Someone asked me yesterday when I will be finished…… wasn’t sure what that meant, so I asked more questions. The person asked me when I would be done with the learning portion of what Dr. Jack does and when would I be able to eat like a “normal’ person. Hmmmm…. I guess my most honest answer to that is, “Never.”
First, I guess it has a lot to do with your definition of what “normal,” is, because for me this is now what normal looks like. I don’t starve, I don’t crave stuff, I eat well, and I sleep great. I know that at any time, I can eat what I want, it is just there are some things I don’t think I will ever want again. Everything about me feels better, and I think that I kind of like this version of normal a whole lot more than what normal used to be before I found him. I don’t even like to think about what normal used to be…. sleepless nights, tummy aches all the time, my hair falling out, brain fog, dry brittle nails, bad skin…. an endless list.
Dr. Jack is constantly learning about new things, better methoids, just as I am constantly learning from him. Dr. Jack travels all over the country, getting information that is on the cutting edge. He is continually doing research and finding out better ways to help our body. I don’t think if I sat with him for weeks at a time, I could learn everything he has to say to me. There is so much to this, and I doubt I can ever absorb it all, even though I want to! When he talks, I take notes! Lots and lots of notes. I sit there hanging on his every word and then going back and looking at what we discussed.
I am a teacher. Education is my business. My goal as a teacher is to produce a life long ambition of learning. If you really want to know something, you take the time to learn about it. When I started with Dr. Jack I was thrilled that this wasn’t just some, “Here is the manual, just do what it says,” kind of program. I had been down that road a million times and failed just as many times. Instead, it was going to be an education. Not only was he going to explain things to me, he was going to provide me with tools and information to get the job done. The most important piece of that was that he was going to educate me about how things in my body work, how my disease came to be, and what I could do to reverse its progress. Wow…… how amazing would that be?? And guess what? He lived up to all of that and so much more!!
I am sure some people sit there and listen and think he has good information, but for me? What actually happened, is that he totally wet my appetite for MORE. When it comes to information from him, it is like I can’t seem to get enough now. He plants little ideas in my head, and then I am scouring the internet looking for more information about that topic. I research and read and read and read. Only, it doesn’t stop there. He suggests things and I try them, and the next thing I know I am reading article after article to find out more about that. I don’t want to be finished. I never ever ever want to be finished!!! EVER!!!
I have learned that in understanding my disease better, and in understanding how the world around me has impacted it, I have found that my willingness to “cheat,” or do things to aggravate it, have diminished naturally. I don’t just not eat things and think, “Oh, that will hinder my weight loss.” My thinking goes more along the lines of, ” Why would I poison myself? That is just crazy. I don’t want that anymore.” He has this interesting effect on me…. he teaches, and I want more and so I keep reading and reading and reading so that I completely understand it. And when I don’t understand what I read, I just ask him and then he explains it to me.
What separates his program from others, is his ability to take that knowledge that is written in all kinds of technical terms I am sure, and his ability to break that down so that regular people can understand it better. I always tell him, I never truly understood my disease until he explained to me! NEVER…. Now, I feel like I understand it. I understand what things I did that contributed to it, I understand how to make it better, and what I need to do for that to happen. It really is like people say…. with knowledge comes power.
So, when will I be “done?” ………. NEVER…. and I couldn’t be happier about it!