I have been absent for a couple weeks as I have been recovering from elbow surgery. Now that I’m feeling better, I’m back to my blog and podcast.
So here we go with Bargaining…Bargaining seems almost funny in the way I think of it…like the game show “Let’s Make A Deal” from when I was a kid. People dressed up crazy and if they were picked they got to choose between door #1, door #2, and door #3…then they’d have something that they won already but they had to decide if they wanted to trade it and take a chance on what was behind the door or inside the box…it was kind of a goofy show but sometimes it was cool to see what people won. People on game shows want to bargain…they want a deal and they want the most they can win…not $5,000 they want $10,000…not $100,000 they want $1,000,000…they want it all…we want it all. Death and loss are reminders that there are some things that aren’t up for negotiation.
We think of bargaining generally when someone we love or when we ourselves are diagnosed with a terminal illness. We plead to have our loved one healed completely and live a long life…. we ask that we be taken instead of them…especially a child. If we’re sick then we try and bargain with promises, heal me and I’ll never do drugs again or drink again or eat meat or I’ll lose weight or gain weight or whatever we think is the best deal…for us of course….it’s all about us…not in a mean way, but it’s our own pain we want to ease.
We may become more religious at a time of a crisis…we want something to be more powerful than whatever crisis we are enthralled in…so we ask God to take away the illness and restore our loved one to health. We may be angry with God as we bargain, or we take a milder tone, so we don’t piss God off more…well that’s my thinking. We think that illness or pain are a punishment and health or lack of pain as a reward…in which case there are winners or losers…if you win and get well you are favored by God or whoever you were pleading to. If you do not get well or the pain does not end, then you are not favored…and that sucks. There is some kind of crazy logic out there like that…for example, in my own head…I have struggled with that thinking for a long time…and still do sometimes.
In my 30’s I had to deal with a lot of emotional baggage from childhood…physical and sexual abuse and I was going through a divorce with 3 small children, the youngest an infant. That thinking of not being favored or liked by God the same as everyone else, or even more than everyone else…who wouldn’t what that. That thinking plagued me for several years (and sometimes still does) as I tried to make sense of my past.
I was a part of a church as I was going through the divorce and people would say, “Oh, God must have a special plan for you because of all you’re going through.” Fuck that shit is what I said…although I doubt it was out loud. I don’t believe in a God or a Universe that puts someone through horrible pain just to make me be how you want me to be…so much for free will. Or they’d say, “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle.” Fuck that too! I do not believe in a God or Universe that causes things or prevents things…shit happens. If God causes and prevents things then God is capricious and plays favorites.
I had to learn that the things that happened to me are not me…they are a part of me, and they helped to shape who I am, but they are not me. I am not my story. My story doesn’t define me, and it doesn’t dictate what is possible in my life.
In my experience people turn to religion, or God, as a way to feel control in a situation you are clearly are not the boss of…and that is scary as shit…go to church more, pray more, give more, anything to try and change reality…to find some ground in our groundlessness. Apparently, I am a big believer in trying to control what I can’t…it takes time to wrap my head around the fact that I am not in control of all things…not even most things…very little in fact.
Bargaining also applies to losses with chronic pain. We try and make deals with the Universe or God or whatever is out there or whoever we look to for a bargain…let this be the last surgery…please don’t let anything be broken or torn…please ease my pain…please, please, please…help me…I need help here. Bargaining can be a temporary distraction from our pain.
I have had many elbow surgeries…my wife says 9 including the one that I just had a couple weeks ago…regretfully I think she’s correct. My elbow replacement was loose and needed to be revised…my replacement needed to be replaced. So, I promise…if this one can be the last, I will never lift anything heavier than a paper plate with my left arm. If this can be the last one I won’t fall anymore (as if I wanted to fall when it happened) or if I do fall I’ll keep my left arm in the air so it isn’t touched…as if I can do that in the middle of falling. But I want to promise something so that things can be the way I want them to be…and in this case it doesn’t seem bad or wrong to want this…perhaps controlling but not wrong…I want a bargain…I do, I do, I do want a bargain.
Father Richard Rohr, a Franciscan monk, writes, “Our wound is our way through.” I have been thinking about this quote for a few weeks now…I think it’s another way of saying that we have to face what is…face what is reality….and to even lean into our woundedness so that we can grow to understand it, instead of fighting it.
By my “wound?” Does he mean just my physical woundedness or does it include the wounds to my soul or my spirit? Richard Rohr goes on to say that, “God sees the wounds and sees them not as scars but as honors….” Now as spiritual or evolved or whatever kind of person I see myself as, I don’t see all my physical disabilities and pain as an “honor.” “Honor” means “high respect, great esteem…to regard with great respect “and that sounds good and if it’s true and God regards me with great respect, I’m grateful…surprised but grateful….still not sure I’m happy about it.
He says, “We need to look for our shadow, what we dismiss and what we disdain. Look at what we’ve spent our whole life avoiding.” I already know that I have avoided the issue of chronic pain and the label of “disabled” or “handicapped” and I know that’s because I feel less than everyone else when that label is attached to me. I have worked hard to accept those labels…sometimes better than others…and to try not to fight what is…which is often my specialty.
The fact is that I am differently-able or handi-capable as I like to say…my kids hate when I say that…I heard it in an episode of the old sitcom “Reba” and I think it’s funny, but not at anyone’s expense. Disabled feels like a put down. “Dis” is a Latin prefix meaning “apart,” “asunder,” “away,” “or having a negative or reversing force.” Thank-you Merriam Webster for that uplifting definition.
I don’t want to move too far from the topic of grief, and in particular, bargaining, but the word “dis” is offensive to me. I’m not sure I like “differently able” because it still feels like being set apart…not being normal. And we can all say, “But really what’s normal anyway?” But if you’re the “not normal” you know what “normal” is and so does everyone else.
So, here’s the thing…We say we don’t discriminate based on sex, age, race, religion, culture, sexual orientation, economic status, education, physical abilities, mental health issues, substance abuse, or developmental abilities, or all the other things I know I’m leaving out…but we do! Seriously we know we do!
If we really valued diversity like we say we do, then, for example, the norm would be handicapped parking everywhere and curb cuts, all showers would be wheelchair accessible, there would be touch pads to open all doors, bathrooms would all have larger stalls with rails and higher stools, there would be alternatives to stairs everywhere, seating in restaurants would accommodate everyone regardless of their size, shape, or ability…if all of that was just “the norm” then we might get close to acceptance. As it is those things only exist sometimes, why? because we don’t care.
Just look at mask wearing. It has become this huge personal freedom thing when really, it’s just caring for each other…we can’t even manage that. We only care when something affects us or someone we care about, otherwise we don’t even notice. We bargain for what we care about…what impacts us.
How can we even get close to compassion first when we don’t even see each other…really see each other? When was the last time we put ourselves in someone else’s shoes and tried to imagine what it would be like to be them? What about the 302,000 people who have lost their lives, have we tried to put ourselves in the shoes of their families? I imagine they tried to bargain and save the life of the person they loved. We have been missing compassion in our country…our world for a long time…maybe especially the last 4 years.
Loss scary and as much as we try…and we try…bargaining does not work…things may turn out as we want but it isn’t because of our exceptional bargaining skills or a deal we think we’ve struck. People are hurting, we are hurting…let’s do some walking in different shoes…
So here’s the thing…Compassion first is the deal of the day…today and every day.
Kai Raines 