Hi
Posted on June 30, 2019 Leave a Comment
It’s been a long time and another year has gone by.
“A year goes by… and I can talk about it.”
5-year mark hit last November. I don’t remember when the last time I wrote was. Things have been… interesting.
Anyway, I won’t pick up where I left off. Too much has happened in the past months and it would be difficult to recap all of it. So, I’ll just start from here.
Well, I will tomorrow. Hah.
Harvey
Posted on August 12, 2018 Leave a Comment
Last night I remembered how scared, how alone I’d been during hurricane Harvey.
Yeah, I’d busied myself with packing donations. That was before I’d realized I couldn’t get out of the apartment building, or that the atmospheric pressure changes had impacted me as they had.
I’m embarrassed to have been so affected when others lived through things of unimaginably different proportions.
I suppose I’ll go into detail later.
So, last night, after watching video clips and photos projected onto a large screen above a stage filled with Houstonians singing something beautifully and appropriately inspirational, I spent the remainder of the show ashamedly swiping away tears. Frustrated. Angry. I’ve no reason to complain.
I’d been as helpless as I’d felt during the hurricane. Vertigo, spasticity – crawling on the floor because my stomach wasn’t handling movement well enough to stand.
I had stopped eating and drinking water at some point because it made me sick. Five days? That was it. A measly five days in a midrise apartment building. I couldn’t handle five days. Ridiculous.
Help. I wanted to help, not need help. I contacted Houston-area family and friends. If any of them needed anything then, dammit, I would find a way.
Instead, reality. Dad rushed in when he’d heard I’d been alone through the storm. Off to hospital.
It amazed me that I had smiled and joked with EMTs during hospital transport. A bout of the familiar ‘low’ had hit during the few days of isolation. The small cuts on my arm attested to that; the female EMT had noticed and pressed about it. I told her that I had accidentally cut my arm during one of my falls.
Maybe that’s why the storm had – unbeknownst to me until last night – taken a toll on me. Maybe because I had been so low, and alone, and helpless – maybe that’s why I cried while watching that recap of the hurricane.
No one had noticed. I was glad for that.
Lightning outside. I pretended to be asleep while Dad drove me home so I wouldn’t have to see the lightning. Sometimes thunder and lightning don’t bother me at all, sometimes they do.
But now, like last night, I just want to paint and then go to sleep.
Journal entry #8
Posted on June 10, 2018 Leave a Comment
This is too on point to not share.
I’m very ugly
So don’t try to convince me that
I am a very beautiful person
Because at the end of the day
I hate myself in every way
And I’m not going to lie to myself by saying
There is beauty inside of me that matters
So rest assured I will remind myself
I am a worthless, terrible person
And nothing you say will make me believe
I still deserve love
Because no matter what
I am not good enough to be loved
And I am in no position to believe that
Beauty does exist within me
Because whenever I look in the mirror I always think
Am I as ugly as people say?
I’m very ugly
So don’t try to convince me that
I am a very beautiful person
Because at the end of the day
I hate myself in every way
And I’m not going to lie to myself by saying
There is beauty inside of me that matters
So rest assured I will remind myself
I am a worthless, terrible person
And nothing you say will make me believe
I still deserve love
Because no matter what
I am not good enough to be loved
And I am in no position to believe that
Beauty does exist within me
Because whenever I look in the mirror I always think
Am I as ugly as people say?
Because whenever I look in the mirror I always think
Journal entry #6 – neuropathy
Posted on April 23, 2018 1 Comment
Three hours to go before my alarm will shout encouragement at me. I’m exhausted. No matter how exhausted I am, I have to stick with my morning workouts. Hemiparesis and spasticity don’t wait for me to be prepared. They show up, uninvited and unannounced, rudely staying until they decide to leave on a whim.
Tiny pieces of wire, sharp as thin glass, bite into my arm as I rest it on the pillow above my head. The skin of my torso throbs; my right hip and glute throb with the sensation of icy fire; my right leg feels as though ghostly hands are pounding away – like a meat tenderizer on a chunk of beef. My foot feels the worst, though. Like skin is being torn away, layer by layer, and I somehow have an infinite amount of layers. It doesn’t stop, and I can’t remember what it feels like to not hurt.
This is neuropathy. Thanks stroke.