Acceptance and Loss ” Part Two
Acceptance is easy to talk about but difficult to adopt. We may have to accept the loss of our ability to do something very important to us perhaps or which we think we should easily be able to do. We may look fine and not have any obvious sign of disability or pain so others may quite reasonably presume we have a normal level of physical activity and treat us accordingly. So it is difficult to accept a loss of ability and the imagined interpretations in other people’s minds about what kind of person we are due to this. But only by moving towards an acceptance of our situation will we be able to leave the conflict aside and move forward.
The reality of our situations is often forced upon us and we have to live with it and the limits it imposes. We can approach our desired goals more closely by making alterations to the usual way we do things. A particular situation might be unchangeable and we are left with choosing to fight it or come to terms with it. Fighting the situation has been shown to have negative outcomes in some respects and it may be better to be able to accept some of our restrictions. Once we have done this we can start to generate useful alternative strategies and thereby make our chances of useful progress more likely.
Not accepting the situation means we cannot release ourselves from the conflict and can’t take on our or others’ suggestions for improvement. If I won’t give in to the pain or let people down by admitting I can’t do something then I won’t see why I should do things any differently or accept a lower standard of performance of the job. This way the route to making the necessary changes can be blocked, getting in the way of our progress towards where we want to be. If we say This is the reality of the situation and I have to work with that we can step forward and begin change.
How we do this depends on the scripts we adopt to describe our lives. We all have these explicit interpretations of what is going on which we don’t think about consciously. An example might be I am very fit and am able to manage my life and do sports and social activities without difficulties. However, in the world of low back pain and other pain conditions such as neck pain and fibromyalgia, the scripts are very different. A resigned script might be I am completely disabled by my pain condition and as there is no chance of me getting better this means I will never be able to do anything I enjoy again.
However, very negative scripts, constantly going round and round in our minds, lead to negative thinking and depression. One approach is to consciously generate new scripts and an example of this might be Even though I do have a pain condition which limits my ability, if I manage my situation well I will be able to do many of the things I want to in a modified manner. This is a realistic description of the situation and more likely to lead to a realistic assessment of our situation and a more positive approach to any action which could be taken to improve it.
Realistic scripts have the benefit of being more positive than the typical negative ones although they should not really be positive as such as if we look through rose-tinted spectacles we will be disappointed pretty quickly when we really see where we are. A more positive approach allows us to participate in the management of our condition, perhaps with the help of a health professional, when previously any new ideas would have met with resistance.
We are more likely to choose adaptive solutions to our problems if we have our assessment of our situation close to the objective reality which others see. We can then stop the continually stressful pushing ourselves and ease off the pressure to some extent.
