Misery

 

 

Recently, Linda and I viewed the movie “The Pawnbroker” starring Rod Steiger on TCM. His character exemplified his emotional state of misery. Steiger was a survivor from the Holocaust, was powerless to save his family; experienced survivor guilt; repressed and reliving his tragic emotional state, and had little motivation for his future. This movie along with everyday numerous horrific human conditions counters, in many respects, Maslow’s notion of “self-actualization” and Seligman’s notion of “well-being.” This disquisition focuses on the psychological state of misery resulting from natural disasters, manmade and physiological reality. Misery is defined as “a state or feeling of great distress or discomfort of mind or body.”

Misery can be the result of human conditions common to all with the inability to control the events regardless of age, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status or skin color. For instance, my dear young friend Jonathan recently passed from the treatment conditions associated with his cancer. Jonathan was a defense lawyer, superb athlete, did not drink, ate healthy and married with three athletic high school aged boys. Through no fault of their own, Tara and the boys were subjected to distress, unhappiness and hardship because of their loss. Also, this past year, my young 51-year-old physician cousin Michael passed leaving his attorney wife Nancy and their two University boys husbandless and fatherless. What a shock, what a shame and misfortune for their loving family. In addition, another dear friend an All-American and All-Pro football player is awaiting the results of having an echocardiogram. Thom’s mother has a Covid -19 diagnosis and his father, no spring chicken, has his issues as well. My friend Dave’s mother is in her 90s and recovering from a medical procedure. Dave is with her and we know what lies ahead for Dave. Furthermore, my 69-year-old friend Tom had an ALS diagnosis and passed away a few months ago leaving his wife Laura and Colt. Incidentally, Tom and Laura were one of the reasons that I moved from the Bay Area to the foothills. Sadly, Tom retired just a few years ago. Everyone faces their own mortality and the mortality of significant others in their life. Early in March is the 40th anniversary of my father’s death. Last month was the 21^st anniversary of my mother’s passing.

Misery can also be related to major decisions made with behavioral choices. Linda suffered a severe equestrian injury about four years ago. She had a punctured lung and required a shoulder replacement. Initially, she applied functional medicine in attempting to avoid surgery. Her pain and discomfort continued and she finally succumbed and had the surgery. That injury was a major ordeal, with much suffering and long-term distress. She was miserable and I experienced her misery as well. She is no longer an equestrian. A dear friend is contemplating a divorce and experiences discomfort as a result. At this early juncture, he is in a troubled state struggling with his misfortune. He knows that his misery will end but not when. I too was once an equestrian. In 2009, I was lying on my back, on the trail, with my horse Gypsy standing over me, Linda calling 911, while waiting for the helicopter to transport me to the hospital. Just think of all the individuals struggling with employment and unemployment issues during this pandemic? Many, of this number, have even lost their health insurance coverage. Tying health insurance to employment is obviously discriminatory. On another note, look at all the misery as result of health problems, in part, because of poor and inadequate exercise and dietary choices?  What about changing residence locations and the initial stress and misery? However, no one can be protected from experiencing misery during a lifetime. Playing golf everyday does not shield one from misery.  I’m not referring to Tiger and his horrible accident.

California and now Texas can thank the utility companies for subjecting millions to be without power. We can thank the profit motive and politicians for being complicit. One is totally dependent on utilities for making life easier. Being without energy is miserable. To compensate, I bought a generator to deal with PG&E’s occasional shutdown of power. My misery was very short term and it was nowhere near the massive hardship affecting the Texas citizens. We know about the devastating effects of Katrina and the hurricane damage that occurred from the inadequate levee system in Louisiana. We had an economic crash brought on because of deregulation, Wall Street greed, and the failure of “Too Big to Fail.” Yes, the suffering citizens had to deal with the bailout. How many have heard of the “American dream?”  That myth was propagated because of our profit oriented capitalistic economic system. It was supposed to bring “happiness.” Since when does a large mortgage result in positive emotions? Happiness lasts how long?

The current Covid-19 pandemic has brought misery exceeding 5000.000 deaths, far too many. Once again, man-made decisions, by those in power, with and without the hazards of nature have subjected its citizens to misery. Not only was the scientific community muzzled, public health denied, with useless and exploitative ideas propagated by the Republican government, has resulted in a  catastrophe in terms of public health and  economic misery. Thank the greedy, self-serving government individuals for their absence of protection. Once again being powerless, with Individuals subjecting others to non-healthy, sadistic and miserable situations becomes common place. Yes, one had to choose between the messaging strategy of the politician or the facts from the scientific community. How about the junior senator from Texas leaving his state for Cancun to escape misery?  How did that work out for him?

 It can’t be all that bad, what about the “Pursuit of happiness,”” Self-Actualization” and “Well-Being,” some may ask?   Maslow’s theory was based on a hierarchy of mastering needs. They ranged from the primary, the physiological or survival to the possibility of reaching self-actualization. With a failure to satisfy the basic needs, leads to deficiency conditions which would be the absence of satisfying one’s psychological health. This suggests that misery lies awaiting.

In Seligman’s theory, there were five conditions that are necessary to achieve a state of Well –Being. His 5 components: 1. Positive emotion creation 2. Engagement and involvement 3. Relationships – Friends, family, intimacy etc. 4. Meaning, creating, or belonging 5. Achievement or accomplishment. Perhaps, it is difficult to encompass all these 5 elements even without a catastrophe. On the other hand, it might be possible to maintain some of the elements in a catastrophe. In any event, achieving self-actualization or a state of well-being is very difficult for far too many of the population even during “normal” times because normal does not exist but human nature does.

It is of no surprise that members of our military, except the generals and political “leaders”, do not experience PTSD, and significant body injuries during war times. In the old days, Alexander led the charge, how uncivilized. It is also no surprise that our military has an exceedingly high suicide rate. What about the military generals and the mental health of the politicians? Misery creation seems like the norm. It is also of no surprise that our citizens have a high dependency and addiction rate on alcohol, food and drugs accompanied with exceedingly high rates of suicide especially among teens. Alcohol, food and drugs can temporarily ameliorate misery while suicide ends it permanently. Yes, there are degrees of misery that pertain to person, place and time regardless of wealth. Just ask Steve Jobs? Sadly, for too many, there’s an imbalance in the ratio of misery to well-being with too many self – defeating measures of escape.