Monday, May 2, 2011

Success, Change, and A "Strong-willed" Child


My parents referred to me as a "strong-willed child." Once I decided to do something in my life there did not seem to be much that would stop me. My rheumatic fever gave me an intense amount of pain on a constant basis. Very early in my life I developed a competitive approach to my pain, and therefore I would work hard, run fast when I could, and I would stay active every moment that I was awake, and my approach to life gave me a competitive edge in living with my rheumatic fever and healing it and its afteraffects.

Of course in the beginning of living my own cure, my activity did increase my pain, but as I had lived with pain I had increased my tolerance of pain so that I could and did persevere with increasing my activity. During this time I was eating the best organic foods that were available on our own farm and lots of oranges each and every day. We raised our own chickens, pigs, beef, vegetables, fruits, and nuts on our farm, so the entire list of food groups were available to me. I ate at least two eggs a day and my favorite food was pork which I ate at least three times a day. My parents were very careful that I ate three oranges a day, which they ordered from Florida and which were delivered to us through the Rural Postal Delivery Service, or in simpler terms, our rural mailman.

I learned very early in my life not to dwell on my pain, but to always be planning in my mind what I wanted to do next in my life. I had announced to my parents at the age of two that I was going to be a nurse. Because I knew what I wanted to do, I was always interested in healing myself and getting on with my life. Every time that some friend would laugh at me when I said I wanted to become a Registered Nurse, which probably did seem impossible in many people’s minds, I would simply answer, "watch me"! I was learning some valuable lessons as I made up my mind to be normal and live a normal life. First of all, at my young age I knew that if we can find the perfect formula for living life, we can help ourselves to grow and change back to health. I was very young when I realized that we must eat fresh and uncontaminated foods, drink lots of fresh water, breathe fresh air, and exercise. I learned this lesson well from my parents, and as I lived this very important lesson I was growing and feeling healthier every day that I continued to live.

This feeling of success about living made me very excited about my plans for my own growth and change into my adult life. I knew that I was going to become a nurse from the age of two. When I was choosing the nursing school that I wanted to attend, I had to find one that would support my eating habits as easily as I could. I did not find one school that used only "organic" foods, but I knew that I was coming in on the cusp of change that I hoped would lead me in the right direction. There were not many cases of what we call "cancer" in our society at that time, but I found myself in the perfect situation to relate our societal change to the change in our disease potential.

I was very interested in societal diseases, such as tuberculosis, which was a devastating disease of the day that had no cure in sight. In my early life, sanatoriums were everywhere and they were used to house patients with tuberculosis and mental health problems. As I lived my nursing education I was making a clear determination within my mind to specialize in research in the hope that I could contribute to change through research that would help the masses of people who were suffering. That is still my goal today.