Headaches gone
People who are unfamiliar with Christian Science sometimes wonder how it applies to pain. The answer is that Christian Science is not about managing or suffering through pain, but about seeing pain as unreal to God, something God would never send or permit, and therefore no more than a mental impression to us—one that can be healed completely and quickly.
The healing of severe headaches, which I experienced some time ago, showed me how prayer can bring pain to a complete stop. I had one of these headaches a few times a year for about a decade. I learned early on that they would not go away on their own. I couldn’t sleep them off or relax or eat something to make them go away. But I could pray and heal them. While I dreaded the headaches and usually went through a short time of moaning and complaining when they came on, I was learning and proving that healing would always come, and that I could stop pain.
Each experience was different. The stories and lessons learned are many. I would like to share two incidents.
In the first, my husband and I were on a vacation in the American Southwest. As we checked into a hotel late one night, I found myself in intense pain. I had no option but to pray, and I wanted to feel connected to God. As I opened Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy and searched for words to hold on to, it seemed that the pain was so much in the way that to pray directly to counter it only made it worse.
I thought about how else I could pray and feel close to God. The idea came to pray about my family. I began to think of each one and identified a criticism or worry about them that I should pray to eliminate from my thought. I got busy with this, and an hour later I was so absorbed in this prayer that I realized I’d completely forgotten about the headache. Remembering it, I found that it was nearly gone. I finished with my list of family members and went to bed. The next day, my husband and I spent a full day at Monument Valley as we’d planned. I was completely well with no residual effects. This experience always reminds me of the first sentence on page 1 of Science and Health: “The prayer that reforms the sinner and heals the sick is an absolute faith that all things are possible to God,—a spiritual understanding of Him, an unselfed love.” As I stood with my faith and made my connection with God through praying to love more unselfishly, I was healed.
In the second experience, my husband and I were sitting with a family member in the hospital when I began to feel unwell. I went to a waiting room to find some quiet, but there was too much conversation and I could not get hold of my thoughts. I asked if we could go home. Once there, I took out some recordings of hymns and listened for ideas about the Christ.
Not long before, I’d heard a broadcast of Sentinel Radio in which Margaret Rogers told how she’d been healed of pain after breaking her wrist (Program 711: “Is the material world as substantial as it appears to be?” March 10, 2007). She pointed out that Christian Science teaches us to begin our treatment of physical ills by first allaying fear. She said she asked herself what she was afraid of. Her immediate answer was that she was afraid the pain would not stop and that her wrist might not heal right. I loved this, because her question and answer were so honest and simple. This woman had been a practitioner for a number of years, and it impressed me deeply that she found it OK to begin to think the problem through this way.
So I asked myself the same question. What was I afraid of? And I knew I was afraid that the pain would not stop, that I wouldn’t be healed this time, and that I didn’t know how I could stand it. In asking this, I realized I’d had this concern every time I’d ever come down with one of these headaches.
I went on listening to the hymns for ideas to help remove this fear, and soon a clear question came to mind. Did I believe that if Jesus were here in the room with me, that he could heal me? I answered honestly that I believed he could. Shortly after that, a second question came. Did I believe that if Mrs. Eddy were here with me, that she could heal me? Yes, I believed she could. The message then came clear: The same God, the same Science, the same laws of health and wholeness that Jesus and Mrs. Eddy would turn to in order to heal me were here and true for me. I could turn to God the same way they did and be healed, just as I would be if one of them did it for me.
And the healing came. When we’d first arrived at the house, I’d asked my husband to make dinner. He had gone to the kitchen right away while I’d gone to the stereo. When he called me to the table a half hour later, the headache was gone. Related symptoms cleared away shortly after.
This was more than five years ago, and I haven’t had another one of those headaches since. I am so grateful that I do not have to be afraid of them!
Kim Kilduff
Catonsville, Maryland, US
