It’s common to go through a period of trying lots of things, failing, and then giving up. Sometimes we try things, and it goes so badly or it’s so obviously unworkable that we drop it into the done that pile never to be revisited.
When you get ill, and start researching what you can do. You find a plethora of advice explaining various things you can do to get better. There are diets, exercises, behaviours, medication, supplements, perspectives, therapies and general advice. All of this can be overwhelming. There is no chance you can implement all these things at once. You tend to pick the most attractive idea based on how much effort it might require, and focus on that.
Sometimes we try something, and it goes badly, and we never try it again. Yet there can be a lot of value in trying things again when you might be in a different position to benefit from it. A position that you might not even realise you’re in. This could be something as simple as trying a supplement, that has cofactors as a requirement. You might try a vitamin D supplement, and nothing improves. But this can be because you’re also deficient in magnesium, calcium or potassium, all these components affect each other, and it’s the same whether it’s a supplement or a therapy.
Your mental state plays a massive part in whether habits you’re trying to change succeed or not. You could feel like your mental state hasn’t changed that much over the years. You’re still depressed, still struggling, still in pain and waking up unrefreshed. But you’ve undoubtably changed. What you’ve tried before, might work this time round, it can simply even be a matter of luck, or a slight change in how you approach something.
Another aspect to trying things, is that they can take much longer than you might aspect to make a positive change, again this is the same whether it’s a supplement or a behaviour. Sometimes we simply can’t manage to keep doing something because negative effects accumulate too much and it forces us to stop. This could be because we’re doing too much too fast, or taking medicine at the wrong dosage, or we could be making a mistake with something, or something might not be tailored for our lifestyle. There are so many variables at work that in my opinion, you could try something a hundred times with failure and still have hope that it might work one day.
One thing you need to keep focus on, is your awareness of your progress with things. Your awareness of where you are with your health and what is affecting you the most is also very important. If you’re having a particularly bad set of months, then you can know that anything you try these months, has the hindrance of a downturn affecting it. Navigating chronic illness alone is basically impossible, you need the knowledge and help of others; ideally medical experts like your doctor. General practitioners might have limited knowledge on your illness, so whilst they can be considered an expert on health, you ideally want to be dealing with a specialist eventually, because a GP will just keep running into dead ends, and not have the time to focus on your particular problems. A GP’s best use is to identify common acute illness in the general population. People with chronic illness often get stuck with a GP who can’t really help that much, so they cycle to another GP, and another. They might even get thrown between various specialists having never really met the right specialist for their illness. Ideally once you’ve suffered for a number of years, there really should be a council of specialists who review a case, to get to the bottom of what exactly would be the best health plan.
My overall intention here is to explain that it’s very likely that the first time you try a supplement, or diet or exercise regime, won’t necessarily be successful, but it doesn’t mean it won’t ever be successful. There obviously isn’t a full understanding of human health yet, and everyone is dealing with their own unique issues if they are stuck in chronic illness. It’s unfortunately up to you to advocate for yourself most of the time, and get to the bottom of why you’re suffering.
Well said!