I see it a lot. The crazies. The addicts. The people who are hard to deal with, and even harder to get through to. Working as a nurse in critical care I see all kinds of patients come into my unit, and yes, to be honest, sometimes they are referred to by the above titles. It happens, but it doesn’t make it right.
I’ll be the first to admit that I’m guilty. I’m been known to get frustrated, even angry. When a person returns over and over related to something that seems very much within their control, your first impulse is to be aghast. You think, what is wrong with you?!
Alcoholics, drug addicts, and those who make repeated, feeble attempts to take their own life, will bring out the exasperation in the calmest of nurses, and make most want to roll their eyes. But should it be that way? Should it really?
When I hear the shift report, “she stabbed herself,” and I see the reaction of those around me, I wince on the inside. I don’t say anything while I hear terms like “attention-seeking” and “batty” thrown around, but I honestly cringe, and that little girl inside me wants to cry. That little girl who remembers her momma doing the exact same thing, she wants to shout out, “it’s not her fault!” But I don’t. I doodle with my pen, and I keep listening.
I see myself surrounded by the most compassionate individuals I’ve ever known. I watch them cry with their patients, their heart breaking over the shared pain when they speak with them. I see my peers and I know their hearts just as I know mine. We want the very best for those in our care, and when it seems like we are helpless to fix them, we don’t quite know how to handle that.
We desire to offer compassion, but in the face of someone continuing on a path of personal destruction, we become confused. We don’t understand why they can’t just stop, why they can’t “get their act together,” why they can’t just change.
I have spent most of my life surrounded by addiction and mental instability. I have personally suffered at the hands of alcohol dependence and depression. I’ve seen the havoc these things play on people’s lives, and I’ve come out the other side stronger.
But even for me it’s easy to forget the icy, steel grip addiction can hold over your life. I mistakenly think people can just decide in a moment’s notice that they are ready to change, ready to be happy, and ready to really start living. It’s not that easy, but we often think it should be.
We expect people to be able to change, to conquer their demons, to let go of the only life they’ve known, and beat the odds. And when they don’t we sigh in frustration and say, “their problems are their own fault!” Maybe this is true, but should we be so easy to judge.
Why is it so hard to try and walk in someone else’s shoes? Why is it so difficult to understand that this isn’t just hard for us? Perhaps it’s even harder for them.
A child affected by a parent’s addiction will be angry, and understandably so, but we all can try and open our eyes a little bigger. Addiction hurts everyone, including the addict. No one knows the darkness and loneliness of depression more than the person who is collapsing under its weight.
It does hurt when someone you love tries to take their own life. Believe me, I know. But sometimes we can become blinded and only see how a situation affects us personally, not seeing the victim themselves.
The “crazies,” the addicts, even the ones we see as “hopeless,” they all have one thing in common. They’re hurting, and they’re weak. The thing is, so are we. We all are in one way or another. We’re all hurting, helpless, and in need of a Savior.
When you take up your cross it’s easier to walk in someone else’s shoes. You won’t do it perfectly, and you’ll still require much work at it, but perhaps if we can look at people with the eyes of Christ, we’ll see hope there.
Instead of seeing a crazy addict or an attention-seeking person intent on self harm, we’ll see ourselves. We’ll see that when it comes down to it we are all the same children of God reaching for our Father’s hand. Some just have a bit farther to reach. That’s by no fault of their own, per say. There’s just more junk in their way of seeing Him.
Every person desires love, and every person deserves respect. But most importantly, we all need saving. Some of us just don’t know it yet.