Frame of mind is the key self-help tool offered in My Own Medicine. When I say frame of mind, I'm referring to what we tell ourselves and what we come to believe about our illness. I'm saying that it's important to monitor our self-talk and to explore how our thinking impacts and defines our illness. Without taking the time to examine and take charge of our thoughts, we may limit our quality of life and the possibility of change. We need to get clear about the relationship between our mind and body, learn to reframe our limiting beliefs and keep checking back with ourselves to look for ways we might be perpetuating or creating a sense of powerlessness or hopelessness or where we are just giving up on ourselves. Words have power. Thoughts have power. Give yourself the upper hand by being mindful that your words and thoughts support you rather than hurt you.

Chronic illness gradually causes us to view our circumstances through the lens of our symptoms and, over time, distorts our life-view, self-image and our sense of worth and power. Once we understand this we can begin to challenge our interpretations and thus release a major source of our discomfort.

I like to use Alice's fall into the rabbit hole as a metaphor for the journey we all undertake when faced with a chronic illness. At first she finds herself too large and then she settles for too small. Even chasing the White Rabbit with his preoccupation with time is fitting.

So - we have fallen into the hole and landed with a thud on the earth many feet below the surface. We can see the sky if we look up at the hole we fell into.

The biggest question we face with the onset of illness is NOW WHAT?

We have several choices:

climb we put all of our effort into getting out of the hole. We try to climb up to get back to what we once had; how we once lived. Climb as we might, there is no way to get a foothold. We have no tools. We can't jump that high. And yet, we are commited to that single goal. So we keep trying, spending months, years, even the rest of our life feeling desperate, unfullfilled, disappointed. We try everything at our disposal, refusing to give up. -relinquishing the quest to regain our former lives is not resignation; it's not giving up or settling. It is making the best of the only moment we have: now.

tantrum we're just not going to take this lying down! We take constant inventory of our discomfort, sickened even further than our bodies have taken us, we poison our minds with negativity, complaining and a single-minded focus on the horrible state we are in. Every thought, everything we tell ourselves and others is related to our illness. Complain. Complain. Complain. There is nothing more. We are nothing more. Oh, do we have stories! -letting go of our negative thoughts creates room for healing. We can recover a life for ourselves if we can stop obsessing over our misfortune.

move in so this is what this moment brings. We can climb, we can struggle or we can size up our new digs and make a pleasant enough home of it. We can notice that the quiet is nice. We can rejoice in a chance to redecorate. We can learn to be comfortable with the smells and textures of this new home. We can embrace the call to simplicity or we can resist it. Think of it as involuntary simplicity if you like - it can still be pretty mellow here. -we do not discard our desire to climb or stomp our feet. There is no thought of permanence. We have grief and that is okay. And we have also made peace.

• find the balance between focusing too much on your symptoms and being reasonable regarding your limitations.
• while cause-effect is helpful in recognizing activities that create a flare-up of symptoms, be cautious about inflexibility. You may be avoiding things that you really can tolerate based on one or two experiences when you were unable to. Illness isn’t always static. Appreciate that your thoughts are very powerful in this regard.

One day an exterminator came to my house to take care of a carpenter ant problem. I decided to use a different exterminator and sent him away. That night I had a horrible flare-up of symptoms. Had the exterminator treated my home that day, I surely would have attributed my relapse to the chemical. Who knows? Maybe I would have altered my entire future based on that one experience. Maybe I would have moved to an area that was free of ant problems, believing I could never tolerate the chemicals used to treat infestations. Watch your beliefs!

fill your life and your thoughts with things you can do as opposed to what you can't do.
think of it this way: you used to live on the sixth floor of a department store. Getting sick is like falling to the fifth floor and you can't get back. You can spend the rest of your life trying to get back to floor six, or create a new life on floor five.

My husband says, "yeah, but what if the fifth floor is men's wear?"

• If you don't take control of your life, your illness will. Don't allow it to define you. Sure, it's a big consideration, but it's not your entire reality unless you allow it to be.

---

My best healing showed up as an extraordinary moment of grace when I realized how I had been keeping myself locked in the prison of my sickness by my ceaseless ruminations and inward vigilance. It was almost as if I had been fiercely hunting my CFS, never catching up with it and so consumed by the task that all the other stuff of life had fallen away.

The trick, I learned, was to give up the hunt and turn back to face the rest of my life. This turned out to be my own medicine. With my mind free to explore other, more interesting things - the billions of pieces that make up a life - I was changed. Or maybe it's more apt to say I was returned to myself.

This was rather like waking up from a coma - at least what I think that would be like. I felt my soul growing strong again as I turned towards beauty, joy and love. My mind was now free to watch a butterfly dip and soar around my flower beds and my heart then filled with lovely things like awe and wonder, peace and thankfulness that such beauty was here for me in every moment.

As long as I was obsessing over hunting down my CFS like the missing link of a chain, the final piece of a challenging puzzle or the capture of an unseen intruder, the butterfly could not be in my line of sight. It had always been there at the periphery, but I was not in a position to see it.

So this turning point was for me a defining moment. I found such contrast between the reward for choosing the butterfly verses the hunting of my sickness. There is undeniably 'no contest.'

I can control where my gaze wanders - what I touch, where I direct my attention. This is choice. I had a choice and I chose the butterfly. My illness, no longer pursued, taunted me less and less. So even when I am in pain, I watch the butterfly. I see the sunset, the grandeur of an ancient fig tree. I watch the clouds move lazily across the sky and my heart is full. I sing joyful songs and surround myself with behavior, people and things that amplify this grace. If my mind is on the good book I'm reading, the flavor of a summer plum, the way the sun warms my skin - it is less on the pain, or whatever the symptom of the hour.

Yes, my CFS remains to some degree. I am not cured. But I don't bother about that most of the time. There are more days in the year I feel cured than not. If and when a relapse comes, I can notice it without fear and then turn to look for a butterfly.

© 2006 Diane Kerner All materials on this site, including images, are protected by copyright law and may not be copied or reproduced without the express written consent of Diane Kerner

"Roses for Dianeeee" by Keith Kerner. Site design by Peapod Design