Superhealing: Engaging Your Mind, Body, and Spirit to Create Optimal Health and Well-Being (ARC) Read Online Free PDF Page B
Author: Elaine R. Ferguson
awed because it
showed we do possess the power to control disease, and confused
because so little control was being exercised. I eventual y developed the opinion that people don’t modify their lifestyles to boost their
Introduction
11
health to optimum levels because they have excessive faith in the
power of medications and surgery to save them from their own poor
choices. They give up responsibility for their wellness to their doctors. As Donald B. Ardell asserted in High-Level Wel ness, “The single greatest cause of unhealth in this nation is that most Americans neglect, and surrender to others, responsibility for their own health.”23
John Knowles, the former president of Rockefeller University in
[AU: Give location], suggested that people have been duped, either accidental y or on purpose. He wrote, “People have been led to believe that national health insurance, more doctors, and greater use of high-cost hospital-based technologies will impart health. Unfortunately, none of them wil .”24 It never made sense to me why we
would depend on medications, which have the risk of significant
side effects, when other choices are available and more important.
My confusion about our choices was reinforced by experiences I had in hospitals.
My first year on a ward as a real doctor, after graduating from medical school, was fraught with a constant mixture of chronic exhaustion, sleep deprivation, uncertainty, and fear. In the second month of my internship, during a typical on-call evening, something occurred that would change my thinking and my life forever.
As I was sitting at the nurses’ station, around 8:00 pm, complet-
ing an admission of yet another patient, I noticed one of the nurses behind me in the pharmacy area preparing a bag containing a thick, ominous-looking, brown fluid. Her crisp white uniform glistened
against the steel cabinets and countertops. A few moments earlier, she’d mentioned that she needed to prepare a child’s chemotherapy.
For some strange reason, she spoke out loud as she connected the
brown bag of fluid to the intravenous (IV) line. “I need to be careful and not get any of this chemo on my uniform.”
12
Introduction
I was an intern, a newbie, fresh out of medical school and still wet behind my medical ears. Wondering why she’d made this statement,
I asked, “Is that because you don’t want to stain your uniform?”
“Honey,” she replied, with a look of utter disdain, “are you kidding me? You think I’m worried about a stain? This chemo eats through
cloth. I don’t want to get any on my uniform because it will burn a hole in it.”
And we’re putting this in kids’ bodies? I thought. That’s not right.
There must be another way. With that concern in my mind, in that very moment I knew I could not become the cancer specialist I had wanted to be up till then. That nurse’s simple statement instantaneously eradi-cated every aspiration I had to become an oncologist, in the process permanently altering my professional career and direction.
In the midst of this deep disappointment—as I was wondering,
Isn’t there a better way? Why do we have to give these babies chemicals that eat through cloth? Isn’t there something that can help the body to heal?— I also could hear my spirit whisper, There is another way . My journey to discover the power of superhealing began.
A few months later, still a medical intern, I’d been up all night
in the intensive care nursery caring for several very sick premature babies who had needed emergency deliveries. While on rounds with
the attending physician, I was desperately trying to stay awake, or at least not fall asleep standing up (which I’d once thought was impossible but now knew was not). The attending doctor began an
impromptu lecture on a research finding that the most significant
factor related to infant mortality rates was not the availability of intensive care nurseries to take care of premature
showed we do possess the power to control disease, and confused
because so little control was being exercised. I eventual y developed the opinion that people don’t modify their lifestyles to boost their
Introduction
11
health to optimum levels because they have excessive faith in the
power of medications and surgery to save them from their own poor
choices. They give up responsibility for their wellness to their doctors. As Donald B. Ardell asserted in High-Level Wel ness, “The single greatest cause of unhealth in this nation is that most Americans neglect, and surrender to others, responsibility for their own health.”23
John Knowles, the former president of Rockefeller University in
[AU: Give location], suggested that people have been duped, either accidental y or on purpose. He wrote, “People have been led to believe that national health insurance, more doctors, and greater use of high-cost hospital-based technologies will impart health. Unfortunately, none of them wil .”24 It never made sense to me why we
would depend on medications, which have the risk of significant
side effects, when other choices are available and more important.
My confusion about our choices was reinforced by experiences I had in hospitals.
My first year on a ward as a real doctor, after graduating from medical school, was fraught with a constant mixture of chronic exhaustion, sleep deprivation, uncertainty, and fear. In the second month of my internship, during a typical on-call evening, something occurred that would change my thinking and my life forever.
As I was sitting at the nurses’ station, around 8:00 pm, complet-
ing an admission of yet another patient, I noticed one of the nurses behind me in the pharmacy area preparing a bag containing a thick, ominous-looking, brown fluid. Her crisp white uniform glistened
against the steel cabinets and countertops. A few moments earlier, she’d mentioned that she needed to prepare a child’s chemotherapy.
For some strange reason, she spoke out loud as she connected the
brown bag of fluid to the intravenous (IV) line. “I need to be careful and not get any of this chemo on my uniform.”
12
Introduction
I was an intern, a newbie, fresh out of medical school and still wet behind my medical ears. Wondering why she’d made this statement,
I asked, “Is that because you don’t want to stain your uniform?”
“Honey,” she replied, with a look of utter disdain, “are you kidding me? You think I’m worried about a stain? This chemo eats through
cloth. I don’t want to get any on my uniform because it will burn a hole in it.”
And we’re putting this in kids’ bodies? I thought. That’s not right.
There must be another way. With that concern in my mind, in that very moment I knew I could not become the cancer specialist I had wanted to be up till then. That nurse’s simple statement instantaneously eradi-cated every aspiration I had to become an oncologist, in the process permanently altering my professional career and direction.
In the midst of this deep disappointment—as I was wondering,
Isn’t there a better way? Why do we have to give these babies chemicals that eat through cloth? Isn’t there something that can help the body to heal?— I also could hear my spirit whisper, There is another way . My journey to discover the power of superhealing began.
A few months later, still a medical intern, I’d been up all night
in the intensive care nursery caring for several very sick premature babies who had needed emergency deliveries. While on rounds with
the attending physician, I was desperately trying to stay awake, or at least not fall asleep standing up (which I’d once thought was impossible but now knew was not). The attending doctor began an
impromptu lecture on a research finding that the most significant
factor related to infant mortality rates was not the availability of intensive care nurseries to take care of premature
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