Can you Cope?

In the world of rehabilitative medicine people who can rehab or function with an injury not needed surgery are called “copers”, meaning they can cope with their injury without surgery. Obviously, those who need surgery are called “non-copers”. While this is in no way meant to be pejorative, it certainly sounds like it, doesn’t it? It isn’t a dig, btw, if your rotator cuff is torn, either you can lift your arm or you can’t, although how someone with a massive RTC tear could possibly lift their arm is a mystery to me, but some can. I have a person right now, massive tear, doesn’t want surgery and she is constantly surprising me with what she can do.

People were all in a tither around a week ago about a politician insinuating that some people with PTSD can’t cope without help, in the context of getting them more help. While it seems to me that generic “people” have a hair trigger for getting in a tizzy lately, it does seem that when we switch from talking about physical to talking about mental/emotional, people are naturally very sensitive.

This seems wrong to me. It should be like the rotator cuff issue. While some people don’t need surgery, they aren’t functioning as well, and they most often need some kind of treatment. Same with mental issues. Some people can function without intervention, but possibly not as well or fully. And there isn’t a good rhyme or reason as to who functions better and who worse.

I would like to see a world where we treated mental/emotional disorders like physical ones. No one is ashamed to go to a hospital because they broke their leg. No one hides the fact they go to physical therapy for a bad back. In fact, they are proud of their accomplishments there. Why can’t it be like that for mental issues? I think we are getting there, a little. I see articles and blog posts about people recovering from eating disorders or agoraphobia. But as long as people can go day after day without treatment until they become a danger to themselves and others, we still have a long way to go.