My beliefs when it comes to Medicine are simple; if something works that’s what I want. Whether it is allopathic or holistic doesn’t really make a difference. Efficiency is priority when it comes to being sick for me. When I get sick I go to my doctor, who fits the typical American doctor-type. His practice is in an office environment, he has a medical degree from NYU, and yes, he does have a white lab coat. He is that stereotypical doctor, looks at you as a patient; he doesn’t really form a real personal connection with you. He finds what’s wrong with you (most of the time), tells you what options you have to treat it, you pick one, and he sends you on your way. It’s an industrial system, and I have no problem fitting into it. The reason I’m fine with it might because the way my parents deal with sickness. Especially my mom, considering that she is the one who takes care of me while I’m sick.
I took the time to ask my mom about the different aspects of illness and dying. The first thing that we discussed is the idea of holistic medicine versus allopathic because that is what we had been talking about in class. One interesting thing that came up was the idea of no medicine at all. To let your body fight the disease on it’s own. My mother believes that if you don’t need to take medicine, you shouldn’t. She said that the body’s immune system could fight off most diseases in time if it has the chance. Well if no medicine is used, does that fall under holistic? I think that it depends on what you are doing while sick. Like if you are eating soups or other foods that people believe to speed up healing, it could be recognized as using holistic medicine. When I brought that up to my mom, she rebutted, saying with that logic anything that you believed helped heal you while you were sick can be considered holistic medicine. That’s the problem with the holistic vs. allopathic debate, while allopathic medicine is more defined and standardized, holistic medicine can range from your homemade hangover remedy to acupuncture.
As our conversation progressed I asked my mom how she views dying. I know this question is very broad, and not the type of question that we should normally be asking, but I wanted to see how she would react. I wanted to know her complete thought process about dying. At first, she seemed puzzled, like I was attacking her with my question. She asked me what I meant by my question. I think she felt the same way I felt when you asked me that question. I was thrown off by it because it’s just not a question that is usually asked. Dying is considered so negative that people try to think about it as little as possible. I guess my reaction was similar to hers because it’s just something that we don’t talk about. It’s a taboo. But she discussed it with me nevertheless, saying how she doesn’t think of dying in the same way as most people. She thinks about it differently in the setting, that dying should be done in an environment that the person feels comfortable with. That dying in a hospital is not the way to go, because you try to be at a hospital as little as possible in life. So why would you spend possibly the most precious moments of your life there? I wasn’t surprised by this answer because that’s how I see dying. And why do I see dying like this? Because that’s how my mom has taught me to see dying.
To go more in-depth about how she felt about dying, I asked her how she would like to be cared for while dying. She said it depends on what’s happening to cause her death. She said that based off of her experience with her father and grandparent’s deaths, it made her realize that sometimes if you can come to terms with your dying, it’s easier to not fight it. That you should go against the common belief of doing anything to live longer. Because when your not trying to fight whatever is killing you, you have the time and energy to actually enjoy the last moments of life that you have left. That idea really spoke to me. People are always obsessed with trying to preserve and extend life. But if they are spending all the time they have trying to create more of it, how are they supposed to enjoy the time they already have? Dying is a part of life, and accepting death can make life a whole lot more enjoyable. That cliché saying, “Live each day like it’s your last” is true to an extent. If you enjoy life a lot, when it comes time to die, it might not be so bad.
Kevin,
ReplyDeleteYour use of detail is impeccable and most definitely admirable. One thing you could build off on more is how your mother's ideas on death overlap with that of your own. You had mentioned it in last sentence of 3rd paragraph and I would advise you to elaborate on it and maybe explore how your generation's beliefs on death are different from that of your mother.