Field Notes: Ways to find calm in hard times, coming to terms with how an illness changes you, rising violence in U.S. hospitals
Plus, a special invitation to Winter Camp, which is almost here... !!!
Hello, dear friends! Welcome to new readers — I’m so glad you’re here.
This is the weekly(-ish )Field Notes, a collection of 6 interesting things I’ve run across lately related to wellness and illness. I think of those concepts very widely — how do we live well, feel well, rest well, tend to our bodies and our identities, absorb what’s happening around us, within reach and across the ocean, adjust to new data, new research, new understandings. I hope you find something useful or illuminating for you here.
1} How to feel grounded: Finding calm in dark times (The Clearing newsletter) — Author Katherine May hears the pain in the world and our “magnetic attraction to the news” right now, our desperate need to help and process it. “It’s one of the reasons that I don’t lose my faith in humanity at times like this: the air is thick with care. This is when we feel our human connection most powerfully. Despite our horror, we do not turn away, but instead turn back to witness suffering again and again, feeling ever more helpless.” She continues:
“With it — for me at least — comes a dose of shame. Why do I get to live in such abundant peace while others are burying their children? There are days when I could be entirely sunk by that thought alone, feeling sick with the privilege of my safe, warm little house with its overflowing cupboards and soft beds. It is bitterly unfair.
But I want to suggest today that, in these moments, it’s more important than ever to take care of yourself. I know that can feel counter-intuitive: making yourself more comfortable seems to only widen our distance from the people who are suffering. But, as people in the caring professions know only too well, exhausted minds and bodies help no-one. This peace, which some of us have been given in life’s great, unjust lottery, is precious. We have a duty to keep it, to tend to it, and to pass it on. It should not be squandered. We live it in hope that it is contagious, so addictive that it passes to our children, and that they hand it down as a basic artefact of being, not a luxury.”
Katherine shares a list of 10 simple ideas to tend to yourself, followed by a list of effective actions to take during a such time of crisis. I’ve read this piece multiple times, and the opening includes a lovely recording of Katherine reading an excerpt of her book Enchantment, too.
2} How the anti-inflammatory diet healed/ruined me (Inner Workings newsletter) — Rae Katz, an “essayist, mother & chronically ill former startup CEO looking for redemption,” shares her two of her own stories about autoimmune diets, “completely opposite and both true.”
3} Everything I Thought I Knew About Nasal Congestion is Wrong (The Atlantic) — “Start with this: You really have two noses.” Sarah Zhang writes: “This sounds absurd, I know, but consider what your nose—or noses—looks like on the inside: Each nostril opens into its own nasal cavity, which does not connect with the other directly. They are two separate organs, as separate as your two eyes or your two ears.”
4} Stabbed. Kicked. Spit on. Violence in American Hospitals Is Out of Control. (New York Times gift link) — “In some sense, violence in the E.R. is stark evidence of society’s broader neglect: a medical system in which mental health beds are scarce, primary care remains elusive and prescription costs soar; a shelter network that’s buckling; a country where parents may not make enough to feed their children. All of this can lead to intolerable overcrowding and interminable waiting in the E.R., which can rupture into frustration, anger and incivility.” In one survey of emergency department doctors, “55 percent said they had been physically assaulted, almost all by patients, with a third of those resulting in injuries. Eighty-five percent had been seriously threatened by patients. The risks can be even higher for E.R. nurses, with over 70 percent reporting they had sustained physical assaults at work.” Not surprisingly, clinicians are leaving ER and fewer medical and nursing students are going into ER medicine. It’s a terrible situation that threatens to get even worse as departures lead to shortages, which lead to greater challenges for the team remaining.
5} I’m Still Coming to Terms With how Much MS has Changed me – And That’s Okay (The Unwritten) — Regina Beach writes about her journey with multiple sclerosis (MS), an autoimmune disease, the most common disabling neurological disease, where the signals from the brain to various parts of the body are interrupted. “This new body of mine doesn’t work the way I want it to, doesn’t do what I tell it to. It feels like I’m driving someone else’s car through a snowstorm. The brakes aren’t as sensitive, the dials are in a different place, and I have to pay extra close attention to keep from crashing.”
6} Nourish sessions for people with chronic illness — I noticed in the latest edition of Nourish newsletter that my wonderful friend Gina Beach is now offering free virtual seated yoga on Wednesdays and free virtual seated breathwork and meditation on Tuesdays/Thursdays for people living with a chronic condition. Scroll to the bottom of this post for links and times, and subscribe to her terrific newsletter while you are there.
One last note: if you are looking for more connection and fun in the next month, you are invited to a virtual gathering called ❄️ Winter Camp❄️ — I host it because I find this season hard too and need a daily boost of connection and gentle nudges. I hope you’ll considering joining— it’s a lot of fun!
To our journeys,
Brianne
p.s. Here are some of the things past Winter Campers have said:
"Winter Camp is taking me out of my slump. I just know it."
"I’m reminded of something that Brianne said about the desire to not keep going through winter 'on autopilot,' and it wasn’t until I heard those words out loud that I realized that is exactly what I tend to do during a typical winter. "
"I had reservations about Dance Mandala since I am not very graceful in my movements and almost never dance. But the exercise was truly lovely - calming my nervous system, loosening up my muscles and shaking out some of the kinks." (Dance Mandala is going to be one of the Saturday sessions this time, too!)
"Winter Camp is working for me. My mood has swung from a 5 to an 8. Not too shabby. "
Winter Camp begins next week, and we'll open up the portal starting Friday for people to say hello. I'd love to see you there!!! (It's $120 for the whole four-week session. Use the code CAMPTIME for $20 off.) Go to the Winter Camp website to learn more.