Struggling and Coping

This morning on Twitter, I caught up with someone I connected with long ago during my first days online. This is a smart, go-get-em kind of woman. It seems that she, like me, is going through some trials. I know that she, like me, is going to come through just fine. But, probably, for both of us - for anyone- it`s not knowing how strong you are before a struggle, or that you will be better afterwards, it's that whole period of 'getting through' it. The being in it. The whole truth of these periods of struggle - which always feel like a battle to hang on to the best of what you are - is that you have to go it alone. The only thing you have is your faith and your trust.

So, to my buddy from way back (you know who you are), I don't know what you're going through. I don`t know how you feel while  you`re getting through, but I know that you can make it through.

My current struggle? Fatigue from and exasperation with this damn sarc. Trying to focus through this haze that clouds my mind every time I attempt to write or pray or just think. I figure I'm getting a couple hours of energy each day (at the most) to spend time enjoying my family, keep up with the blog, and taking care of myself. The rest of the time, it`s a terrible effort to do anything. Sleeping doesn't help because I'm not tired. I'm not tired, I'm simply fatigued and fogged.

I need this on a t-shirt

When you get an odd disease, one that's not so recognized and understood in general, your doctors do all they can to fight the progression. You get medicine to keep you alive - and, in my case, to keep me from walking into walls. What you don`t get is lessons in how to cope with the damage that`s been done. Or how not to be so irritable that you begin to hate yourself.

They got a drug for brain fog?

No decent person would expect someone on crutches to run, a blind person to drive, or a mute person to "speak up". It's tough for people to know that I have a disease that comes with its own issues. I don't realize that I'm annoying because I might be asking you the same question now that I asked 10 minutes ago. If I get quiet and still in my body because that helps my mind get quiet and still then, yes, I might get edgy when you pierce that quiet and stillness with a lots of loud noise.

Stop. Please. Or at least PAUSE.

 

Because, while my disease is being treated, no one is teaching me how to cope. I am learning as I go and the going gets ugly. Having to concentrate so hard when I do anything - drive, clean, write, read, pay bills, make appointments- is tiring.

Before this disease, writing was my coping therapy. I wrote short stories and long stories and even novels and, whether they were never going to be read by another person, they were my therapy. Now I can`t even keep grasp of one thought long enough to weave it to another. Before, if I wasn't writing, I was reading. I still read, but listening to audio books is better because, somehow, hearing stays with me longer than reading. If I don`t get frustrated because the audio is more 'noise' than I can take sometimes.

I can deal with most of my symptoms, but this fatigue piled on top of it all is too much. Not being able to sleep well - or to feel rested when you do sleep - and not being able to find the energy to function when you are awake is just too much. I have been meaning to clean the bathroom for over a week now. I did spray cleaner on the shower walls yesterday. That's something. I rinse today. Maybe.

So. I am struggling, but that in itself is a positive. Struggle is action. Prayer is medicine. God is good. This struggle, this fatigue, this strain are just symptoms. They are not the whole of me. My main coping mechanism is one that can't be polluted: faith. I have faith that this, all of this, will pass.

Peace
--Free

P.S.: I promise that the whine session is now over. I'm going to try to get back to posting reviews asap. I have just finished a couple weeks of trying out and using 3 products. Just have to get my notes together. You now know how that will go!

I Don't Know What I'm Listening For

There has been a lot of stuff going on in my circle of family and friends lately. I lost my brother, one of my aunts lost a great-grandchild and another of my aunts passed away. On his birthday, my estranged husband lost a son of his in a car accident.

Last night, my sister and I were calling other family members with the news of the accident. When we finished, I looked at her with that "What next?" question in my eyes. "Don't ask," is what she told me. "Leave the future to the One who created it." She sounded so much like my mother.

Whenever any one of us went through tough times, Mom would tell us to listen for what God had to say. She didn't mean what elders meant when they'd say, "God is trying tell you something." Mom meant that we need to hold still all our own thoughts and just listen to God. Sometimes, I will tell myself that things aren't going to get better while God is telling me to stand strong. Whatever the message, I usually "hear" Him. Lately, I don't know what to listen for.

Maybe I should be listening for some way to get my discipline back. I started back smoking when my brother died. For two weeks of the hell that happens in a family during mourning, I smoked, drank and popped Valium and Xanax. When things calmed down a little, I didn't miss the alcohol or pills, but I renewed a friendship with the cigarettes. I came clean (ha. ha.) to my doctor and I am back on the Chantix. That will help with the smoking, but it won't do a damn thing for restlessness in my heart. So I'm going to keep listening for whatever God has to say.

Peace
--Free