MCS/Environmental Illness is like Modern Day Leprosy (With a Harrowing Twist of Irony)...

No oozing sores or loss of limbs, but most react to those suffering with MCS/EI, mentally and emotionally as they would have reacted towards a leper physically, way back when. Getting too close or "touching" an understanding of the condition means you might catch it, means your old way of life might become deformed, might deteriorate into a mere skeleton of what it once was.

You might feel terrified that you will be infected by the information, that you will no longer be "normal" and accepted, that you are engaging in mental anarchy. You might feel that if you really take in the severity of the consequences of chemical exposures and the serious outcomes that can manifest (ie: this horrible disease), surely your life and world view would so drastically mutate from what it is now, that you couldn't handle the magnitude of the changes that would ensue. You might not be able to fathom having to make these changes, it might feel like sheer terror having to approach the issue at all. Most likely you will feel afraid of being different, of asking the world not to do harm, of initiating the necessary steps you must take not to poison yourself and others on a daily basis.

You might be horrified and not actually be able to believe how seriously you are harming yourself and others, how you are harming your family and children, how your family and loved ones are harming you. You might feel so much shock that you go numb. You might feel mortified, when you see how much industrial corruption harms us, how little regulation there is of chemicals in products on the market that you have been using since you were a child, that your parents used when they were children. You might be angry about how helpless you feel, you might not be able to deal with how infuriated you are. You might feel like your entire foundation is shaking. Or you might tell yourself you can't afford to switch to natural products, that you're not liberal/green/ hippy, that you love and rely on your chemical products way to much, that your kids/spouse love their chemical products and certainly THEIR minds couldn't be changed so why bother, that it couldn't possibly happen to you or a loved one, that it's a rare disease, that germs are more dangerous then chemical cleaners, and so on and so on. The brainwashing fights against what is left of your mind.

Or you simply and unequivocally might not give a shit.  About our planet, whether you or those around you live or die.  You might be a sociopath.  If so, don’t worry, you are in good company.  You are in the majority.  You will be accepted, employed, heavily rewarded, embraced in community.  You will have a two car garage and two cars in it. You will fit right into to this cozy little world of mindless dispassion.

Imagine though now that your body has a mind of it's own, as it does, and has other plans in store for your future then the life of your brain. Imagine that you no longer have a choice to maintain the privilege of denial.  That your lack of compassion catches up with you.  That you are forced to understand the severity of the damage that harsh chemicals have on the human body and on the earth daily, and that you feel the pain and agony of this knowing, directly. Imagine that your body, suddenly, maybe overnight, develops the inability to maintain the illusion and gives way beneath you. That reality floods in all at once and you HAVE to deal, like it or not. You become the social leper that you once alienated and shunned. You become the shadow, the whisper, the one wearing a mask being sneered at, the secret illness embodied. You become a political issue simply because your body tells the true story that the media, that the fragrance industry, that politicians, that the medical industry, are desperately trying to hide. Your daily reality becomes invisible, you fade into the background.

You are Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Pagan, Atheist, White, Yellow, Black, Red, Olive, Democrat, Republican, Liberal Progressive, Straight, Gay, but suddenly you are part of a community of diverse strangers that you need to rely on and trust for support. You are screaming as if behind the Matrix, and very few can hear you. Their ears are filled with chemical jingles, pretty songs they skipped along and hummed to as children, lies so loud their ears have become deafened to truth. Their eyes are blurred by visual enchantments, colorful, bright hypnotic cheer, blaring everywhere, blinding their eyes to truth. Their minds are filled with information mirages, with psychic implants, with masks upon masks, blocking truth. Why else would a mother hold her child to her Downy breasts while the child coughs and screams? Their minds have been drugged into submission. Their bodies are filled with lethal poisons. Their bodies, ears, eyes and minds are addicted to and numbed by lethal poisons.

So where's Jesus when we need him? Where is the healer of lepers and wayward souls? Where is this intermediary between truth and lies? Where is the holy healer of earth and humanity? Where is my long lost ancestor, my distant cousin, my great-uncle, my blood brother?

And these modern day lepers, those with MCS, they too have to live on the edges of society, often separated from their families and communities.  As a result, just like those separating themselves from the leper, everyone is "protected", in this case from a consciousness they might catch. But the question is, who is actually the leper? In this case, who is the one that should be avoided? The fully chemical free human trying to heal one's body and the planet, not polluting, not harming, just trying to survive? Or the chemically saturated human, drenched in toxins from head to toe, emitting poisons in all directions, harming, polluting? Who is the healthier, who is the wiser, which state of being has become more “deformed” from "normal".

Who is actually sicker? Those who have fallen ill from the horrendous pollution and environmental devastation of the planet and as a result now live impeccably healthy, earth conscious lives? Or those who are so deeply invested in their denial of what is happening on the planet that they would abandon family members and loved ones who have fallen ill? Who would abandon their own health and mental sovereignty in order to maintain the delusion they have been handed, all the while continuing to contribute to the suffering of life on earth. Not learning from the suffering of their friends, family and neighbors. Not heeding the warning signs of those offering the gift of their lives to show humanity that we can NO LONGER LIVE (Literally) THIS WAY.

So where's Jesus when we need him?  Well, he/she's right here... inside of us. WE, are the modern day sacrifices to a corrupt planet, the ones dying for the world's sins against nature. WE, are the teachers who are the embodiment of the teaching, of the harm we are doing to the earth, the animals, ourselves and each other. WE, are a million pieces of light that have fallen ill with MCS and other chemically induced and terminal illnesses in order to help raise awareness on the planet. WE, are the ones that even through our suffering still fight for justice and planetary balance and peace. WE, help each other, we heal each other, we heal ourselves. WE, are both the sacrifice and the holy healer. It is within our power to make the changes we need to. To care enough, to open our eyes and ears and hearts. To open our minds. To heal the world.

So now we have come to a draw. The face off between Environmental Illness and Mental Illness. The showdown between the mind of the earth and mind of the human being disconnected from the earth.
Which side are you on?
Who will win?
We will wait patiently and see.
It is a battle to the death.
Who will survive?
Cowboys take your positions.
Cowboys ready?
3...2...1...
Fire.

-Jamie Isman (Revision 9/1/12)