Change

Fall officially began yesterday. It’s my favorite time of the year. Temperatures start to cool, but not so severely that you can’t enjoy the outdoors. The leaves begin to turn colors and fall from the trees. Preparations for Halloween begin. It’s just a fun and beautiful time of the year.

Remember when you were young and fall meant raking the leaves into a giant pile and jumping into them? I don’t know why we felt that was so much fun, but we did. After jumping, sometimes we’d just lie in the pile of leaves and look up in the sky to watch the clouds floating by. We don’t take time for things like that nowadays. We’re too busy answering emails, texting or talking on our cell phones. We didn’t have distractions like that when I was young. I miss those days.

Fall always meant my favorite fall foods like soups and chili. There’s nothing quite like spending the entire day outside playing in the leaves and coming in to enjoy a nice hot bowl of soup. We didn’t know it at the time, but chili and soup are actually quite good for you. They’re usually loaded with beans and vegetables and help keep you hydrated. The best part was it didn’t feel like eating healthy. We just knew it was delicious.

Fall meant change. We were leaving behind the heat of summer and transitioning into the cold of winter. It was preparing us for the freezing temperatures ahead. The trees would start shedding their leaves. Flocks of ducks and geese would be flying in formation on their migration south. Combines would be in the fields harvesting crops. Everyone seemed happy in the fall. They had survived summer.

Myasthenia Gravis means a change for us. Our lifestyles will change based on what we can or can no longer do. If we weren’t already, we are now on a regiment of medicine that has to be taken at certain times of the day. We’re not quite sure how to deal with MG. To use an analogy, winter is ahead and we don’t know what it will bring.

Change is difficult. It moves us out of our routine.

There are actually two different kinds of change. There’s voluntary change, in which we make a conscious decision to change, and involuntary change, which is forced upon us.

Let’s talk about voluntary changes first. I’ve always said a person will not voluntarily change until they become uncomfortable with their current situation. I often use the analogy that I could afford to lose a few pounds, but I probably won’t do anything about it until I become uncomfortable with how I look or feel. A doctor can suggest I should lose a few pounds, but unless it makes sense to me or is life-threatening, I’m probably going to ignore the advice. However, when the day comes that I look at myself in the mirror and find myself uncomfortable with the way I look, that’s probably when I’ll start to initiate change.

Then there’s involuntary change. That’s when we are forced to change, even though we see no reason to do so and aren’t uncomfortable with the current situation. We may even like the current situation. We usually meet forced or involuntary change with hesitation, resistance, or even downright rebellion. Maybe it’s the company I work for making a policy change. Maybe it’s the community that’s changing around me. Maybe it’s a diagnosis of Myasthenia Gravis or other chronic illness. In those cases, I may not have a choice and am forced to go along with the change.

Let’s dive a little deeper into the involuntary change that was forced on us with Myasthenia Gravis. We found our bodies reacted differently than how they used to react. Reading became more difficult. Speech was sometimes limited. Our legs gave out much quicker than they used to. We began a regiment of medicine to combat our symptoms, but we still experienced breakthroughs. That’s a lot of change to have to navigate.

Here’s the good part. In spite of the involuntary change caused by Myasthenia Gravis, we can decide to voluntarily change how we deal with it.

We can’t change having MG, but we can change how we react to it. I can wake up in the morning and decide I don’t feel like getting out of bed. I’ve done that. When I do, I close my eyes, but I don’t sleep. Instead, I think about all the ways MG is messing up my life. I wallow in pity. It’s not a pretty sight and, I speak from experience, it doesn’t help. It doesn’t make me feel any better and it doesn’t change anything. Sooner or later, I come to my senses and pull myself out of bed.

Now, when I wake up in the morning, the first thing I try to think about is all of God’s blessings around me. Not whether or not I slept well, not all the things I have to do today, not all the things I failed to do yesterday, not how I ache, not how I have MG. I think about God’s blessings and I take a few minutes to thank him.

Sometimes I’ll hear the birds singing. Sometimes one of my dogs will hear me stir and greet me with a warm wet kiss across my face. Sometimes I just lie there and feel thankful I’m alive. That sets the tone for my entire day.

Each morning, I have a decision to make. I can resist the involuntary change of MG forced upon me, or I can voluntarily change my outlook. I can choose to be happy. I can choose to be thankful. I can choose to live and enjoy my family and friends.

Change is inevitable, but even when change comes on us involuntarily, we can still choose to voluntarily face it with thankfulness, hope and love.