Mindfulness Me! Using mindfulness practices promotes safer healing after surgery and enhances emotional and mental health balance preparing for surgery. Is it worth trying? I would say yes! I would often recommend my patients practice deep breathing exercises and focus on the present moment of their feeling while discovering any emotional blocks that may be present. Over the past few weeks, I have discovered that one of the subtopics was mindfulness meditation while learning the Naturopathic course. It grabs my attention that I started researching more in-depth about mindfulness meditation, its purpose, and its benefits for patients suffering from depression or occasional depression, anxiety, pain, and addictions. Mindfulness meditation has been in existed for thousands of years (Ackerman, 2021). It is non-religious, so it makes a great compliment to your spiritual faith (Liam et al., 2021). I have learned it is a simple technique that would be effective for surgical patients to implements into their preparation and recovery plan after surgery. For those unfamiliar with Mindfulness, it is a mediation exercise that trains the brain to focus on the present moment. Mindfulness is not about ignoring other thoughts that may enter but redirected to found balance and clarity in the present moment.

The benefits for surgical patients to implement Mindfulness as a part of their regimen for pre-and post-surgery are to enhance self-awareness of the person’s feelings about having the surgery, such as acknowledging nervousness, excitement, confusion, anger, and even sadness, especially if surgery is the last chance of hope (Ackerman, 2021). Alongside identifying the feeling, it allows the surgical patients to explore the emotions by journaling in a composition book, recording their voice by audiotape, and recording their discovery by video blogging. It may feel weird initially for patients to do it, but they feel better and more confident in expressing feelings in preparing and healing from surgery over time. Mindfulness should allow their subconsciousness to reveal the true feelings of what the surgical patients may not feel comfortable verbally stating out loud. I would recommend that the patient communicates with a licensed mental health counselor safely dive into those unspoken feelings to learn how to navigate them and locate where they are rooted. The subconsciousness does play a vital role in how well the patient will prepare and heal from surgery. It’s the unspoken language that patients say that hinders optimal recovery. The second benefit is improving body awareness for patients to become more conscious of the body sensations or reactions to their surgery or how they respond to their emotions (Ackerman, 2021). When surgical patients have more experienced in identifying how their body is responding, they will be able to communicate with their care providers, surgeons, nurses, family, and friends to resolves the problem. It could be as simple as drinking more water, starting to move their body a certain way, removing certain foods and beverages that causing discomfort to their body, and applying lotion that satisfies their skin. The body is constantly communicating with us, but we have to be consciously aware to assists our body in every way. The third benefit is promoting self-compassionate or graciousness in their surgery journey while learning to use mindfulness exercises (Ackerman, 2021). I have found surgical patients focus on perfection in their healing process but ignoring the simplicity of embracing mishaps. It is the main reason; Mindfulness will help them give grace to themselves and give grace to their body during their healing process. I believe it stems from the feeling of unworthiness about being flawed and the fear of being a burden to others.

For this reason, the care providers could reassure the patients that they are not a burden, and it is okay that your healing process is not perfect. The fifth benefit is Mindfulness promotes self-confidence; these benefits coincide with other benefits previously mentioned to cultivates a healthy surgical patient preparing and healing from surgery (Ackerman, 2021). Becoming Mindful is a state of the now, not your past nor your future. Learning to embrace the now will rule out multi-tasking, which gives us all the excuse not to be present. Cherish the day and embrace the now moment. Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. ~ Matthew 6:34 NIV (Liam et al., 2021)

References:

Ackerman, C. E. (2021). Mindfulness and positive psychology: A look at the benefits and links. PositivePsychology.com. https://positivepsychology.com/mindfulness-positive-psychology-3-great-insights/.

Liam, Grace, S., Lisa, Ania, Aleen, Ryan, Dharma, F. J., & Adebanjo, K. (2021). 65 Bible verses that Show Mindfulness Was God’s Idea. Calming Grace. https://www.calminggrace.com/bible-verses-about-mindfulness/.