Have you minimized the extent of your pain and injury?
That may set you up to have an unrealistic expectation for treatment.
There’s a situation that comes up from time to time with my patients
that I want to share with you.
It’s called minimizing.
Let me illustrate what minimizing is with two stories.
The first story involves a female patient in her late 50’s. She came
into the office with severe lower back pain. Upon examination and
x-ray it was determined she had severe subluxations and advanced
degeneration in her spine.
Basically, her lower back was in BAD shape. There was a tremendous
loss of health in that area of her body.
This patient came in for her chiropractic adjustments for
approximately 2 weeks and then stopped.
I didn’t see her until 2 months later. I asked her why she had
stopped care, and her response was she didn’t think the adjustments
were working fast enough. She had returned because her pain was
miserable and the medical doctors and physical therapists were not
helping her and she was desperate.
The problem this patient had is she MINIMIZED the severity of her
health problem, even after she’d been told how bad it was.
Because she minimized her problem, she had an unrealistic expectation
of how long it would take to feel better and restore health to her
lower back to as near normal as possible. She didn’t give herself
enough time and chiropractic adjustments to heal the problem. Good
news though, she did recommit for a couple months of care and is
feeling awesome now.
Here’s the second story.
A patient in her late 60’s came into the office with terrible neck
pain and shoulder pain. For her age, her spine wasn’t great, but it
wasn’t terrible either. Each time this patient came in, she had an
attitude of defeat. She would repeatedly say, “This is probably as
good as I’ll ever feel,” or “I doubt I’ll be able to get much better.”
This patient was minimizing her potential. This is very dangerous
because when someone starts to give up hope and minimizes their
ability to heal and be well, it is very hard to improve their level
of health.
Ask yourself these two questions:
* Are you minimizing the reality of your current health?
* Are you minimizing your potential?
My suggestion is to not do either. Be real with yourself about your
current health and make the commitment to do what it takes to get
better and stay healthy. If you minimize your problem, you are not
being honest with yourself.
This will set you up to be very frustrated because you think your
problem will go away and be healed much faster than it really will.
Never, and I mean NEVER minimize your potential as a human being.
You can accomplish great things, including improving your health, as
long as you have the right attitude and commitment.
If you minimize your potential, it becomes very hard to get what you
truly want and desire. [Tweet “If you minimize your potential, it becomes very hard to get what you”]
I hope this has been helpful. Have a great day and I’ll see you soon!
Sincerely,
Dr. Justin Trosclair, DC
serving Breaux Bridge, Lafayette, Henderson, Parks, Cecilia 70517, 70506, 70592
