Learning from the Sick

Visiting the sick is a very human thing to do. It comforts the sick person and makes you value your own health and well being. However, I wonder why visiting the sick is so draining on the mind and body. It is more tiring than a full day of housework. You can be washing dishes, mopping the floor, doing the laundry, cooking and chasing the kids and yet you still seem to have energy for doing the grocery and checking your e-mail. In comparison, when all you did at a sick person's
house is provide comfort and talk about living a life of hope, and you come home not having energy even to watch T.V. How strange is that?

A family relative in her 60's fell down from her bed and had a hair line fracture in her arm. She was already very frail and weak from a previous surgery and didn't seem to have any energy left in her body. She loves to talk but has nobody to talk to. All her children are grown up and busy in their lives. Her old Husband is catering to her activities of daily living as much as he can. However, with her limited mobility, anything is just not enough. In short, it is a life being lived at the mercy of others. Visiting her was a very depressingly insightful experience.

Depressing because of all the sadness around in her life. A dependent life, a weak body, a feeling of hopelessness and the seemingly endless wait for her life to end.

One thing that I learned from this experience is, what ever life we have left, we need to live it well or at least try. If not for ourselves, we should do it for our loved ones around us. Each person's time on this Earth has been predetermined by God who has power over all things. If He has decided that we will live for a 100 years, no man can change that even by one day. So, hoping to die is not believing in His will and command. Choosing to live, even in a dependent  state is a true test of your faith.

I am thankful for a lot of things in my life, yet the single most thing I should be most thankful for and I have taken for granted, is an able, fully functional body. It is a gift that surely will not last forever. I will not have the same body when I grow older. I might just end up like another sick old lady. But, it can be altered by the choices I make today. I can eat healthy, get physically active and make a lot of money. Having money not only can attract people, it can also buy the luxuries in life to make the final years of your life comfortable.