To Your Health
“Being healthy” was one response to yesterday’s query about “the important thing……” we hope for. In a July 4th post in Aetiology entitled What is “health”, Tara C. Smith recalls this definition from a mural on a wall at the University of Michigan School of Public Health:
Health is more than the absence of disease: it is a state of complete physical and mental well-being.
Professor Smith also notes, with a reference to the Fourth of July, “a similar sentiment in the public health corridor here in Iowa,” namely that
“Health isn’t simply the default state when one is disease-free; it’s also being emotionally well, and of having rights and liberties in a free society.”
When I consider of all this in regard to Charlie, my first thought is that, to the casual observer, he is quite the picture of physical health. He is tall for his age, eats well, developing muscles in his legs and shoulders from all the physical activities he does; he has stamina and strength. He also has tremendous anxiety that is broadcast via the actions of his entire body (as was evident today when he went with me and my parents to test drive cars—-our green stationwagon, which began its life in White Bear Lake, Minnesota, is showing its age—-Charlie, I think, thought that we were going to leave the old car then and there and get some strange new vehicle; to the probable disappointment of the car salesman, we walked out new car-less but better informed).
I do think Charlie is emotionally attuned to the people (and the cars) around him: I trace some of his fretfulness in the last few weeks of school to seeing his teachers pack up the room (he will be in a different classroom next year), and to knowing that his teacher, who has been with him since he started in the school district in June 2006, is not coming back. He was able to sit in the back seat of a strange car while I drove it quietly, if solemnly: Charlie is learning to regulate and manage his anxiety and, I hope, his emotions.
The connection of “having rights and liberties in a free society” to health merits a post of its own, about independence, and what is the place society allots to Charlie—-a healthy society, I think, must recognize that all of its members, disabled and non-disabled, must be recognized and will participate. Generally, from my involved autism mother perspective, “health” means a boy who can get on the schoolbus and goes through the day illness-free, especially from the type of bug that bedeviled Charlie last week, is still making me queasy, and just got to Jim.
You never miss health so much until you do not have it.
11 opinions for To Your Health
Daisy
Jul 5, 2007 at 10:25 am
Attachment is good: until it needs to be broken. Anxiety, and coping with it, is a large part of our lives, too.
Lisa/Jedi
Jul 5, 2007 at 11:36 am
I hope you & Jim feel better soon, Kristina!
I like the quotes about what health really is… I think there’s a parallel between health being more than the absence of disease & child-raising being more than recognising your child’s faults & dealing with them. Praising the positives & recognising good behaviours/times (along with appreciating health when it is present) are very important ways to help raise emotionally healthy kids :)
mcewen
Jul 5, 2007 at 12:17 pm
Cheers! But yes, there’s nothing like reading about other people’s misery where a child is seriously ill, wired up or drugged up, bed ridden etc. to see a glimpse of how it impacts a families existence. You can’t learn anything or enjoy anything and it’s so pervasive. Makes me realise how lucky we are.
Best wishes
Kristina Chew, PhD
Jul 5, 2007 at 12:25 pm
I am almost better, drinking a lot of Chinese sugar cane and waterchestnut tea—-Charlie went on a field trip to IHOP—-I will send on the good wishes to Jim! I’m lucky to have my parents here to take care of Charlie, that’s for sure.
Niksmom
Jul 5, 2007 at 9:08 pm
Hope you are *all* soon feeling chipper again.
McEwen, I guess it’s a ll a matter of perspective isn’t it? I mean, there are those who would have said my son, Nik, was once a very fragile and ill child (all those months in the NICU all those years ago). Yet, through it all, I always thought we were the lucky ones as I watched babies who seemed to be *healthier* than Nik wither and decline. Yes, some died as I sat helpless and grieving. All the while, though Nik wasn’t the picture of perfect health, I knew he had something that many other children in that NICU did not — a committed, stable (well, usually!), and loving family to stand by him NO MATTER WHAT. What matters to me still is not JUST the good health we now (mostly) enjoy, but the ability to love deeply and share that love in the face of adversity.
“Blessing” is often a matter of perspective. :-)
Retired Waif
Jul 5, 2007 at 9:17 pm
I was hoping you’d let me include this post in the next Disability Blog Carnival on July 12th, which I’m hosting my blog Retired Waif. Your post has set me thinking on various tangents about “health” and disability–I’m about to have a baby any second now, and when people find out I don’t know the gender they tend to smile and say “Well, as long as it’s healthy, right?” As a disabled person, I find something a little off about that particular sentence… and I think you put it really well when you mention “the connection of ‘having rights and liberties in a free society’ to health”…this might be something I have to go write about right now. Thank you!
Incidentally, I also just realized, after several months of reading Autism Vox, that I know your husband fairly well from school, and have met Charlie as well. I’m a Fordham student in Jim’s program, and I’m beyond mortified about the face-blindedness and not-making-the-obvious-social-connections that prevented me from realizing “the Autism Vox blog mom” must be Jim’s-wife-Charlie’s-mom, but in any case I thought I’d say hello and that I really do enjoy the blog.
Kristina Chew, PhD
Jul 5, 2007 at 10:40 pm
Yes, that’s me—-many greetings and I’d be thrilled if you might include this post on the Disability Blog Carnival! Hope to meet and speak soon. best wishes —-
AJ
Jul 5, 2007 at 11:58 pm
Boy, ain’t it the truth?!? Julia came home from two weeks out of town, and she brought home some sort of bug to JP, Eleanor, and me. Nothing is more miserable than a mom who feels like she cannot care for her sick kids….
As for the whole car thing, I finally got the minivan I was wishing for back in April. It took a couple of weeks to get Ely used to it, though she took quite well to the captain-seat arrangement (not quite so confining). What sealed the deal? The back-of-the-headrest DVD players, plus wireless headphones, to watch her beloved Elmo. (Added bonus? I can’t hear Elmo. I can have my Talk Radio!)
I am now, officially, middle-aged and content. Driving is not so much a scary proposition anymore. For Ely, or for Mom!
Kristina Chew, PhD
Jul 6, 2007 at 12:28 am
I’m looking at something a bit smaller……..
Disability Blog Carnival #18… and a baby? Perhaps? « Retired Waif
Jul 12, 2007 at 10:21 pm
[…] for asking! Not strictly a disability blogger, Kristina Chew at Autism Vox demonstrates in her post To Your Health that parents of autistic children, and those children themselves, are just like everyone else, too! […]
The Disabled! We’re just like YOU!!!!: Disability Blog Carnival #18
Jul 13, 2007 at 1:11 pm
[…] Crutchmaster; Timothy Griffin on categories of annoying friends; and a section on autism bloggers (Autism Vox gets a kindly mention for my post To Your Health, which title I am much appreciating as Jim and I […]
Have an opinion? Leave a comment: