Never Stop...Never Quit... ®: Reconstructing and Defining Kevin Part Eight: What Is Wellness and Where Do I Get Some?

Part Eight: What Is Wellness and Where Do I Get Some?

wellness, noun

the state of being healthy, especially when it is something that you actively try to achieve (3)

Before going down the rabbit hole of what it means to be healthy [healthy - strong and well (4); well – in a good way (5); etc.], Kevin chose to stick with a more impressionistic understanding of wellness.

“It’s more the concept of how I feel. Since I live with a debilitating illness, the accusation of healthy can inflame a conversation. ‘But you look healthy,’ often leads to reactions like, ‘Why don’t you do more,’ or, ‘It must be all in your mind.’ I have had those conversations many times. Often, my impression is an overreaction. Other times, the jab was intended just as I received it. I don’t like to worry about the intent, so I avoid the term whenever possible.”

Kevin likes wellness. It describes how he can feel great given everything going on in his life. It is subjective, so when considering wellness, “things” can be good. They can also get better or worse, by a little or a lot. Small words oversimplifying complex factors are often the best descriptions of how he feels.

The pursuit of wellness is often relegated to association solely with alternative medical treatments versus traditional mainstream therapies. A small administration under the US Department of Health and Human Services houses many discussions on Dimensions of Wellness at the federal level. SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) was a significant first step. Their presentation, CREATING A HEALTHIER LIFE: A STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE TO WELLNESS (6), provided a near-perfect representation of what Kevin was looking for with his initial search to “feel better.”

“I have one issue,” he explains. “I agree with almost everything and can relate to the in-depth descriptions of each dimension. I spend quite a bit of time on nonprofit and philanthropic endeavors, but technically I am on disability and do not have a job. The term OCCUPATIONAL doesn’t sit well with me. They describe it as ‘getting personal satisfaction and enrichment from one’s work and hobbies.’ I don’t consider what I do to be work, nor is it merely 1a hobby.

“I bookmarked the site and kept on searching. That’s when I found Dr. Debbie Stoewen’s article on Dimensions of Wellness. She focused on the same eight mutually interdependent dimensions, with one exception, replacing VOCATIONAL for OCCUPATIONAL. The two articles combined describe my search.”

Dr. Stoewen defines the Vocational Dimension as:

Preparing for and participating in work that provides personal satisfaction and life enrichment that is consistent with your values, goals, and lifestyle
Contributing your unique gifts, skills, and talents to work that is personally meaningful and rewarding (7)

To Kevin, the term was a better description of his situation. He felt less of a need to clarify the word. We will merge the two descriptions of all eight dimensions into our own working model for the rest of our discussion.

We have two publications holding equal value in our discussion of Dimensions of Wellness. The first was published by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The second article, though housed in the US National Library of Medicine, National Institutes Of Health, was first published by The Canadian Veterinary Journal. Dr. Stoewen is the Care & Empathy Officer and Director of Veterinary Services for Pets Plus Us, Oakville, Ontario. She is a licensed veterinarian and registered social worker with a special interest in “the social side” of veterinary medicine. Both Kevin and I are grateful for this bounty of information and hope these concepts will be increasingly shared throughout every medicine channel.

(3) https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/wellness

(4) https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/healthy

(5) https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/well

(6) https://store.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/d7/priv/sma16-4958.pdf

(7) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5508938/

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The developing draft of my story will be shared on this secure drive location: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1E4cNpkFBU4qf3zYDIqZ5Nw72DzhGe88r?usp=sharing

These are the thoughts going through my mind as I try to piece it all together…

This is not about what my life will be like when the fight is over.

I will never stop

I will never quit

This is my story