Diary........... September 2004............ Letters to Friends Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 15:09:44 -0700 (PDT) Subject: The Loss of Self The loss of self is a hard thing to face. We are taught to hold up what we do as being that upon which we are valued in this society. What we do, the roles we play.. no matter how we feel about these roles. Most of us become these roles. We are no longer individuals who have worth for simply being alive, we are parts of the machine that is our society. So when we can no longer fulfill our roles in society, in our families, we become lost and unsure of our own identities. Who am I? I don't know anymore. Ask anyone who they are and they will start to list the things they do; "I'm Jenny Doe, Jimmy's mom. I work at the Sunset Credit Union as manager of their mortgage loans section, and I coach girls soccer on the weekends. My husband Jay teaches accounting at the community college." But then Jenny gets sick and doesn't get better. She loses her ability to coach soccer, her friends find her no fun since she can't go out with them anymore. She then loses her job because she can't think straight and has lost her math skills. Jenny looks in the mirror and does not know the woman she sees. If she is very lucky her husband will honour his marrage vows of "in sickness and in health" but the odds are not with her. Most likely he will leave her for a healthy, active, fun loving woman, possibly her once friend at that. Once well off financially, Jenny may now be struggling to survive. Once Jimmy is grown and off on his own she will be alone. Jenny is now a nobody.. a cultural and social non-entity. She is not a worker, she is not a doer, she is not a wife, she is not a mother. Who is she? And does anyone besides Jenny even care? Jenny has been sick for so very long, and without the good grace to die. So even the patient role is denied her. Patients either get well or they die. Jenny does neither. She doesn't fit in any proscribed niche, so she is ignored. If they ignore her maybe she will go away. Jenny doesn't have the skills or the will to fight. She is lost in the shuffle, lost in the maze of paperwork and the "not my department" and "there is nothing I can do for you". Jenny is confused.. she knows that she is not who and what she once was, and is being told over and over again by the actions of the people she turns to for help that she is now not a person worthy of help, solice, or comfort. She is only worthy of that which is bestowed by her social status, and now she has none. She is only worth of that which is bestowed upon her by economic status, and now she has none. She is a nobody, a no one, of no value and not redeemable. Her self esteem is as shattered as can be and still let a person stay alive and be ruled sane. Our culture is more broken than Jenny is. It is broken in they way it systematically promotes youth, health, vigor, self betterment, conspicious consumption and the "I got mine and am soo much better than you are" view of the worth of life and the individual. The making of money is the end-all-be-all, and if you can't pay- you can't play. We are only what we can do. Relationships are transient. Look out for #1, and to he*l with everyone else. We are pressured to do everything we can, and push ourselves untill we break..and once we do we had better be able to get better quickly or die and get out of the way. Jenny has to get out of the way, she is but dead weight. It is only political correctness to not stare at her and her sad plight, so everyone looks away. The medical community is into the get better or die mindset. They don't want to be faced with patients they cannot fix who don't go away and stop wasting their time. Palliative care isn't a priority. Rehavilitation care is limited. Jenny doesn't get better, and she doesn't die. So they ignore her, or even drive her away. There is no status to be gained by patients who don't get better. Insurance companies want their doctors to cure patients.. it is not in the doctor's best intrests to not make them well or get them to stop coming back as often. It all ends up coming back to money.. and Jenny has none. Fixing her self esteem and self identity problems won't help her to become financially self sufficent so she is marginalized even further. Even if Jenny does have family to look after her, and financial resources at her disposal, there is not the will in the medical community to help her sort out her feels of loss.. of being lost. The subject of chronic illness is almost taboo in our society. Much like dying, it is not a subject that gets talked about much. It is antethema to the youth culture that our aging society continues to embrace in denial of their own mortality. Jenny will get no help. She must face this loss of identity alone, and she may well go to her grave never knowing who she is ever again. Phyllis -- ~*~ ** A Burden Shared is a Burden Halved. ** .........................