Mountains & Molehills

I have a migraine, she whimpered raggedly, I have to go the hospital. I'll probably be all day.

What she actually had was an ongoing fight with her partner of the last several years and it took precedence over her responsibility to be at work. Being prone to depression and anxiety - and now migraine headaches, it seemed - she's easily overwhelmed and defeated by everyday obstacles and she reaches for the simplest solution. The doctor wasn't buying it but we were desperately busy and there was no time to worry about it - the waiting room was already full and we were behind without having begun. Let's go, he growled and headed for an exam room, chart in hand, muttering under his breath. A moment later he had put it behind him, Young man! he exclaimed cheerfully to the eighty something patient with alzheimer's and bunions, Lookin' good!

Adversity, real or imagined, serves a purpose. It challenges us to dig for resources in ourselves that we might not otherwise find. It shows us what we can do under fire, measures us and tests our faith, stretches our abilities and reinforces our humor and determination. We face up to it and become stronger, more self reliant, braver - or we run and hide, hoping it will go away and find someone else to bother. Real adversity builds character, strength and conviction, the imagined kind makes cowards of us all, too weary to attempt anything and barely having the will to give up.

Rather than leave her problems at the door and put on her smile face, our young nurse arrives each morning with a litany of disasters - migraines, traffic, medication shortages, bad sleep, irritating contact lenses, loss of her cell phone, forgotten chores - she is on a perpetual uphill climb with no end in sight and for the rest of us who are forced to pick up her slack, it seems staged, annoying, and endless. Her days are made up of sighs and unfinished work, reports left undone and stashed in a drawer, clock watching and personal calls, self pity and slights. She reeks of sadness, a profound despair that prevents her from moving on, clouds her judgement, and slows her down. Her emotions reign unchecked and painfully visible. She is undone by a harsh word, overflowing with apologies, and quick to promise that she'll do better. She means well but meaning well and doing well have miles between them. Trying is not nearly enough.

Better to learn to separate the mountains from the molehills and act on the difference. You can't run fast enough or far enough from your own self.