A Doctor with Serious ADD Issues...

Some people say I have Attention Deficit Disorder. I think it is more information overload. My brain is continually filled to overflowing, swirling and churning with thoughts and ideas. So much so that my employees tell me there are times when I walk away in the middle of a conversation. They say something, I give a reply, and then I walk away when they start to respond. Like a dog who sees a squirrel something grabs my attention and off I go. I am oblivious.

This behavior is rather embarrassing and can lead to harm in relationships. It would be easy for my staff to get hurt feelings, call me a jerk and then complain to others about what an insensitive boss they had. They could use their knowledge of this behavioral flaw to embarrass me. They could, but my current employees don’t.

They do the opposite. Because they know my heart and my desire to do the right thing they not only overlook this fault, they actually take steps to counteract any harm. They cover me and protect me, they have my back. When we have new employees or students in the office they warn them, “Dr. Barrett can be a little ADD at times. It is hysterical, but sometimes he will turn and walk away in the middle of a conversation. Don’t be offended, it’s just him!”

This is what people do when they care about someone. They cover over the flaws of others and protect their weaknesses.

Paul addressed this, saying “Love always protects.” One way to interpret his words is to say that like a roof, love always covers.

This is a characteristic of healthy relationships and particularly of healthy marriages. We look out for one another and step up to defend and protect one another. We do not take advantage of our knowledge of weaknesses to make ourselves look good, instead we intentionally act to keep others safe.

While this is important to do in marriage, it is important in all of our relationships, in our families, our work relationships, our church relationships and friendships. It is not easy, it can be risky, but it is what love does. This raises the question- Are you a protector?

- Bart

This post is the 10th in a series on love, taken from the Bible passage 1 Corinthians 13. Since all of us need to be more loving, consider sharing these blog posts with your friends.

4 Rules for True Friendship

Sometimes it is hard to know who your friends really are. You think someone has your back and then when circumstances get tough, they disappear. Who do you trust? Who are your true friends? A better question- what qualities define true friendship? Here is a short list-

1- A true friend runs to your side when times get hard. "A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity,” is how it is described in Proverbs 17. When the going gets tough, great friends don't even wait for you to call. They come.

2- Friends tell you what you need to hear, not what you want to hear. “Wounds from a friend can be trusted,” says the proverb, and it is true. Years ago a colleague called me at home and told me that my aggressive attitude was offending some of the other doctors. He encouraged me that a softer approach would serve me better. He was right and in correcting me he showed he was a friend.

3- True friends are committed to the friendship. Neither time nor circumstances should diminish the bond, which is why the Proverb says we should not forsake our friend or the friend of our father. I think of Daryl, a friend of 40 years. We have laughed together, played together and prayed together,even hurt one another, but we have never quit.

4- True friends know when to keep their mouth shut. “Gossip separates close friends.” says Proverbs 16:28, and boy does it. The writer expounds on the principle in the next chapter saying “He who covers over an offense promotes love.” Close friends know how to hurt us. True friends protect us.

What kind of friend are you? I know I can do better!

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On the 32nd Anniversary of Meeting My Wife, Thoughts on Why We've Lasted

Lisa and I met on a Friday. Feb 5th to be exact. I asked her out on Sunday the 7th (after unwittingly falling into her well laid trap, a story for another day.) First date- February 13th. Proposal the first week of March. Wedding- July 16th. A Wonderful Whirlwind.
If we were to tell you we knew exactly what we were doing, we would be lying. We were clueless in so many ways. But we did love each other, and we did love God. It seems so often this is not enough, as many Christian marriages fail. Why did we make it?
I can't be certain, but I think a big reason was our life goals. These were present when we met and haven't changed in over 30 years. 
While I did not have any idea of my future vocation, I was sure of two things. 
1- I wanted to be a godly husband
2- I wanted to be a godly father. 
Lisa wanted to be a godly wife and mother. We both understood that these goals would require immense effort, would be elusive, and would require personal sacrifice. We were both committed to do whatever it took to achieve these goals.
And we did. We have swallowed pride, made apologies, asked for help, extended grace and sought forgiveness. We have put our kids and one another ahead of our own interests, and admitted it when we didn't. We have set God's Word as our authority, and subjected our wills to its correction.
And it worked.
We are best friends, soul mates and true partners.
Not too shabby for a clueless couple only 3 years out of High School when we met and got married!

