Often an illness or pain becomes, over time, a part of us. It makes it all the more difficult to part from it.

Parting from an Old Acquaintance

I was worried. A first meeting with a new client and I was worried. I shouldn't be, I reminded myself. I have plenty of experience: most of my patients are either healed or, at least, feel a definite improvement. Some do not and I have learnt not to let this get me down.

But this time I was worried. Usually when speaking on the telephone for the first time, pleasantries are exchanged and I ask the patient to explain briefly why they are coming so that I can prepare myself beforehand. Then again I might suggest they meet with another member of the Neve Briut staff, if I think a specific treatment will yield more effective results.

The illness she described is quite common, so that couldn't be why I was perturbed. I had just come away from successfully helping a client to relieve the symptoms of a very rare auto-immune skin disease and my self-confidence was high.

It wasn't the comprehensive way that she reeled off the names of specialists, rare and expensive techniques or the array of pharmaceutical products (natural and synthetic) which would have challenged any pharmacist's memory.

It was the way she said it all, the way she presented her problem - with pride, with authority. It was her illness and she knew what she was talking about!

She made an impressive entrance. My previous client had left 15 minutes previously and this had given me time to clear the place up a bit, arrange the various forms on the desk and, in true English spirit, arm myself with a reassuring cup of (herbal) tea.

Her entrance was emphatic. A brisk sweep of the eyes took in our modest clinic and I barely had time to rise and shake her hand before she was seated and plunging into the intricacies of her case.

I took a deep breath, stopped her and requested that she fill out the necessary forms and questionnaire. She was momentarily perturbed, but quickly back in the swing of things. I was impressed to notice that she continued exactly from where she had left off when I had interrupted her.

When she finished she looked at me triumphantly:

"Well?" She said. "Do you have a solution?"

I had been glancing at what she had written and, here and there, had added my own observations. I slowly put down the papers and my pen and leaned back in my seat. I was trying to look calm, to create a rather dramatic effect. The truth is, I was silently praying this wouldn't rebound on me:

"As a matter of fact, I do," I said. "The question is: are you ready to get well? It will change your life and the things you focus upon. It can be quite unsettling. You must be really sure that you are ready to make the change, otherwise the remedy that I give you will not be effective."

She had a strange look on her face and I saw my practice in Eilat disintegrating before my eyes. But when she spoke, her voice was uncertain:

"I do," she said quietly, though not too convincingly. "I've had this illness for a long time, you know."

There was nothing else that really needed to be said. I treated this patient with the Bach Flower Remedies, a gentle, yet incredibly profound herbal method. My client took her doses with veritable accuracy and over the next six weeks she parted company from an old acquaintance, so far with total remission.

If the symptoms return, I suspect it will be accompanied by a sense of insecurity and loneliness, even though she knows that this particular relationship was never in her best interests.

* * * *
Alon Shalev is a holistic health practitioner and manager of the Neve Briut clinics in Eilat, Tel Aviv and the Health Centre at Kibbutz Lotan. He heads a staff of highly professional Bodywork practitioners in addition to a Homeopath, Chinese Medical Practitioner and Naturopath.

Printed in the English In Eilat Magazine March 2001