Uncommon Thanks

Dear CRPS, poverty, and all other poor decisions I’ve made that’ve landed me bed bound for 11 days now,

                I am alive, you fuckers, I’m alive. You didn’t kill me and you didn’t make me kill myself though I admit that was a close one. Some days I couldn’t confront the “take it a day at a time” mantra; it was a breath at a time mantra. In and out. In and out. In and out until something gave a little bit. I’ve made an extensive study of the wall beside my bed. The one the clock that ticks off the seconds of time until this is all over hangs. It is complete in its imperfection, like me. There are fingerprint smudges, small smudges of color where God/dess knows what swiped against it, and a couple of small dings that I have no idea of their origin. That damn wall is a lot like me, full of the smudges of mistakes, dings from passing too close to angry people with judgmental attitudes and the fingerprints of those I have loved that are printed on my heart. See, I am alive. I may, in fact, be more alive than I have ever been. So thanks for that.

                Thanks for the pain both from the disease and from the withdrawal from the meds I’ve been taking. It forced me to research my disease and thus find some answers to questions I didn’t even know I had. It made me take stock of myself, not my life, myself. Big difference there, huge difference. Really, focused my mind inward, down into the dusty corners people have inside them but where they rarely visit. There are gems and gifts and monsters down there. All the monsters look like me and I am no longer afraid of them. Am not sure if I can get the gems and gifts up and out but I know they’re there and monsters are powerful creatures so maybe I will liberate them and they will rescue me from this poverty that is frankly freezing my fingers on this keyboard at 4 AM. I am now also able to tell the difference between CRPS pain and the other, lesser pains of simple arthritis that NSAIDs will handle. So thanks for refining all that for me. It’s been an education and if you knew me at all you’d know the only thing I’m truly addicted to, is learning.

                Thanks for the friends I’ve been forced to meet. I had self-isolated which is never a good thing. Thanks to you, I’ve met people who are like ME. Some are Wiccan/Pagan and don’t judge my spiritual path; some are bed bound and disabled in the body like me and some have been disabled by that dirty trick you sometimes use on people’s minds. But make no mistake, they are my friends. They’ve accepted me and loved me and supported me right out of the gate. Without you I’d never have met any of them! I’d surely be a much, much poorer person if that had happened. It’s been their bravery, their strength, their belief, their hope, their courage that’s given me what I needed to find my own. I won’t thank you for the help of my Dear Son. He is and has always been my gift to myself. You can’t take credit for him. I won’t let you.

                Oh, and thanks for the insomnia. Without it, I probably would never have just said “fuck it” and started the blog or the website business. What else is a person who has no television service supposed to do at 3 AM except write and decide to take chances that the daylight makes seem silly? Oh, it exhausts me, weakens me, makes me cry but without it I’d never have watched the moon from my window as she’s travelled across the sky, waning, waning these last eleven days just like you. I also have learned to tell the time of the early morning by the amount of early morning light coming through the window and I can predict the sunrise almost to the minute. I don’t know if these things have any value now or if they ever will but somehow they seem important to me. So thanks for the insomnia. It fogs up my mind sometimes but I’ve learned so much here during these cold, dark, long nights alone with only you for company.

                Thanks for the weakness I’ve felt in my body. My knees are so weak, I can barely make it to the bathroom and I did do a header into the bathtub a few days ago that’s left a large bruise on my arm. It just reminds me that we are all weak at some time in our lives whether physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually. I may fall but I will heal. I won’t thank you for not cracking my head open and forcing me to bleed to death before Dear Son found me. That was the God/dess so don’t expect any special kudos for that. But you should know that the weakness is slowly, very slowly, passing. One day, I expect to wake, probably at 3 AM, and find that my legs will carry me all the way to the kitchen and beyond. Then you’d better look out because I am coming for you and when I catch you (and make no mistake, I WILL catch you) you will be a sorry son of a bitch because I will do everything I can to make sure you and your influence is reduced among others who suffer the way I have. Fair warning; just thought you should know.