A Lesson I Learned From Being Abused as a Child

By the Grace of God, I survived child abuse. I was  regularly beaten, mocked and ridiculed as I grew up. While many emotional scars remain, I have been able to learn from some of the terrible experiences I endured. What follows is the story of one of those experiences and the lesson learned.

As a young boy, I liked stewed tomatoes. (I had strange culinary preferences for a 6 year-old).  My fondness wasn’t only based on taste. In my little boy mind there was something special about juicy warm tomatoes that were sort of like soup but not really.  They felt good going down my throat and were soothing to me, a type of yummy comfort.  They were a family favorite, served as a side dish with beef.  The liquid nature of the dish made it impractical to simply add it to the dish; stewed tomatoes required a bowl of their own, a holder worthy of their specialness.  My mom would scoop the tomatoes into little bowls for us and set them beside each of our plates.  I can still picture them in my mind.  

As much as I loved them, the glorious era of stewed tomatoes was short.  Their reign as a dinner time staple came crashing down one evening, on a night when a bowl of stewed tomatoes was at the center of one of my earliest painful memories. It was because of stewed tomatoes that I experienced my first concussion.
 We gathered for dinner that as we always did in the dining area between the kitchen and the living room.  The apartment was not particularly large; the table was situated close to the wall.  I sat on the wall side of the table next to my twin Bret, who sat to my right.  To my left was my step-father, across from my older brother Rick and younger brother Jimmy.  My mother at the end of the table opposite my step-dad.
As was our habit, the kids had all already taken our baths and put on our pajamas.  (Kids went to bed early in those days!) We had taken our places at the table and had all been served our food, which included a bowl of delicious stewed tomatoes.  The bowls were at the top of our place settings, next to our glasses of milk. I wanted my bowl on my plate, so I asked my mom if I could put it there.  My mother, who didn’t care much for my opinions and desires back then, told me to leave the tomatoes where they were.  Disappointed, I went about eating my meal.
I do not remember what made her change her mind about the location of my tomato bowl, but she did.  It might have been because I was making a mess each time I maneuvered my tomato laden spoon from the far side of my plate to my mouth, or it may have been because I gave her a particularly mournful look that caused her to understand the importance of stewed tomato geography in my developing mind.  Regardless of her motivation, she  told me I could put my bowl on my plate after all.  Once my stewed tomatoes arrived in their rightful place, I was happy.
My happiness was brief.  I had barely ingested one spoonful when the blow from my step-father came. He had not been paying attention to the latter part of our tomato dialogue, as he had briefly turned away from the table. When he turned back to his meal, he saw the bowl of stewed tomatoes on my plate.  As he had not heard my mother give me permission to move the bowl he deduced that I had defied his wife’s commands, and being the violent man he was, he reflexively struck.
With his right hand he delivered a back-handed slap to my forehead, fully intending to cause severe pain.  I did not see it coming and did not have a chance to protect myself.  With full force the backs of his knuckles impacted my 6 year-old forehead, driving my head back.  My whole body was carried backwards by the blow, with the back of my head slamming into the wall behind me.  My head exploded in pain, my face exploded in tears.  I have only vague memories of the moments that followed, the concussion clouded my mind for several minutes.
I remember crying, I remember vomiting, and I remember losing my appetite.  I remember the dent in the dining room wall from where my head made contact, and I remember the dull, throbbing ache that followed. I remember a terrible argument which resulted in my step-father leaving the house for several hours.  I remember my mother holding a cold towel to my forehead, as he stormed out through the front door.
When I think back on the events of that night, I remember the one word echoing in my mind as my head throbbed- “Why?”  Why did he hit me?  Why did he hate me?  Why did he hit me so hard? Why?
The answers to those questions are complicated, far beyond the comprehension of a 6 year-old boy.  Even now, as a 52 year-old physician, the answers are not totally clear.  I do know that he hit me not because I had done anything wrong, but because he was a brutal, violent and alcoholic man.  I don’t think he hated me, but I do think he was incapable of love.  He was angry not at what I had done, but at what he thought I did.  Although I had been obedient, he interpreted events in a way that led him to believe I was defying my mother’s instructions.  In his perception, I deserved to be punished.
His erroneous perception of what happened, his incomplete understanding of events, caused him to respond in anger.  
It took me many years to recognize the lesson I could learn from the abusive response of my step-father that night. I am not a violent man and would never strike a child in such a way, but I am a man who at times reacts without completely understanding a situation.  
This tendency to react without complete understanding is not unique to my step-father and me.  It is one that has plagued mankind from the beginning of time.  Foolish actions, unwise promises and broken relationships can often be traced back to this same root cause- jumping to a conclusion. We can get so worked up over so little, and be so quick to judge. I have learned to take the words of the New Testament writer James to heart- “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness that God desires.”
I am a much better husband, father, physician, boss and friend when I suppress my initial negative responses and take the time to stop and gather more information. The more I do this, the less hurt I cause. I wonder if we all can't learn from my step-father in this way. 

