Vets Save Lives

Seeing a few months before me and now a few months behind me, I now can see the pattern of therapy and healing. All of us may think that we have a better plan than a vet but something they have on us is experience and wisdom. They never, ever once led me astray in advice. If they do error, it isn’t a significant error and they apologize. So just had an a ha moment and I think I can explain it.

New quitters here are fresh and excited about their quit. They have failed on their own and fear that they will fail again. But the support and love they feel is great.

Then someone caves and all hell break loose. Vets come in and beat the holy shit out of a caver. (Oh the things they say, wow if that was me, it would push me away. If I ever caved, I would just fade away. I wouldn’t go through all that) Yet cavers come back and post a day 1. Why? Why would they post and take the beatings to come?

So as a new guy, I actually thought it was funny to tease and pick on a failed quitter. It was like that movie scene in airplane where the lady freaks out and then a line forms to slap the shit out of her. It was an opportunity to nic rage. Then I sometimes would worry, was I too harsh, did I push them away? Then a vet would come in and beat the caver to one inch of their life and I would think, “c’mon guys hasn’t he had enough?”

I now get it. VETS save lives!!!

When my son was 3 years old, he fell off a trampoline and broke his forearm. It was an ugly break. It looked like he had two elbows. I came to the emergency room and saw my son in that condition. It broke my heart. To make it worse he wanted me to hold him and kept begging me to take him to the car. He was scared, I was scared. I didn’t want him to hurt.

Fathers understand that love for a child is unconditional. They are your flesh and blood. He didn’t understand but we needed to set the bones. So two doctors are over my little sweet baby son. He is scared to death, in pain and kept yelling, ouwy, ouwy, dad, car dad, please car! I walked over to try to reason with my son that the doctors where helping him. I go to hold his hand and the doctor said, “Your son is a good fighter, I almost have the bones set but I need help holding him still. Now, I look over my son and with tears in my eyes, I am holding him down while the doctor sets the bone. Here I am his protector, his guardian, his teacher, his dad. I have to hold him down and take the pain because it is good for him????

Well he got the cast, his arm healed and I saw the kid jumping off the roof onto the tramp and doing some backflips yesterday. I recalled how hard that day was for me. I looked at his left arm and it is healed.

So what if I protected my son, took him out of the er and nursed his arm and did everything to ease his pain? He more thank likely would have ended up having it amputated. At the very least, his left arm would have been deformed and useless.

So I get it. We feel the pain of failure but our vets are that wise dad that knows we have to set the bone, clean wounds and infections, and then bandage them up so that they wont fail again. A ha! Trust our vets. They are smart enough to hold down a caver and set the bone so that they will be successful in quit!

For a Christian spin on this. “I the Lord God can not look upon sin with the least degree of allowance or I would cease to be God” Peal the onion layer back and no human can forgive faster than the Lord. God wants us to be successful, he loves us, and as such, he can not tolerate our failure. If we screw up, he gives us the tools to repent but he never forgives us in our sins….He forgives us from our sins.

Lesson learned, if someones fails in their quit, they are injured and you need to hold them down so the vets can set the bone. Why because you want them to heal and quit. If a caver walks out of the E.R. they aren’t ready to heal. Still a choice but this hospital is going to hurt so that we can heal properly and effectively.

KTC is such a microcosm of life. I came here for support to quit nicotine. I got a whole new perspective on my purpose of life.

Follow the vets and you will stay quit.

NOTE: This piece written by KillTheCan.org forum member razd611