Bargaining

Whether or not people profess faith in God or follow a spiritual path, they find themselves trying to bargain their way out of desperate situations. The old adage, “There are no atheists in fox holes” could easily apply to chronic illness. One of the stages of grieving, and remember we are grieving for our own losses, is bargaining. Whether it is bargaining with God as we know God or bargaining with something as vague as the cosmos, people will try to bargain their way out of the illness. The process starts when the patient looks back at his or her life and decides that their less than perfect life style or attitude is the cause of the sickness. The next step is making promises about future behavior in return for relief from the sickness. Bargaining sounds something like this, “If I get better (or You make me better) I promise I will (eat more vegetables, stop kicking the cat, be a pleasant person,_____). Bargaining makes some faulty assumptions. The first is that we caused our illness. The second is that our illness was inflicted on us as some kind of religious or cosmic punishment. The third is that whoever we are bargaining with will remove our sickness the same way they gave it to us.

Whether or not you contributed to your illness is only important in that you have learned to stop doing that. What happened happened and nothing can change it. While prayer and meditation can be very helpful in managing chronic illness, playing “Let’s Make a Deal” is not. Fortunately, the bargaining stage usually doesn’t last very long. Instead of spending your energy figuring out what constitutes an enticing offer, put your energy into something you know will pay off and make a plan to manage your disease.