Do you feel this Important Symptom of a Diseased Spiritual Heart?

Symptoms are important. They tell the patient that something is wrong and when properly understood can tell the physician what that something is. Every once in a while I get surprised by someone who is much sicker or worse off than I imagined. I find myself asking, “How is it they didn't feel this?”

I think of a 10-year-old girl who came to my office several years ago. She had fallen off of the monkey bars a few days earlier and had occasionally complained of arm pain. Her mother was only a little concerned but brought her in to see me just to be sure she was okay.

I examined the child, poking and prodding and moving her arm and shoulder all around. Not a peep or a grimace of pain. Her exam was perfectly normal. I told the mom I could not make a good argument for getting an x-ray, but gave an order for arm and shoulder films just in case. I told her to get the x-rays done if she was not better in 2-3 days.

Three days later they were back. The girl still was relatively asymptomatic, but this time one thing was different. This time she brought an x-ray of her upper arm that showed the humerus was broken. IN TWO! Snapped. Completely broken with the bones a centimeter apart. To this day I cannot understand how she could have slept comfortably, much less allow a doctor to move the arm over her head. It is hard to recognize a problem when there are no symptoms!

Our society is in a similar circumstance right now. We have serious problems, but many people do not feel or recognize them at all. They are missing something crucial that would allow them to understand how sick they really are.

Ravi Zacharias, a brilliant and articulate Christian leader, described the problem perfectly in two recent Facebook posts-

“To raise a child without shame is to raise one with no immune system against evil.”

“Shame is to the moral health of a society what pain is to the body. The sense of shame provides an indicator to the mind.”

Dysfunction is spreading through our culture, spreading because people lack a key means of recognizing it and dealing with it. They have lost a sense of shame. People are openly proud about behaviors which were once (and still should be) considered shameful.

I can think of many examples, such as the young man who came into my office for a check up, and when I asked about his sexual history, proudly declared that he was sexually involved with several girlfriends at the same time. Taken aback by his unabashed boasting, I clarified his response, asking, “So you are not saying you have had multiple partners in the past, you are saying that you currently have multiple women you are sleeping with?”

He extended his fist to give me a knuckle punch as he laughed and turned the word “Yeah” into one of three syllables. “Yea-a-ah, dude!” He had no shame.

I have seen similar sentiments expressed on Facebook, in blog posts and on television. Casual sexual encounters, vulgar language and other immoral behaviors are displayed as badges of honor instead of markers of shame. It seems that our world has fully embraced the view that no behavior is inherently wrong. If it feels good and brings pleasure in the moment it should be proclaimed and celebrated.

The freedom promised by the shameless pursuit of pleasure is false freedom, as it traps people in lives where it is impossible to experience the joy and peace that come from living life as God intends. Instead of running from and denouncing shame and embarrassment, we should train ourselves to cultivate a healthy sense of shame that will sound the alarm when we foolishly go our own way.

God wants to heal our diseased hearts, and appropriate shame can lead us to seek the cure. Ask yourself- "Do I feel the symptoms of my sinful heart, or am I becoming hardened to shame?" The answer is important.