Christmas, Santa Clause, Politics, Self Care, Retreat, and Ethics - oh boy…. lots of banter

This is my favourite time of the year. I love Christmas. I sent out all my Christmas cards and I included Santa Claus. Why not? Next year I will probably write Santa a letter and post it here as well. I did not participate in the Santa Clause parade this year. My leg was acting up and why not, I have abused my body by running and climbing and pushing my body beyond my limits as part of my training. I have rested my body and am now good. Now for my brain, I took off November and am easing myself back into my practice. During a recent ethics course, I was reminded as being the only person in private practice attending, that I have the option to decrease my hours if I wish. That is true. I blurted out that I took November off. I am very much in command of myself. I am aware that in hospitals there is a decrease of what should be, which puts a heavy burden on those who work. Saturday I attended a retreat and was very disappointed. It became about an educational subject rather of what a retreat should be. I talked to one student who gave me permission to tell her story. She has cancer and is fighting it. She is in a Masters Program and her hospital told her that she would not be able to continue with her studies. She was also asked by the social worker at the hospital if she felt less of a person with breast cancer. She was furious. I was furious seeing her pain and what had caused it. There are questions one asks while determining a disorder in the DSM. It is numerical in different categories and viola you have this or that. I have written in detail about that in previous blogs so I won’t go further. Then there are assessments to determine how a person is doing. Normally it is quite obvious as in anger management and addiction. Viola, this person is an angry fellow and this lady is an addict. Ok, I am making light of this but it isn’t, I am just trying to explain this in its most simple terms. I would presume that this question was in an assessment and not diagnosis of determining how the patient is doing. What I would recommend is removing this question all together. It is biased and as this student said it plants a seed. She begins to question that if this question is asked then perhaps she should be feeling this. As you know I have worked as an Intern with hospital patients suffering and dying from HIV and Cancer. I cannot imagine ever asking such a humiliating question. Why not ask the patient how she feels about having cancer and how she feels with those changes? Why ask if she feels less than a person? Why ask this of anyone, regardless of what they are suffering from? Why do health care workers regardless if they are doctors, nurses etc……use the word can’t? You can’t study? You cannot use your brain? As this student told me she was angry, I joined her. She is not my client. She was my fellow person on that day. She had still to graduate but that was the only difference as far as academia. I knew nothing else about her. I was at a retreat, to relax, to discern and to pray. The only prayer was at mass. That was a prayer, so I shall not be going next year. I have education all year round as part of my practice. Retreats should be of a different nature and at one point it felt more like group therapy because of the lack of facilitators. Once again I was the only spokesperson indicating this view while others remained mute though in agreement. How can we grow if we remain silent? How do we improve if we remain silent? Why be silent in a democratic country? This is why, if I travelled to a communist country it would be like playing monopoly - go to jail and stay there. In this situation I went out to dinner afterward and spent 4 hours at the restaurant. Balance - have fun. I did eat too much and need to be more mindful of that or so my body told me. I wasn’t going to talk about politics but why stop ……. I was surprised to hear the Conservative leader ask Trudeau why he gave 250 million dollars to China. I nearly fainted. Apparently it was for their infrastructure including pipelines? Really? I was reading an article the other day about why persons who would be great leaders do not go into politics. I won’t bore you with the details. It was actually a clinical assessment. 250 millions to China? Apparently Trudeau also sent his small business minister there for photo shoots and talked nice about China being so inclusive. China is a communist country. China, if we are not careful will bypass us with technology they have stolen and are now working to beat us all. They just may do that with artificial intelligence. They already have cities under surveillance and examining their emotions. Boy are we in trouble and we are giving them millions? They have two Canadians in prison. How dare we give them any money at all. They have a prison facility where they imprison Muslims and others for what they refer to as re-education. I think we need to revamp the entire system. We keep making the same mistakes every century which is leading us to a path of self destruction. A young 15 year old girl is more aware of the imminent dangers of climate change than politicians who we vote for. What happened there? A politician apparently had the nerve to say she had mental issues? Why? Laughing or putting down people because they are beyond having the capacity to understand a person’s intellect does not justify them to make demeaning remarks about a child. If this one girl can do so much, imagine what is possible? Last night I heard on the news that we may have a problem getting coffee because of climate change. Now that hurts. I wonder if that will put people on edge? Now enough about my banter and humour. For the remaining season of Christmas, I shall spend more time on reflection and continue with self care. I shall spend more time with family and friends which I have been doing. I shall go to every party I am invited to as long as they are not in conflict with another. I did go to two weddings once at different parts of the city. That was challenging but fun. I shall take a break from anything related to education for at least three weeks (or I shall try). I shall continue with my morning ritual of looking at nature, reading and being with……. Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays……..I didn’t want to talk about (fight or flight or )freezing while being attacked today. I am still in the holiday mood. Hey Santa, what am I getting this year? Have I been good? What do you think?