A critical factor in how long it’s going to take for a person to get better is how long it took to get that way in the first place. A lot of people make the mistake of thinking they went to bed one night perfectly healthy and awoke the next morning sick or in pain.

Few want to accept responsibility for their health problems, however. Once I overheard a man jokingly say, “It’s the doctors fault I have high blood pressure. I never had it until he put that cuff on my arm!” The reality is, it takes time for health problems to develop.

The Supremes wrote a popular song later sang by Phil Collins called, “You Can’t Hurry Love.” You can’t hurry health either! Problems that took 10-20 years to develop certainly won’t go away over night. The only aspect of the process that you can hurry is how soon you respond. Procrastinate, and you can expect a longer recovery time.

The sooner you take action, the faster you’ll get well.