally ill for their insanity. He dumped the crazies out on the street where we see them today, talking to themselves, eating out of garbage cans, and sometimes verbally or physically accosting us. <BR/><BR/>Of course, blaming those groups for their own ills assisted greatly in cutting off federal funds for their aid. First, dehumanize, right? A tried and true practice.<BR/><BR/>Do you remember *compassionate conservatism?* Reagan originated that spin; Bush II copied it. It didn't survive either of their presidencies. Reagan's own party, as a sort of running joke, rephrased it as the *cruel to be kind* approach. I found little in his actions that demonstrated true compassion, and found many things that demonstrated the opposite, and I was certainly not alone.<BR/><BR/>His attitude found fertile ground, and part of that ground was the New Agers. You'd think they'd be on opposite sides, but often they were not. Nancy, for example, ran Reagan's schedule - with an iron fist - by first consulting with her horoscope advisers.<BR/><BR/>*Magical thinking* - where if you believe something hard enough, it will therefore make it come true - began to be accepted as a *normal,* if non-mainstream, viewpoint. Rational discourse was not credited as much as in the past; a set of feelings could stand in for facts as an alternative but valid *belief.*<BR/><BR/>Example: Riding on some conservatives' fears of Satan and of sex, false allegations of mass, organized child abuse at the hands of *Satanists* went rampant for a while. Some innocents are still in jail, even after incontrovertible evidence clearing all others has come forth in their particular cases. Interestingly enough, years later this trend became blamed on the *liberals* rather than the conservatives (usually DA's) who rode into office on these cases. Now THAT's a great political coup, huh? If I had any respect for politicians, I'd almost admire that one.<BR/><BR/>There's a great difference between holding someone responsible for their actions, and judging their characters. During the Reagan administration, that difference was ignored at the presidential level.<BR/><BR/>Before that, it was perfectly common among the populace, but a long history of its distinction in civil and criminal law kept it out of higher politics. Most politicians, of course, are either lawyers or studied law; politics has everything to do with law, with legislation, so that's their training ground. Reagan was not an attorney, but simply a slightly self-educated person who *acted presidential,* in a phrase of the day. So he didn't have that legal background honing the distinction between responsibility and judgmentalism in his political mind.<BR/><BR/>For a wide variety of reasons, this change in attitude flowed through all aspects of governmental control. So while it may make no logical sense to you or I, standing here in 2008, what happened during that time was a great shift in the perception of human validity.<BR/><BR/>If you were sick, it was probably your fault for having the wrong attitude or beliefs. Same as calling ketchup a vegetable for school lunches. Not logical - but there you have it. There were many, many times when physical illness was blamed on a lack of Christianity, especially of fundamentalist Christianity. It's happened to me personally, to others I know, and was sometimes in the news as pertaining to policy at the time.<BR/><BR/>Throughout history, it's been very comforting to many people to be able to blame their discomforts on the underdogs of society: on the sick, the poor, the insane. However, that doesn't work very well unless those sick, poor and insane people can be held at fault. If they're innocent, you just look like a jackass. (That's where the hungry school kids bit gets tricky.)<BR/><BR/>A strange twist, there: holding others responsible for absolutely everything negative in their own lives, but not holding one's self responsible for anything negative in one's own life.<BR/><BR/>Strange fruit.<BR/><BR/>What people younger than myself can't recall from those times is this: President Reagan set records for being the president who was most approved of <I>personally</I> while his <I>policies</I> were least approved of. In other words, people adored him as a man, while often simultaneously disagreeing with many of the things he did. History taking its usual course, people now mistakenly believe that his policies were highly regarded by the majority in those times. They were not.<BR/><BR/>*The singing patient* up there nailed one very important impetus behind this change from compassion to judgment: It's also a part of *blame the victim.* If that rape victim got raped because her skirt was too short, then we can prevent bad things from happening to US by not wearing a short skirt. *They can fool themselves into thinking it will never happen to them.* How very well put.<BR/><BR/>It's not a coincidence that *singing patient* found this experience in the church. Judgment. Character. Beliefs vs. fact. Christian fundamentalism was a driving force in Reagan's election and in his politics.