June 17, 2011

"TAKE A WALK IN ANOTHER MAN'S SHOES!"

A conversation with my mother today got me thinking about the title of today's topic. As we were sitting in the examination room of our local gastroenterology office waiting to see the doctor for my mother's six month check-up, she started to ask me questions about my husband's major surgery and his recovery time. One story led to another, and soon we were discussing the criticism that I received for hiring a nurse to come into our home to change my husband's bandages twice a day after he was released from the hospital. Many people felt that I was being selfish, and they felt since I am my husband's wife that I should be cleaning his wound and changing his bandages. Now, I will be the first person to tell you that I am NOT a nurse! I can deal with wounds on my own body, but to have to change another person's bandages just freaks me out. People even had the nerve to make fun of me and laugh in my face that I was no Florence Nightengale. These types of comments really hurt me, and they made me think that maybe those people should have volunteered to take a walk in my shoes.

Back in the 1970's, Elvis Presley sang a song entitled, "Take a Walk in My Shoes." The entire song is amazing; however, the lyrics that jump out to me the most are, "Don't abuse, criticize, or accuse until you take a walk in my shoes." 

How many times do we sit back and criticize someone else for how they are taking care of business especially if their way is different than how we may approach the same situation. It is easy to cast blame or accuse someone of not doing something to our specifications, but how many times do we sit back to see if their way works out. For instance, the people who criticized me for not changing my husband's bandages could have volunteered to come over to our home twice a day for three months to change his bandages if they felt their way was the best way. In my mind, I felt I was providing my husband with the best professional service possible, because if an infection set in, we had a nurse here twice a day who could spot it right away and send us to the hospital. I would not have known what to look for until it would have been too late. Plus, the nurse took my husband's vital signs twice a day, and on one occasion, his vitals were very low, and she sent us straight to the emergency room.

This is just one example in my own life where people were unwilling to look at things the way I viewed them. Just because I could not change my husband's bandages did not mean that I did not love him. I loved him dearly and still do, and I wanted the best for him. If I had it to do over again, I would not change a thing.

Before you start criticizing someone, because they may not be doing something the way you may do it does not make that person a bad person. It just means that person has a different thinking process, and if we step back and watch and listen, we might learn a thing or two. Like Elvis said, "Before you abuse, criticize, or accuse take a walk in my shoes!"