Heal your Body, Your Mind will Follow

"I finally realized that being grateful to my body was key to giving more love to myself. "

- Oprah Winfrey

If you are a survivor in the process of recovery and healing, odds are your body is stressed, fatigued, and worn down. You may be seeing a therapist, reading self-help books, or seeking spiritual help.  These activities are essential in the healing process, but only address your mind or spirit.  What about your body?  How can you heal yourself, if you are constantly weak and sick?  You need your strength to fight, recover, and heal.  You need your strength to take care of yourself and your children.  Being constantly stressed is not healthy for your body.  Chronic stress is linked to heart disease, stroke, and a weakened immune system.  A weakened immune system can make you susceptible to common colds, flu and bacterial infections.  You need a strong immune system and body to heal your mind and spirit.

I am a firm believer in the interconnection of our mind, body, and spirit. "To optimize the function of the healing system, you must do everything in your power to improve physical health, mental/emotional health, and spiritual health." (8 Weeks to Optimum Health by Andrew Weil, M.D.) How can we heal our mind, if our body is continually fatigued?  How can we heal our spirit, if our body is battling one sickness after another?  We must keep our bodies healthy and strong, if we are to heal our mind and spirit.  Feeling strong feeds our spirit.  In turn, feeding our spirit gives us courage to be strong.   Eating healthy foods, in addition to counseling or spiritual help, will provide you with a resilient body on your journey to well-being and peace.

Where's My Happily Ever After?

"No one can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending." - Marian Robinson

After two failed marriages I can not help thinking sometimes, "Where is my happily ever after?"  My happy ending? What happened to it?  Where is it? Is it hiding?  Did it run away?   The fairy tales I read as a little girl, told me we all have a happily ever after.  So where's mine?

Often in the middle of the night after E has gone to bed, and I'm alone, I ask these questions.  Don't get me wrong.  I actually enjoy being alone.  I am quite happy to have the silence envelope me at night.  I am content to go to bed alone in my king size bed.  I am satisfied to go to sleep when I want, eat when I want, leave my toothbrush where I want, my dirty clothes on the floor if I want, keep the house organized how I want.  Being alone is not the problem.

My sorrow comes from not being alone but from being lonely. 


I am grieving for a marriage that is never to be.  Certainly, I am extremely grateful for my son.  Having him in my life fills my heart with light and love. But at times when I'm feeling sorry for myself, I begin to feel robbed of the false fairy tale of getting married, having two kids, and living happily ever after.  And as I think on it further, it's not the loss of the fairy tale I grieve, but the loss of partnership.   I grieve for the man I thought I knew.  I grieve for the loss of my best friend.  I grieve that there is no one to call when I have a bad day.  There is no one to call when I have a terrific day.  I grieve for the love and trust that I should have had in a true partner.  I grieve knowing that I will not grow old with the man I thought I loved and thought loved me.  I grieve for the man I fell in love with but never truly existed.  My dream, the future I thought I would have, was stolen.  And I realize how lonely my life has become.  I wonder, "Why me?  Do I not deserve happiness?"  And this leads me further down the black hole to "What's wrong with me?"