Clergy/Leaders’ Mail-list No. 0-017

by Norman and Ann Bales

With the exception of death itself, nothing disturbs the tranquility of a family quite so severely as prolonged, serious illness. We seem to take our health for granted. We all have colds, flu, viruses, headaches, stomach disorders, backaches and other short-term illness. Sometimes people have more chronic illnesses, which affect their ability to function and often last for long periods of time. Some are life threatening. Some are incurable.

Long-term, serious illnesses dramatically impact family life, family dynamics, family solidarity and often tests family commitment. We want to share some insights about illness and it’s effect on the family.

WHAT WE CAN LEARN ABOUT THE NATURE OF ILLNESS FROM THE BIBLE

1. Sickness is a normal part of the life cycle.

2. God expects Christians to express compassion for the sick. (James 5:14-15)

3. Prayer is an important activity when ministering to the sick (James 5:16).

4. When people become ill, their families are impacted. (Mark 4:21- 43; John 11).

5. Sickness is not necessarily related to sin (John 9:1-5).

PROBLEMS A FAMILY EXPERIENCES WHEN SICKNESS OCCURS.

1. Loss of order in the family. This could include loss of income, reduced productivity, disturbance of routine and neglect of responsibilities.

2. A feeling of helplessness and inferiority. When illness strikes, you may ask, “What’s wrong with us?” “Why did this have to happen to us?” “What are we ever going to do?” So long as we go through life without health problems, we have a sense of well being. We rarely pause to reflect on our mortality. We perceive ourselves to be in control. Others may be having problems around us, but our family is an island of strength. Illness proves all those presumptions false and leaves us with a clouded, uncertain future. “When we heard the word tumor, it was as though the entire floor fell away and left us standing on a tiny chunk of safe ground hundreds of feet above a deep crevasse. Life, which seemed so safe and predictable only moments before, was now revealed to be on the verge of calamity.” – Dave Dravecky. “Comeback” in Growing a Healthy Marriage. p. 243.

3. Distrust of the medical community. Despite the many jokes about doctors who think they are God, medical science does not have the answer to all our health problems. The cost of medical treatment is enormous and for that kind of money, we expect to see results. We become impatient with the physicians who can’t fix what ails us. Add to that disillusionment, the fact that we are forced to enter a strange environment in which our clothes are taken away from us and we are given a flimsy gown that ties in the back. If we have a sense of modesty, we can expect it to be violated.

We are forced to comply with numerous requests to lie in certain positions and we may develop certain hostility to those who inflict these procedures upon us. Besides that, they don’t know us. They have seen so many people who are worse off than we are. Consequently, they display little sympathy for our symptoms and complaints. They invade our bodies with needles, run tubes inside our inward parts and bark out so many orders that you wonder if they were trained to be drill sergeants. In time we question both their competence and their interest in our well being.

4. Separation. Loved ones are not allowed in the operating room. Visitation time in ICU is limited. Those who endure long hospitalizations can’t go home and be comforted by their pets. They are forced out of familiar surroundings. Even when loved ones come, they must eventually leave to go home and rest. The entire family routine is broken.

5. Fear. The prognosis is not always known and sometimes remains uncertain. Waiting becomes an arduous task. A patient may wonder if family members are trying to keep something back. It can produce conflict between the family and other members. Patients fear having control over their bodies taken away from them by family members and members of the medical profession. Worry and anxiety over the quality of future life, financial matters and other concerns become an important consideration.

6. Personality change. Sometimes medication or the condition itself will alter the way a patient responds to people. Family members may sense they are now living with a stranger. Adjustments have to be made to cope with these altered personality patterns.

7. Fear of losing love. A surgery may leave a person deformed. A Viet Nam war soldier was sent to a burn center following a grenade explosion. One side of his face was permanently disfigured. When his wife saw him, she welcomed him home, but many of his fellow patients were not so fortunate. Some wives threw their wedding rings on the husbands’ beds and left in disgust. When a woman loses a breast, when a person loses a limb, when one suffers loss of coherent speech capability following a stroke, when bowel and bladder control are lost, patients often wonder if they will still be acceptable to other family members, especially spouses. Sometimes a family member chooses to abandon the sick person rather than face the unpleasantness of caregiving.

WHAT CAN WE DO TO HELP A FAMILY THAT IS COPING WITH ILLNESS

1. Practice the Golden Rule. How would you want to be treated if you were in the same situation? Would you want people to stay away from you? Neglect you? Take no interest in your circumstances? Would you want them to try to reach out and help even if they did it poorly? Try to think through your own reactions to life if you were to suddenly lose your ability to function in a normal way.

2. Become informed. Try to understand what the patient and the family are going through. We are not suggesting that you need to become a medical authority. In fact, you need to be careful, because “a little knowledge can be dangerous.” The family probably does not need medical advice from you, but it is helpful if you have some understanding of the terms they use and the conditions they describe.

3. Help the family to accept reality. This will require great wisdom and patience. When long term serious illnesses arise, most families expect recovery in a short time. At some point, they will need to recognize the true nature of their loved one’s condition. Helping them face reality can be delicate. You want them to deal with their problem realistically, but you don’t want to take away their hope.

4. Help the family to see the problem from a spiritual perspective. Several years ago, we baptized a cancer patient into Christ during the last weeks of his life. We also baptized his wife at the same time. None of his children had ever made any kind of commitment to Christ. On the day he died, we were called to the hospital by the nursing staff. His children did not want to let go. They were pleading with him to hold on. The hospital staff was frustrated because they were only prolonging the man’s agony.

We finally called the children together. We weren’t sure they would understand what we had to say to them. We said, “Your father is going to a better place. He’s going to be with God. You need to give him permission to go to that better place.” We’re not sure what they thought of us, but they did as we requested and he slipped away a few hours later.

5. Don’t judge. Don’t tell people “If you had taken better care of your health, you wouldn’t be in this mess.” You don’t know all the reasons for the illness or for circumstances that produced the illness. Sometimes people are quick to form judgments about a patient or a patient’s family, when they only have a partial view of all the facts.

6. Don’t flaunt your blessings. It is common for Christians to feel the Lord has blessed them. Many of us have been blessed with good health. Some have experienced remarkable recovery from serious illness and credit the Lord for “pulling them through.” That’s fine, but we need to stop and think what that sounds like to a person who has undergone serious suffering, who has prayed fervently and still not received relief. We need to learn how to be grateful to God for his blessings without sounding like we are rubbing salt in the wounds of a person who still feels pain.

7. Pray for those who are trying to cope with serious illness. Pray for healing (Philippians 2:27); pray for the ability to cope (Philippians 4:11-13); pray for the Lord to open a door of opportunity to help (Matthew 5:16).

8. Make yourself available to help. Offer transportation, prepare meals, sit through the night with those who need constant attention, be available for listening, show special attention on birthdays and anniversaries, mow the lawn, trim the bushes, do the laundry, clean the house, open up your home if relatives come to visit.

“How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving, and tolerant of the weak and the strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these.” George Washington Carver. quoted by Charles Swindoll. Growing Wise in Marriage” p. 213.

CONCLUSION

“Prior to World War II, Dr. Paul Tournier, the Swiss physician, first proposed his concept of medicine of the whole person. When an individual is sick, Tournier believed, his or her whole being is affected – the physical, psychological, and spiritual.” – Gary Collins. Christian Counseling. p. 409. We agree with Dr. Tournier’s conclusion, but we also believe that the entire family is affected when a person is seriously ill. As Christians we need to think through our response to families who deal with illness.