<BR/><BR/>As questions of human conduct so often do, it comes back to control. We want to be in control of our lives, our destinies; this is one of the very unhealthy ways that's expressed.<BR/><BR/>Your take on the mind and the body fascinates me. About ten years ago I began to see, in this clear unbroken stream, how certain forms of misuse and/or abuse from babyhood on up has influenced my physical health. Those things certainly become entrenched, don't they?! And in essence, what began it all was a lack of compassion in parenting - broadly, meaning also in the school system, etc. When I was a child, displaying much compassion for your kids was widely considered to be very bad parenting indeed.<BR/><BR/>And since we all want and need and strive to be loved by our parents, what do we tend to do? Turn stuff like that inward.<BR/><BR/>You know some of the worst results of that in my own history. I look back and understand how things happened, and see the effects even today.<BR/><BR/>But there's been a fundamental shift inside me. I believe that's why I'm still alive and more or less whole. I should be an amputee and I'm not. I should be dead and I'm not. Why?<BR/><BR/>Death was so close to me in 2004, it was hovering over me like this huge black entity. My mother and father actually came to Florida to be with me. A first in recorded history for our family, who generally holds it as Bad to Visit People When They're Sick. (It supposedly prevents them from getting better! Yeah, I've Spoken to them about that. Very, very gently. *Did you know that studies show...How interesting, huh?!* They've gotten much better.)<BR/><BR/>My mother, I think, had a sense of that black thing over me when I got home from the hospital. It was sitting in the air above my bed at home. Thick and huge and oppressive. It wanted me. I think maybe that's why my dad came too. It was very...it was almost palpable, you know? That thing. So much so that even a woman like her, that would normally laugh at the very concept of something like that, felt its presence. I felt her fear. It, too, was almost palpable.<BR/><BR/>I wanted to explain to her that it was okay, it would NOT get me, I never doubted that or had any real fear of it, just a watchful eye; but I couldn't at that point, still too sick to talk. They sent me home from the hospital a bit too early, my veins were all blown and I was a high-maintenance patient so they sort of figured --Why not?... <BR/><BR/>Mom learned how to soak my foot, then pack it with Iodoform. So did Walter, the usually squeamish. So did my dad. (Well, he already knew, of course.) Mom's *reason* for coming was that Walter was having shoulder surgery right when I was released, so he needed help for both of us. <BR/><BR/>Our friend Burke, whom we all loved and loved us back, was in another hospital with MRSA pneumonia and an abdominal MRSA abscess at the time. Poor Walter was going back and forth, sneaking us Cuban pastries in our hospitals...Burke was released and supposedly got better, but he died not long after that, perhaps from a PE. He probably gave the MRSA to me as I ferried him around to hospitals at various times.<BR/><BR/>I'd do it again, too. In a heartbeat. Oh God, how much I miss him. Why did he die, and I did not?<BR/><BR/>Both Mom and Dad went with me to Dr. M when the infection resurged and I had to get it debrided a second time, no morphine...Dad was assisting Dr. M, and my mother let me squeeze her hand and I almost broke it, I'm too strong, and my dad said impatiently, --No no no, just hold out two fingers, they can't break your bones that way-- and Dr. M laughed as he scraped. Dad sounded exactly like he was scolding a surgical nurse. In our way, we all had a very good time that day.<BR/><BR/>For them to do all that played another big part in my healing. I can feel it reverberating still, healing me with that very slow process through the density.<BR/><BR/>They had become, you see, compassionate.khttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06430423256832961746noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-83907702687152806902008-04-28T12:27:00.000-04:002008-04-28T12:27:00.000-04:00Also, a huge amount of what causes people to get s...Also, a huge amount of what causes people to get sick in the first place is by absorbing abuse over decades from PEOPLE LIKE THEM. Grrrrrr.Pretty Ladyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00342833918614545778noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-86024488397180551942008-04-28T12:25:00.000-04:002008-04-28T12:25:00.000-04:00Do you think the shift from compassion to judgment...Do you think the shift from compassion to judgment had something to do with the New Age 'you make yourself sick with your mind' sort of thinking? Because that's the source of a lot of abuse I've seen and read about.