                Thanks for the unrelenting thirst and the loss of desire for food. I’ve lost ten pounds just lying in this bed, suffering yes, but still just lying here. I’m only thirty pounds away from what I always considered my ideal weight. Boy, what a jump start you’ve given me. The thirst is just awesome; it has stimulated some kind of creative problem solving inside me that I didn’t know existed. For example, well a person who’s weak and hurting and sleep deprived and scared half to death tends to spill things so I’ve learned to use the adult version of a sippy cup with a lid and a straw. And to keep me from knocking the damned thing onto the floor and out of reach I’ve used a roll of duct tape as a kind of coaster/keeper. The sippy cup sits in the middle of the roll. It fits perfectly! Duct tape really does fix everything…well, except pain and sleeplessness and all the other gifts of CRPS and its cohorts. But given time duct tape might just fix you too.

                Thanks for the sweats. At least they are happening in the winter during a time I cannot afford to turn on the heat in the house. All I have to do for relief is just throw the covers off. Of course, I still have to deal with the sweat but I have a towel that lives here in the bed with me to dry off all the places the sweat tends to linger. Then all I need to do to be comfortable again is to get dry and warm. I have the electric blanket and the heating pads for that and it is always, as the Australians would say, a two dog night here. They snuggle me and keep me loved and warm. I’m sure the sweats must be evacuating some kind of noxious “stuff” from my body, so keep ‘em coming, you bastard, because I know how to deal with them now.

                Thanks for the anxiety and the panic attacks that come out of nowhere and whisper to me that we are going to freeze to death or starve to death or that some of the animals will. Now I know that fear is just a feeling. It might raise my blood pressure but it probably won’t kill me since I don’t have heart disease, I have CRPS. We might indeed starve or freeze but now I know that I won’t let that happen to the innocents, my pets. I know now what must be done if it comes to that. So thanks for making of me a person who can face some tough decisions and act in spite of her fear. I think they call that courage don’t they? The feeling the fear but acting on it anyway? Now I know without a doubt that I do possess courage.

                Thanks for the bitch-o-meter that goes from zero to uber-bitch in one fifth of a second. Man, is that fast! It helped me defend myself against the attacks of my extended family. Helped me put up some real boundaries with them about my choice of how to worship the Divine. I think my mother now understands what will happen if she ever calls me a blasphemer again and I’ve learned NOT to read any of my brother’s emails that begin with the words “I know you’ll be mad after you read this email.” My bitch-o-meter kept me from playing “Whose Chronic Illness is Worse?” with my mother. So thanks for that.

                Thanks also for the diarrhea. I almost thought I was going to get out of this without experiencing it but the small bowl of Ramen noodles I was able to choke down tonight must’ve tipped the scales. Poop is a good thing, even diarrhea, because having it means I know that my bowels are still working despite the number you are doing to them with the whole neuron dysfunction thing. I appreciate the reassurance that my body, though hurt beyond my telling, though suffering through withdrawal too, though weak and thirsty and unable to bear much food, is still working. It’s doing its job to spite you, you cock-knocker. It may be hurt but it is not out of the game yet so you can wipe that smug smile right off your lips because the food is moving through me not putrefying inside a locked down stomach that refuses to accept new foods and throws them up. Given a choice between diarrhea and vomit, I’ll take diarrhea every time.

                So, yeah, thanks for it all and for all the lesser things I haven’t mentioned. I’ll go to the doctor tomorrow and begin some kind of treatment for the pain that maybe doesn’t involve meds I have to withdraw from but the life lessons I’ve learned here in bed, the things I’ve discovered about myself and my situation and who I really am and what I will or won’t tolerate, those are mine to keep. You can’t take those from me. It’s been a really uncommon ride and it’s almost over. In the immortal words of Frank Sinatra, thanks for the (uncommon) memories. But don’t think I’ll miss you when you are gone. I am going to devote myself to educating people about you. I’m going to tell them what to expect and some ways to deal and what they can do constructively with your little “gifts.” And don’t forget my promise, I’m coming for you. I’m on my uncommon way right now.

XXOO (just kidding; I really mean fuck off)--Selene