Health Care Reform Needs to Start with Your Own Health

Health care is becoming a very popular topic. It is on the top of the list at the national conventions as we near the presidential election. Congress, state and local government officials are in discussion. It is on the minds of millions of Americans as we see costs continue to rise. We’ve heard countless ideas and options for reforming the system. We’ve heard about a universal plan that would automatically provide health care for every citizen. We’ve heard of employers being required to provide health insurance to workers and family members.

No matter what you feel is the best plan, we all agree that something needs to be done. We may not have the new plan calculated and ready to roll out, but we all know that reform is coming. But what will reform do for us? That is a great question.

The answer, if we continue life the way we have been living it for the past 20 years, is nothing. That’s right, health care reform will do nothing for us if we continue our current lifestyle. As a nation, we have used more and more medical services, become more dependent on drugs and we’ve become more and more out of touch with our health care.

What compounds these issues (or causes them, depending on your position) is the fact that we are so out of touch with our own health. We don’t take the responsibility to do what we know will help us. We don’t take responsibility for the condition that we are in. In fact, we don’t want to take responsibility for the money we spend to fix these conditions that we have brought upon ourselves. We want to pay for the easy method and take medication to “solve” our problems, but want someone to change the system so it doesn’t cost so much.

Well, they are working on it. They are trying to reform the system so we can all have what we are “entitled” to have. We all deserve health coverage. We all deserve the best care possible. I completely agree with those statements. What I don’t agree with is the fact that we have an entire system devoted to saving people from themselves. The whole system is designed to provide care for illness and injury. What we have done to ourselves has overloaded the system and turned it into something else.

We call it health care. It should be called sick care. We are getting sick because we refuse to take care of ourselves and the system says “ok, here is your surgery, here is your prescription and here is your new title for you to identify yourself by so you don’t feel self-conscious or responsible for your actions”. We ignore the fact that these cures are more expensive (and much more dangerous) that simply preventing conditions in the first place. We’ve all heard the phrase: “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”. It’s true. That is the most frustrating part of it all. Diabetes, Obesity, Depression and even many cancer cases are preventable. We chose the behaviors that brought these conditions on.

To conclude my thoughts on sick…or health care, I will ask you this: How will you reform your health? The government can work day and night to fix the system. We can argue over what we are entitled to or not. The bottom line is, if we don’t take care of ourselves, the system will never be able to save us. In fact, the system itself will always appear to be broken until we fix ourselves.

At Byrd Wellness Concepts, we help people change those behaviors. I don’t point a finger and scold you for your current state. I work with you to find the future state that you desire. What goals do you have to reach to start living the life you want to be living? That is what we work on, together. It is all about your goals, your health and your happiness.