Saturday, December 31, 2011

thoughts for the new year............

Thoughts for a new year..............This year I want to have more fun, more laughs and more time with my husband.  I want to be more patient and less critical.  I want to take a Zumba class outside the confines of my living room!  I will audition more.  I will be more courageous.  I will ski with my boys, build snowmen, and be in the moment with them.  I will muddle through flare ups and...remember that I am still me even when I am sick.  I will look for the worth in others, as well as in myself.  I want to paint, dance, act, write and strive to be the mother I was meant to be.  I will be my own best friend and consequently will have more to give to others.  I will pray more and worry less.  I will keep on walking, stumbling, crawling even when I feel I have lost my way.  I will be cheerful.  I will remember that we are all just human beings doing our best in this world.  I will know that I am enough. 



 

Sunday, December 4, 2011

The Honest Truth

This has to be one of the worst flares I've had.  Maybe not.  My memory doesn't seem to be cooperating with me very well lately.  I haven't written in a long time due to the pain and fatigue.  You know what?  That's not even the real reason.  Truthfully, I have been afraid to write.  I'm very aware that everything I write is read by people.  This can be a detriment to honesty.  Then again, how much honesty are people ready for?  How much am I ready to admit?  I like to consider myself a patient, optimistic, determined person.  Here's the thing, though.  Lately, I don't feel like any of these things.  I am trying.  But, sometimes I don't feel like trying.  I feel like all I can do is survive the day.  And surviving a day or two is one thing.  But when you begin to string days to weeks and weeks to months of surviving, life becomes just that; survival. 

I am fed up.  Anger has erupted in me like never before in these past several weeks.  Sadness has overcome me in a very deep way.  For a person who has often had trouble crying, tears have been drowning me.  I feel alone, lost and (here comes the truth none of us want to hear) shrouded in hopelessness.  My children need me.  My husband is working in overdrive.  My house is a mess.  Christmas is fast approaching.  Everything is spiraling out of control and I'm in too much pain and too exhausted to so anything about it.  I want to make cookies, decorate and play with my children.  I want to make my husband a nice meal for his birthday.  I want to dust and do laundry like a normal person.  Forgive me, but I do not think I am asking for too much.  I just want more of a life than existing until bedtime when I crumble into the sheets and hope and pray for relief. 

Of course I am grateful for a home, my healthy happy children, a wonderful husband and that I do not have a fatal illness.  But, does that mean that I also am not allowed to want more?  We Fibromyalgia folks are too often criticized for complaining, malingering, exaggerating, and being attention seekers. 

The hell with it.  I am complaining.  I am angry and sad and feeling desperate.  I'm exhausted.  Like I have the flu 24/7 exhausted.  Like walking to the kitchen and back and shaking from over exertion exhausted.  I hurt.  Pain like knives are being stabbed into my neck and back.  The kind of pain that literally takes my breath away and leaves me nauseous. 

This is what I wake up to and deal with day in and out. I pray for sleep to give me respite.  This is the only escape I have.  Some nights are not as kind as others. 

So there.  I threw up all over the page and onto you, my readers.  I'm sorry.  I'm sorry this is not an entry with some kind of positive message.  I'm sorry I cannot be a role model today.  I'm sorry I cannot inspire anyone. 

Today I just can't.  I'm just trying to get through the day.  Again.  Trying to muster up a little speck of hope for tomorrow. 

This is real.  My illness is real.  My pain is real.  This entry is real. 

Honest and true.