Nearly twelve months have past since I last wanted to share
any aspect of my life with the world. My constant cries of “no, I am NOT ok”
went unheard or ignored leaving me depressed and wondering what my purpose in
life really was. Sure, I had an amazing son who I love more than life itself,
but was that enough to get me out of bed each day?
My pain and fatigue continued to destroy my quality of life
and while acupuncture gave me some relief, it was not enough to keep me feeling
well. I continued on my quest to uncover what was causing my ill-health. I went
to more practitioners, doctors and specialists seeking answers. Each time,
thinking, yes, this is it, only to find out that it wasn’t.
As the first semester ended in July, I had run out of
options and run out of class-room opportunities to learn. My days of classrooms
and exams were over and soon I would be in our clinic rooms seeing clients with
real health issues, just like my own. The thought of this was paralysing. If I
couldn’t fix myself, how I could I help others? But then, no other practitioner
could help me either!
I decided the only thing I could do, was to take a holiday.
A break from life, study and thoughts of the future. I spent weeks organising
for a house sitter, a dog sitter and respite care for Mum. The night before we
were due to leave, I had no energy left to even pack our bags. To finally
fire-up the old girl and drive out the driveway was a feat of epic proportions.
Sebastian and I headed for Mt Gambier, followed by The Great
Ocean road. I had serviced the old girl who also needed new tyres and several
thousand dollars later, it seemed our holiday would have to be on a tight
budget. But it didn’t matter, we had each other and everyone was cared for, so
we could relax and enjoy the journey.
From the Great Ocean Road we travelled inland to Sovereign
Hill to experience the magical Christmas in July celebrations. It was such an
amazing experience and we both felt extreme happiness. The two weeks went by at
lightning speed and before long we were back home and back to reality. I now
had a week to prepare for my next Endeavour experience-working in clinic as a
student nutritionist practitioner.
I organized as much as I could, but nothing could really
prepare me for the intensity of this environment. The time pressures, all the
different procedures, restrictions, supplementations, computer systems and
operational know-hows completely overwhelmed me. I fell apart several times in
the first weeks as supervisors yelled at me for not managing my time correctly
or for not asking the right questions or for not red-flagging a client file and
following protocol. Never in my life had I felt so incompetent and yet, I knew
that I wasn’t, but I couldn’t find my feet or calm my nerves. Every mistake I
made confirming that I wasn’t cut out for this work and I was close to
quitting.
By mid-semester I had seen a few clients, several of them
with quite complex health issues. I had begun unpacking their life and health
journeys and started identifying the underlying factors driving their
ill-health.
By the second half of the semester, clients were returning
with improvements in their conditions and pathology reports that reflected my
suspicions. I started identifying heavy metal toxicity in several of my clients
as well as myself. The more I researched, the more I found on how toxicity effects
bodily functions such as the liver, the thyroid, brain health, weight and iron
levels. In helping my clients, I began to see the potential answers to my own
health challenges and the path forward started to unfold.
As the semester finished, I had my three supervisors review
my clinical performance and I was blown away with their positive comments and
their high grading of my work. I was told that I had gone above and beyond and
obviously worked hard on researching and piecing together the health of my
clients. For me, I was just glad that I could make a difference in someone’s
life and that all these years of study was beginning to amount to something
significant.
With the semester ended and
no exams to study for, I was free to breathe, reflect and look forward to a
visit from my beloved Cousin from Germany. I spent my days planning special
events, gatherings and ways to show her our beautiful state. Her three weeks
were full of laughs, spontaneous singing and constant joy and it was one of the
most special Christmas’s I had ever experienced. We talked about holistic health,
organic food and our modern world of processed food and disease. We talked
about health retreats, yoga and meditation and we learned and discussed a
future that “could be”.
