Healing vs. Curing . . . in Memory of the One Who Taught Me The Difference

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=220 BGCOLOR="#CCCC99" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Practical Spirituality"><U>WMEades.com Home Page</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="http://www.counseling-waco.com" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://www.counseling-waco.com"><U>Counseling-Waco Home Page</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="http://wacopartnership.org" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://wacopartnership.org"><U>Waco Partnership for Psychological and Spiritual Care Home Page</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="http://practicalspirituality.wordpress.com/" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://practicalspirituality.wordpress.c"><U>Practical Spirituality Blog</U></A></div> <div> _________________________</div> <div> <A HREF="aboutme.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="About Me and My Work"><U>About Me and My Work</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id518.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Making an Appointment"><U>Making an Appointment</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="policies.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Policies"><U>Policies</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="cost.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Cost of Counseling"><U>Cost of Counseling</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="helpfularticles.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Helpful Articles"><U>Helpful Articles</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="directions.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Directions to Office"><U>Directions to Office</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="booksummaries.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Book Summaries"><U>Book Summaries</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="counseling.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Pastoral Counseling"><U>Pastoral Counseling</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="premarriage.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Premarriage Counseling"><U>Premarriage Counseling</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="enneagram.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Enneagram"><U>The Enneagram</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id494.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Alcoholics Anon. Mtgs."><U>Alcoholics Anon. Mtgs.</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="faith.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="When Faith Doesnt Work"><U>When Faith Doesn't Work</U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="http://www.theravive.com" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://www.theravive.com"><U><IMG SRC="83da03c0.jpg" border=0 width="160" height="60" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" BGCOLOR="#EEEEEE" TEXT="#080000"> <div>  by Don Murdock         (8/27/00) </div> <bR> <div> She was thirty eight going on fifteen when, on my way to Grand Rounds, I met her in the hallway of the locked psychiatric unit. With a wide-eyed look of a frightened fawn, she leaned into the wall to let me pass. Softly, I called her by name then moved on, wondering about the source, magnitude, and origin of her fear instilled isolation. At Grand Rounds, her psychiatrist reviewed her life, illness, treatment, and bleak prognosis. His treatment plan included me as her pastoral therapist. So we began our ten year journey. </div> <bR> <div> Her emotional, relational, and spiritual life had been frozen in time, twenty four years earlier during the night she was raped by her father. She was almost fourteen. At fifteen she was admitted to the psychiatric unit after a near-lethal suicidal effort. She was diagnosed with a bipolar disorder, hospitalized for two weeks and discharged with medication. This was the beginning of twenty four years of treadmilling her way between hospitals, outpatient treatment programs, halfway houses, broken relationships, three miscarriages, drugs, a sexually transmitted disease, and surviving on the streets of her small Midwestern city. By age twenty-four, her diagnosis included an untreatable congenital chronic heart disease. She summarized her life, I do whatever is necessary to make it through the light of another day, and then whatever is necessary to get through the darkness of another night. </div> <bR> <div> A new psychiatrist diagnosed her with chronic schizophrenia, changed her treatment plan, and soon her symptoms began to soften in depth and duration. Later she told me how this physician's Christ-like kindness also helped her improvements. By twenty six, she was enjoying frequent periods of relatively stable living and clear thinking. During this period she gave her life to Christ. She was baptized into a small fellowship that accepted her and her off-beat companions. During the next twelve years hospitalization was less frequent. She worked part-time cleaning houses and studied scripture and books on Jesus and Christian living. She grew close to Christ and learned to set boundaries to protect her from those that tended to use her. She also learned to trust her primary care providers, including myself. She committed herself to chastity and to abstinence from drugs and alcohol. She managed her medications and kept doctors appointments. She managed her money and controlled most of her impulsions. Then, on her thirty eighth-birthday, her mother died. She became an orphan in a very scary world. She decomposed rapidly into a very bizarre psychotic episode. She regressed to that traumatized fourteen year old girl. Once again she was placed in a locked psychiatric unit. These were the circumstances in which she slowly allowed me to join her in her journey for the next ten years. I remain indescribably grateful to her for extending to me such courage and generosity. She, more than anyone else, taught me about healing not just about healing in general but healing specifically, hers, mine, ours, perhaps even yours. </div> <bR> <div> I want to share with you what I learned. </div> <bR> <div> Curing and healing are not the same things. Curing is a bio-chemical process. Broken bones and many diseases can be cured, i.e. restored to their previous condition. Healing is about wholeness. A person can experience a cure and yet, not be healed in any meaningful sense. Healing is characterized by acceptance of reality, even painful reality. It is about making peace with what is and doing the best one can within limitations. It is about commitment to ones identity, value, and purpose in living. It is about becoming a centered-self rather than living self-centered. It is about a deep sense of well-being even in the midst of brokenness. It is about living freely and responsible within the reality of ones identity and resources. All of this correctly implies that one can experience a cure, say from a chronic life threatening disease, and never be truly healed. I know one person who was cured of cancer after a five year intense medical struggle. For the next ten years he continued to grow more bitter because he had lost a very promising business during those years and therefore his one chance to really become somebody. His rancor and bitterness has contributed to his alienation of his children and the divorce by his wife. </div> <bR> <div> She also taught me that courage and trust are more important than having access to the very best health care and having clarity about the future. For her the main lasting issue that emerged during her thirty ninth year was: When I am now up against something I cannot change, e.g., chronic schizophrenia, heart disease, sexually transmitted disease, and having no family, the issue is how I will let these things that I cannot change, change me. Will I let them change me for the better or for the worse? This is the main issue. I am convinced that only a person who is experiencing healing can engage this tough an issue. It is no wonder that she often requested that we pray specifically that God would fortify her courage and trust. She also requested that God help her learn to discern trustworthy people from those that would use and abuse her. As time unfolded she became healed enough to know that these are the durable goods that would enable her to learn to live as fully as possible until the day of her death. </div> <bR> <div> She and the Lord enjoyed together her healing journey toward wholeness during the last ten years of her life. I know, I know. By our cultures standards she was never truly successful. To the day that she died of heart disease, most who saw her labeled her as sick or deficient. What some of us knew was a whole story, and it reveals one who did the best she could with what she was given, and in the end made a difference in the lives of others. She trusted enough to let the Only One who can hold any one of us together from the center of our being pull the brokenness of her life into a mosaic of courage, trust, hope, faith, love, and even beauty. And what she learned she shared with me and a few others. And I have passed these lessons on in practice and teaching to many others now for the past fifteen years. </div> <bR> <div> Isnt it amazing how this one who suffered from diseases that tend to restrict victims to a tiny circle of social influence allowed her life to have a range of healing influence that includes many, even you? How did she accomplish this? I dont have all of the answers for this question. But certainly one of the key factors was in her letting the Lord get just enough of a toehold in her life to lead her over great time and tumult toward deep healing. Back then there were no cures for what ailed her. But, she learned from Jesus that healing is always possible. With Him faithfully strengthening her courage and trust, she set out on a journey toward wholeness, i.e., of letting that of which she could not change, change her for the better. At her memorial service, we celebrated her life. She had come to finally know who she was, that she was of infinite value, that her security was in Christ, and that her life had meaning. Furthermore, she enjoyed a glimmer of realization that she had made a lasting contribution to those of us who were privileged to walk with her. She became one of the most profoundly healed people I shall ever know. Her eyes and heart had taken on the qualities of her First Love. </div> <bR> <div> I remember. I honor. She is one of Gods glorious gifts and fine teachers. </div> <bR> <div> (reprinted with permission of the author)</div> </td> </tr></table></body>