<BR/><BR/>It's a horrible and tragic mistake, because although it's true that the mind plays a part in illness, it's not a thing you control with your <I>will.</I> You don't 'think happy thoughts' and get better; it's much subtler and broader than that. It has much more to do with the sort of courage and grace that YOU show, k, on a daily basis. In your own very deep way, k, you ARE healed--they're just too ignorant to see it. <BR/><BR/>Also, physical illness is an incredibly dense thing, which does not respond quickly to changes in consciousness. It takes a long time for negative psychic energy to 'dense down' into a physical illness, and thus a change in that energy will take a long time to show a physical result. Also, there's a feedback loop going the other way--pain and disability have a terribly dragging-down effect on your mind. Thus there's definitely a mind-body <I>connection,</I> but one does not rule the other.<BR/><BR/>And finally, the primary rule of all this is that you cannot EVER know what's going on with someone else; you cannot EVER get into their heads and know all that has gone on to contribute to their illness. Thus judgment is not EVER appropriate.<BR/><BR/>Grrr. This is basic.Pretty Ladyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00342833918614545778noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-64343874830903031652008-04-28T00:38:00.000-04:002008-04-28T00:38:00.000-04:00Thank you all, so very much. You have moved me to...Thank you all, so very much. You have moved me to tears.khttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06430423256832961746noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-4365303233168752172008-04-27T21:00:00.000-04:002008-04-27T21:00:00.000-04:00If I'd been quicker on my feet, I'd have asked thi...If I'd been quicker on my feet, I'd have asked this question: --Just out of curiosity, because I really do want to know, can you tell me precisely what those people would be trying to *get?* What sort of payoff would they be trying to *milk* from their disabilities?--<BR/><BR/>K..my thoughts, exactly, as I was reading what you said about those insensitive people.<BR/><BR/>How in the world, anyone, could think that a person could be after 'what they can get' out of a terrible, dibilitating, affliction is beyond me.<BR/><BR/>It's enough to make you sick..but don't allow it to make you feel worse than you do, now, if you can possibley help it.<BR/><BR/>There are plenty of us out here, who really do care, and admire you, so talk about everything as much as you want or need to.<BR/><BR/>I'm so sorry you had to be hurt like that.Janhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16083702120097667613noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-17995044284551337322008-04-27T19:51:00.000-04:002008-04-27T19:51:00.000-04:00well said!i have labels for a couple things you de...well said!<BR/>i have labels for a couple things you describe here.<BR/>one of them is "compassion fatigue." folks who are willing to help at first, then they realize they will never be rewarded by getting to see you"all better" again, like helping someone with a broken foot or a cold (something finite, as opposed ot a chornic illness that never goes away.)<BR/><BR/>the earlier part of your post reminds me of "blame the victim," which i experienced in my case from the very folks in the church. it's like the folks who blame a rape victim by saying she was "asking for it" because of how she was dressed. why do they do this? think it's self-centered fear. if they can convince themselves that you brought it on yourself, then they can fool themselves into thinking it will never happen to them.<BR/><BR/>i joined a yahoo e mail group called "lupies"<BR/>between that and my blog, and other blogs like yours, i feel much less alone/ insane, because someone has always been through what I have.<BR/><BR/>thanks for sharing your thoughts.Carla Ulbrich, The Singing Patienthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15102866927457990437noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-13373542292614505152008-04-27T19:50:00.000-04:002008-04-27T19:50:00.000-04:00Yep, they do judge and usually come up with a nega...Yep, they do judge and usually come up with a negative judgement.Nancyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12629439279545629954noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-7543579954667501172008-04-27T16:25:00.000-04:002008-04-27T16:25:00.000-04:00The number of ignorant people in the world is frig...The number of ignorant people in the world is frightening.<BR/>I so much admire your strength and your determination, k.Jeanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02099808690177823190noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11967806.post-24913842565724612082008-04-27T09:23:00.000-04:002008-04-27T09:23:00.000-04:00Always interesting, K. Good to hear from you.Always interesting, K. Good to hear from you.Cefenixhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00075899171375575013noreply@blogger.com