Hard Days

My body is going through a huge cleansing and healing process and in the mean time, my body feels like crap. Donna Gates, the author of The Body Ecology Diet, compares our body to cleaning our house. Once we start a big cleaning project in our house, everything looks worse than when we started as we pull things out of closets and drawers and move around dust. Once the chaos is over and everything finds its rightful place again, the house looks and feels so much better. I have been so good on this diet and all I can do it remind myself over and over that right now it is experiencing the worst part of the clean-up and once my digestive tract and liver are working to the best of their ability again that I will experience a body that not only looks good but also feels good.

I am not sure how others handle a flare-up but for me I become withdrawn. I enjoy my family around me but other than that, I need to be alone. Sometimes, like today, it is because I fear that I will break down in tears if I talk to others, sometimes it is because the energy used to get up and move around takes everything I have to give and then of course there is just my own personality which is somewhat quiet anyhow. My friend who is studying to be a naturopath is taking a homeopathy class right now. I have used a lot of homeopathy in my RA adventures, some that have worked miracles and others that didn't do so much. She keeps asking me questions trying to find a remedy that might work for my current circumstances. One of the recent questions was whether or not I like people around when I am experiencing a flare-up. From this one question more followed that were more detailed. These questions seemed to justify how I often feel because when I am in a flare-up, I know I seem distance and maybe a little disinterested in friends and acquintances, but it isn't so. I just need to save my energy for my family and me. When we have a busy day, like today, I know that if I overuse my energy there will not be any left to make dinner, read with my son, talk with my husband or even listen attentively to my daughter. I can't risk that anymore than I have to.

Today is hard. I feel emotional. I feel lots of pain. I feel frustration and I feel overwhelmed. However, another part of me, the deep down inside part believes so strongly in my body and its ability to heal that it can't give up. I know I have to continue trusting that the foods I eat are doing wonderful things within my body. I have to continue reminding my brain that it is healing. I have to continue doing what I believe in and that is healing. Today that healing is just coming with lots of tears. But tears are a way of releasing toxins so maybe that is a good thing, right?