A YEAR....ONE WHOLE YEAR!

It's been one year

and

180 Posts

One year has gone by since I received my life sentence. One year has gone by since the cell doors slammed and my life would forever change. Even though the symptoms started a while before it's been one year since I heard the word Fibromyalgia. It's been one year since I decided that I needed something to do that would help me process everything that was happening to me. I remember getting started. I knew I needed an outlet for the frustration, fear and the myriad of issues that I have going through my head. I got on my computer and googled blogs. Thus started my journey that has led me through the pain of Fibromyalgia to the joy of knowing that I am not alone. 

I didn't know where I'd go with this post. I didn't know where I'd go and I most certainly didn't know how I'd even write it. The pain has been so intense the last couple of days I wasn't sure I'd be able to type anything plus I've been in retreat mode. The last post was such a struggle. It was struggle both physically and mentally and I prayed I'd be able to get it together to do this.

My first post was about my Type A squared personality. I guess even when I was young I was a real pain in the ass. When my mother would say I've hardly touched my food, I'd put my hand on it and say, "there I've touched it." When she said there were starving people in China, I'd look at my untouched food and offer to send it to them. My name should have been PIA (pain in the ass).

My initial goal was to find out all that I could about the disease that was robbing me of my life. All I knew was that I hurt; and I hurt real bad. I'd always managed pain. In a recent post I mentioned that I had stitches on a table when I was four. What I didn't say was that I was carrying a glass bowl full of potato chips in to my dad and uncles. Klutz that I am, I tripped and went face first into the bowl. In the ensuing panic I was the one that was calm EXCEPT when they wanted to take me to the hospital. I guess I freaked then. The doctor threatened  me and said he was going to stitch me up right there. I got up on the table and laid there. He said again that I'd have to go to the hospital if I moved. Evidently, I didn't move a muscle.

I've always been able to breathe and talk myself out of pain. I don't know how I was able to do it but I have done it since I was very little. Maybe because I knew it was a transitory kind of pain not a chronic one. Who knows?

I could do it then but I cannot do it now.

Also, what I hadn't expected was how sleep deprivation would affect me. I've always been able to fall asleep at the drop of a a hat. I would also STAY asleep. A bomb could go off in the room and it wouldn't disturb me. It didn't matter what happened during my day because I could take a warm bath and drift off to dreamland and wake up refreshed and renewed. The insomnia bothered me so much because it was new. Pain had always been there and managed but sleep problems?

 Not me. I could fall asleep standing up.

I was so frightened by what was happening to my body. No sleep and out of control pain. Then, the piece de' resistance was the brain fog. I've read, and loved, contracts all my life. I could take them apart and put them back together better than they were before. It was something that I really enjoyed doing and I was good at it. I loved new home sales and even though the management sometimes sucked it was a real high for me to put together communities. I could remember the names of people in all my communities and where they lived. 

Nope. Not anymore. 

That was gone too.

So as the fear kept building I kept reaching deeper and deeper inside to write about issues I'd never had the desire to face before. As I wrote there were things I'd never faced and also never known was buried deep within. The dark side of depression was creeping up because of the pain and I wanted to purge myself of anything that might hamper my ability to beat this disease. You see, I haven't accepted that I will be living like this for quite some time. I haven't made it through all the stages of grief and I keep repeating a few stages like some never-ending loop. Is it the pain that causes depression or were some things that were always there? I was always a happy person and loved to laugh and smile and I smiled a smile that reached my eyes.

That too, is gone.

I introduced my daughter and it was a pleasure to write about how much joy she's brought to my life. Truly, I have had a ball raising her. She's got a unique way of looking at the world and as trying as parenthood gets at times she could say or do something and I'd be doubled over in laughter. I look at her face and wonder how I got so blessed. Nothing else in this life could have ever given me more.

That will never change.

I found that there was a theme running though my posts of denial and anger. I can't stand, and still can't accept, that I will not be able to live a high intensity, high stress life of a new home sales agent. I'm angry that getting rear-ended in January of 2008 sent me spiraling into the black hole of Fibromyalgia. I know that there are sufferers out there who have overcome the pain and live a great life with few flares. I want to be one of those people but I'm nowhere near that yet. I feel like a big, fat lump instead of the woman who thrived on the intensity of selling.

Nope. No way and no how.

I was so excited when I got my first comment and follower. WOW! That was so cool! Maybe, just maybe, I wasn't alone in this after all. There were people out there who felt just like I did. I felt like I had a lifeline and I grabbed it and held on for dear life. I was in love with blogging and it filled up a void that I didn't even know I had. Before I started this I had never read a blog. Really, I didn't even have a desire to read one. Now, that's how I start my day.

Then I met three special women and have helped me more than they can ever know. I've never met them face to face but we've met heart to heart. I've said it before but I can't let my year anniversary go by without saying a special thank you again to Lynn-Marie, Michelle and CJ. You guys have really made this special. We've got the same issues and problems. We hurt, cry and laugh through the posts that bare our souls to the world. We all have family and friends that we've grown up with but there is something special that is shared when this illness strikes. It sounds trite but unless you have felt this down-to-the-bone-agonizing-ache-and-pain you don't understand how someone can tolerate this day in and day out. It's also hard to understand how this changes you. We would all love to turn back time to the day before this all consuming pain hit us. But we can't. Ain't happening.

So to the women who have helped me make sense of this crapola in my life....thank you and I hope I've helped all of you in some small way.

So it's one year into this life sentence but hallelujah.......I've got cell mates!

So here we go into year two. 

We can do anything as long as we have the people we love and friends by our sides.