On the podcast, the Art Frank was talking about his experience in the hospital and how he told his story many times. He described that the more he told his story, the more he found someone that was able to understand his story, and that his story – telling his story out loud to others – made it easier to understand what happened to him, himself. He described an incident that, when in the hospital, a nurse told him to “start taking care of himself” due to his appetite habits. The nurse was not understanding his side of the story – the busy schedule, and the harsh medicine. It is important, as a care taker, not to forget about the patient’s point of view. He says that it can only take 3-5 minutes to simply as as a care taker “what are the important things that you want me to know about you.”
In the reading The Wounded Story Teller: Body, Illness, and Ethics, I picked up on a quote that made me think of the story that I heard during my interview with Jolena, “Stories have to repair the damage that illness had done to the ill’s persons sense of where she is in life, and where she may be going. Stories are a way of redrawing maps and finding new destinations.”(53). I believe that the first time I talk to Jolena was the first time anyone has ever asked her to talk about her illness as a story that happened to her. Nearing the end of the conversation, we began to talk about how the disease changed her, and how she grew as a person from the illness. I believe talking about illness in such a way improves recovery from an illness, and explores any misunderstandings from how the illness left you.
