January 24, 2011

"SMILE EVERYDAY EVEN WHEN YOU DO NOT FEEL LIKE IT!"

If there is one lesson I learned this year that I know works everytime, it is the fact that smiling can change your mood from being lousy into being terrific, and a smile can make one realize that life isn't so bad afterall. You may be going through a horrible struggle right now, and smiling might be the last thing you want to even consider doing, but I am telling you that smiling will lift your spirits and will help you to feel better about your situation. You may think that I am crazy and that I do not know what I am talking about, but I can reassure you that I know that what I am saying is true.

On April 9, 2010, the day after my husband's major surgery when the doctors removed his stomach and esophagus, I walked into my husband's intensive care room with a huge smile on my face and remained smiling while speaking to the surgeon about my husband's condition. You may think this is odd after having gone through such a traumatic event in our lives, but I was smiling because smiling back at me on the other side of the room while lying in a hospital bed was my husband. I will be honest that I was nervous when I walked into the room, because when I had left him at midnight after a 13 hour surgery, he was unconscious and was lying in his hospital bed with hundreds of wires attached to him including a respirator which helped him breathe. Even though he was still hooked up to numerous wires when I walked in the room in the morning, the respirator was removed, he was awake, and he was smiling at me. Just the sight of my husband being awake made me smile!

My husband's journey to healing was long and arduous, but I don't think there was a day that went by that our family didn't find something to smile about. Each day we had something to be grateful for and that was the fact that my husband was still with us. I read somewhere the saying, "Smile at everyone you meet because it might be the only sunshine they receive that day" or something similar to that, but I am sure you understand what I am trying to say. Find something to smile about everyday! Even if you don't feel like smiling, do it anyway, and see what happens. I will bet that your spirits will soon be lifted higher.