I was listening to a lady the other night that was diagnosed with Krohns disease. It was 1967, and she was 17 years old. Her doctors told her to get her affairs in order and at the most, she was not going to live past 27. She's 63 now and no plans on dieing. She told a story about a nurse that gave her the will to live. She didn't do it by running a test or by giving the lady a magical pill. She did it by being nice, by listening to the heartbreak that the lady was feeling from her diagnosis. She was very sucidial and a lady took the time to listen to her and be nice. In return the lady received a will to live.
It occurred to me that a will to live was something everyone needed in life and exspecially when living with a disease. There are those that say, the number one reason for fatality with people with a disease is suicide. Unfortunately the will to live gets weak and then of course there isn't one.
For me it is close to my heart and luckily I have many reason's to stay alive. My daughter put it best to me. I said, "I'm so sorry that you have, to have a Dad with MS," She commented "why would you say that dad?" I said, " because I can't run around with you and jump around with you like other dads do". She looked into the distance and you could tell she was thinking very deeply and then looked at me and said
"well, its better then not having a dad" and for me, this and every moment I see my kids are my "wills to live"
Kids are easy to see as a good reason to keep on living. Family is a good reason. Friends are too, but having that will to live comes from within us all as something that we all have. For some maybe its confusing and for some maybe not clear. For me its simple but I think more than that people, especially when your talking about health, need a will to live. I read somewhere that the trillion of cells you have in your body know how to be healthy. They probably also know how to live and the are intelligent to understand if there is a will to live or not. The last thing they need is a will to not live. Their shee nature is a hunger for life, a hunger for reproducing a hunger to thrive. To me this is what has kept the lady alive for 67 years. Her cells don't want to go anywhere. Her cells don't know anything about Krohns disease and thank good ness. Sometimes the worst thing we can do is learn something and then forever hold that as truth. The simple truth is that we only believe we know something. We should learn from animals, everything you need to learn is in you, listen to it.
