Who’s in Charge of your Health and Well Being?

Several weeks ago I saw a car accident. The man driving behind me changed lanes without looking and hit the woman in the lane beside us.

THUMP.

Quickly he was driving behind me again (very closely, mind you)! As she sailed past me, looking completely unphased, I saw the side of her car streaked with the paint from his. She just kept driving.

Huh?

I followed her. It was several minutes before she finally pulled over, and I pulled in behind her.

I jotted down my contact information and walked up to her car. She rolled down the window, saying she was unable to open her door. I sympathetically handed over my details, telling her I saw everything in my rearview mirror, I’m happy to be a witness, and please have her insurance call me.

As I was heading back to my car the other driver pulled in behind me. Amazing! I was so happy to see he did the right thing. He could have driven right past negating his roll in this situation. He didn’t have a front license plate so I couldn’t make note of that when he was driving behind me.

A month later her insurance called me. I gave my account of everything that I saw. They asked me some very specific questions. How many people were in each car? Were the drivers alone? Then she said, “Thank you so much for sharing. This will really help the driver who was hit. The other driver is not accepting responsibility.”

But! He stopped! And did the right thing! Didn’t he do the right thing? I’m only assuming, based on what she said, that he was trying to convince the insurance people that it wasn’t his fault or WORSE, that it was her fault. Essentially he did just drive right past.

This got me thinking about responsibility. I like to play with words, dismantle them, and really understand what they really mean. Like forgiveness which I talk about here.

If you Google, “Define: responsibility,” you’ll see lots of possible definitions. I also looked up responsible and am really jiving with this definition: liable, to be called on to answer. Simple right?

Taking this further, I asked my coach about this recently. I loved what she had to say about it.

She said, “ Responsibility is the ability to sit in the consequences of your choices. And irresponsibility is wanting others to suffer for our actions … or to blame someone else for the consequences of your choices.”

Sadly that driver is being incredibly irresponsible. Enough already about this car accident.

How does this impact you? And your health?

Well… let’s get physical (physical).

For every action, there is a reaction (hello Newton).

For every choice, there is some sort of consequence.

For every cause, there is an effect.

You make a choice to eat junk or even eat foods that most of the world would consider to be healthy but are inflammatory and reactive for you, then there is a consequence. For if I eat rice I’m up all night. If I eat chickpeas that’s a whole host of bloat and room-clearing gas. Maybe for you, it’s diarrhea, or headaches, or skin rashes.

You take on stress that depletes you and you’re a drained zombie wandering around with holes where your thoughts used to be and no mojo.

You refuse to get to bed at a decent hour and you increase your risk of every chronic illness including cardiovascular disease, autoimmunity, and cancer.

Obviously, there are positive choices too.

You set a boundary with your inlaws and suddenly you’re feeling free and energized.

You eat copious amounts of veggies and you have text-book bowel movements.

You drink the right about of water for your body weight and your skin clear up!

There are countless examples of how the choices we make affect our physiology.

And here’s the clincher. Only you can take responsibility for your own well being. Unless you’re a minor incapable of making medical desisions (which, side note is different from the age of majority), no one will rescue you.

Yes… there are people like me who can help you but at the end of the day, I’m not going to be there to tuck you in at 10 pm (partly because I would have already been asleep for 30 minutes).

At the beginning of the day, I’m not going to be there to make sure you’re drinking your lemon water or taking your herbal medicines.

In the middle of the day, I won’t be there to take you to the grocery store to grab a salad instead of hitting up the Timmy’s drive through.

You’re the only one who is going to be there day in and day out, making the choices, and sitting in the consequences of those choices.

While you can make a choice to come see me… (and I hope you do), I think it’s important we’re clear on who’s responsible for what.

As a naturoapthic doctor, I’m responsible for taking all the information we get from our conversations, physical exams, and lab tests and putting together a wellness plan that will help you meet your goals, and ideally cause as little harm as possible in the process.

You, as the patient, are responsible for implementing the plan – moving your body regularly, putting the fork full of broccoli up to your mouth (and in the mouth for best effect), killing the devices and getting to bed at a good time. Make sense?

I also need to relinquish the responsibility for your responsibility. It’s up to you, and how you decide to act is on you. I’m happy to provide the information and cheer you on. You, my friend, provide the transformation through your new choices and subsequent consequences.

Or not! It’s entirely up to you. Whether you step up and accept the consequences of your choices or you negate your responsibility and blame things or people outside yourself, that’s totally your decision. But I’ll tell you this. Only one will actually benefit your well being in the long run. You’re a smart cookie, so I bet you know which one it is.

I would love to know where you’re at with this. Where in your life do you need to take more responsibility? Where do you need to sit in the consequences of your own choices? Let me know in the comments below.

To your healthy, thriving, delightful life,