How do we heal?

Today, I write about healing:

I spend a lot of time contemplating healing and what facilitates the process. I have come to ponder that healing is not something we have the tools to make happen. There isn’t a pill, a food, a therapeutic technique that causes cells to knit themselves back together, bone to repair or mental, emotional or psychic wounds to dissolve. 

A friend recently called me, tearful, asking for help. She had a wound that could not be stitched up and required packing; a process of removing the old and inserting new gauze every 24 hours, each time a little less, as the wound healed from the inside out. This is called healing by third intention. Her partner had witnessed the gauze insertion in the urgent care. It had been painful and without the human tenderness she needed. And, he looked at me and said, ‘with all of our medical technology, this just seems barbaric. Isn’t there another way? Don’t we have a better technique than this?' I understood the frustration behind his question. But, the truth is, there isn’t a technique that makes a wound heal. 

Healing is something that is done by the life force within us that informs our tissues to knit together. In some cases, this is facilitated by closing a wound with stitches or staples, bringing the edges close, reducing risk of infection, and allowing for new cells and scar tissue to form. But, sometimes, a wound can’t be closed; either because of its size, its depth, the length of time it has been open, or when manually closing it would create a pocket the body would fill with fluid and would be more prone to infection. Sometimes a wound needs to drain in order to heal from the inside out. The body regenerates from the base of the wound, layering fresh cells upon fresh cells and growing blood vessels until it has completed the process ending with the outer skin. 

While packing a wound is painful and undesirable, what could have been less barbaric is not the way the wound needed to heal, but rather the way in which the person with the wound was cared for. She needed to be able to ask them to stop when the pain was too much. She needed agency and for someone to sit with her fear and panic and pain for a few minutes. Without that, not only did she experience the physical pain, but new wounds were inflicted on her mental and emotional body. 

We do not have the tools to make healing happen. But, we often have the tools to not cause more harm. One of the greatest gifts we can give to our bodies and to one another is to listen to the needs expressed by the body and by the person, and in meeting those needs, the environment for healing is created. Those needs may be an antibiotic, stitches, packing, doing surgery or setting a bone. They may also be nourishing food, holding a hand, tender words and compassionate care. 

There is a greater life force that does the actual healing. It is the incredible, infinite life force that infuses every living thing on earth, that wakes us up each day, that blooms in a flower, grows in a tree, swims as a fish and informs you and I. A whole cascade of biochemical signals direct cell replication and blood vessel growth. Skin and bone knits itself back together. Chemical signals allow for the balanced amount of inflammation, for immune cells to stand guard and pick up debris, for endorphins to balance and organize the steps involved, so that no one action is too much or too little. This life force is universal and does not rely on individual will.

Our invitation is attentiveness.
The first step is to know that the wound exists.
The second is to clean the wound, or to set the bone.
The third is time and tending as appropriate.
With these steps we meet the needs of the body so that it can go about the business of healing.

But what about our mental and emotional wounds, the wounds of neglect and abuse, the wounds of betrayal and abandonment, the wounds of shame, of loss? So often, I find that while it may seem obvious to align a bone and give it rest and time to heal; while we trust that healing is happening even where we can not see it occurring; we do not apply the same tenets to these wounds of the spirit and mind. 

What does the anger need? What does the sadness need? What does the grief need? What does the shame need?
When was the last time you asked this question and listened for the answers? When was the last time you even gave yourself permission to have needs? 

Even in the therapeutic process, we, at times, run on the uneven shards of an emotional fracture. We may not even acknowledge its presence, leaving it unaligned and vulnerable. We leave wounds festering, ignoring or bypassing their pain. We tear at and curse the wounds that are healing too slowly. An emotional wound can not be stitched up. It will always heal by third intention, from the inside out, when it is acknowledged and the needs are met for the business of healing to occur. 

How?
The first step is to acknowledge the wound. Where do we feel the pain? What do we feel? This is not the story of how we tore the skin or the story of how we were traumatized. It is the raw edges, the redness, the heat, the fear, the sadness, the grief, the anger.

The second step is to clean the wound. This may be where excavation and exploration is useful.

And the third is time and tending as appropriate. It is meeting the needs of the body, mind, spirit so that conditions for healing are present, so that life can mend the wounds.

And lastly, we may need to learn new skills, relearn patterns of movement and interaction that are now possible in this newly healing state. 

I can not say what these needs will be for each person. We are invited to explore what is still causing harm. To meet the physical, emotional and mental needs that align or nourish the healing process. To offer a space of compassion, curiosity and safety. Often the acknowledgment itself, without judgment, creates a healing space. Once we know the wound is there, we can employ the tools to help facilitate the healing process: immobilize a fracture, reduce infection with an antibiotic, support a nervous system with medication, perform surgery, pack a wound, nourish the body with food, hydrate, learn new movements, receive touch, work with plants to support healing, set relational boundaries, engage in therapy, and the list goes on. And underlying all of the tools is a profound invitation to trust, to remember that life moves towards healing when these needs are met, that healing is not something we can make happen, nor is healing clearly defined. Healing is also unique and individual and nuanced and may or not meet our conditioned expectations. 

And, perhaps most importantly, healing does not happen in a vacuum. Creating the environment for healing requires systems of support, systems which do not continue to cause harm, and systems which allow for a space of safety to be known. 

I invite each of us to give a little attention to our wounds.
We are vulnerable creatures and wounds are a given part of moving through life in a vulnerable body.
We each have unique needs.
We need one another to meet those needs.

It is my hope that in healing, we may also learn to contribute less to the wounding of others, to be curious about each others needs without assumption or judgment, to lovingly tend each others wounds, to extend compassion and find ways to lessen harm.