(Way too uncomfortable to proofread--try to figure out any weird parts...)
Things are a lot better today. I am amazed at how quickly feeling terribly sick makes my BP symptoms kick in. It's scary, really. The stress of illness throws my whole brain off balance. I had to be careful today not to babble on and on. At the same time, I had bouts of profound depression, and not because I saw a future of pain, but simply because I felt overwhelmed by the challenge of feeling so unwell. It's not that I don't have fight in me; it's just that there's not enough me in me to withstand a significant assault on my health. There's not enough self-monitoring and inner-scaffolding to keep me from falling down all around myself.
That being said, everyone who knows I'm sick commented on how wonderfully I'm doing and how they would never guess I'm as sick as I am. Unlike with BP, people have heard from reliable sources just how horrible shingles can be, so it's something they think is within their frame of reference. Trust me, unless you've had shingles, you do not have frame of reference anymore than you would if you were experiencing BP by reading about it in a book.
So, today I survived a few mini-bouts of paranoia, a little run of hypomania-fueled chatter, and some longer stretches of severe depression. At one point, my hotel room key deactivated, and for a minute, I was devastated, as if this were a monumental, personally-aimed tragedy. I took a deep breath and realized that it could have happened to anyone and probably does on a fairly regular basis. I was able to pull myself back to a rational state, and that is a personal success or sorts. Is this not the core of cognitive-behavioral therapy...to see that our thinking is running away from us and then knowing we have the power to pull ourselves back from distress?
Anyway, I stopped taking vicodin because it was just making me too sick. How do people get addicted to it? I'll never understand it because, frankly, narcotics do nothing for me. I just don't see the attraction. That's probably a good thing, given that researchers estimate that seventy percent of BP sufferers have an addiction comorbid with their principal illness. I am relieved to find myself in the minority section of that statistic.
Despite my troubles this week, I am reminded, just by being here, that I love the East Coast, I love New York, and I miss it. The West feels sleepy and bland in comparison. Maybe it's better that I don't live with the constant stimulation of this place anymore, but when I'm not here, it's just an abstract memory. Being here, right here, surrounds me with all of the reasons I wanted to stay in the first place and those reasons are vivid and tangible.
I am surrounded by my past, but it is my professional life that I feel most acutely at this moment. I am here in a professional capacity, only blocks away from the soul of my previous professional life. My work is mousy and unassuming, but it matters. Still, how does one keep that in mind when the flash and dazzle of previous days are in buildings just a couple of blocks away?
Am I rambling? Sorry.
I had an interesting experience today. I met up with a woman who works in refugee resettlement overseas. She works in a prominent position with an organization that is one step below the UN, but works in lockstep--as a partner agency--with them. I know her, but I only see her once a year. I asked her about a documentary that came out on PBS last spring, Rain in a Dry Land. The documentary is one of the most astounding works ever produced on the topic of refugee resettlement. I asked this woman if she had met the filmmaker, Anne Makepeace. She laughed and said, "May, I facilitated her visit--she was in the camp as my guest!"
It made me realize that I still know important people, except the important people I know now actually do something--something substantial.
I am nobody. I am somebody. I hope that no matter which way my brain scrambles on any given day, I will still be a contributor.
I want to be worthwhile.
5 comments:
I know what you mean when you say that you felt such a profound depression when your key deactivated. I have felt overreactions as well, but mostly with anxiety. I think when things like this happen, it is because it was just that ONE LAST THING that can just barely even be dealt with when a person feels like they are at the end of their rope already.
Yes, I hear you when you say people have heard about how painful shingles is, and thus 'give permission' to someone who has it to feel ill. I get so sick of the 'permission' game. It's exhausting. Even though I have had shingles, much of my understanding of your pain comes from what I have heard as well. I had shingles when I was 11 or 12 years old, and it was more mild than what you have. Plus, I suspect I was a bit disconnected from my body as well. It was barely a blip on my screen compared to how you are suffering. Still, I am glad I have a deep understanding that others do not need, or even want, my permission to be in pain. We feel what we feel.
I am intrigued by your past line of work. I will read greedily should you choose to write about it.
And you matter, May. You matter now, you mattered in the past, and you will always matter.
{{{{{{{{May}}}}}}}}
I agree that in our culture, there is a sense of "I have no idea what you're going through, therefore, it isn't relevant. Get over it and get on with it." We are expected to keep on going--with minimal interruption--when our discomfort is meaningless to the people around us. Especially those who expect certain behavior and results from us in the course of the day. It frustrates me to no end.
It frustrates me that we ghettoize our illnesses and problems. You can talk about shingles, but not bipolar disorder. You can talk about the pain of divorce, but not the tagedy of domestic violence. I can bitch about what an ineffective parent my mother was, or even my father's drinking and temper, but you can't talk about the pain of sexual and emotional abuse. Why does our society surgically carve out which discomfort is and isn't acceptable to mourn or even talk about? It's fundamentally cruel to have to negotatie the rules and keep them all filed appropriately.
"Why does our society surgically carve out which discomfort is and isn't acceptable to mourn or even talk about?"
If people had to really look at the enormity of our pain and accept it as valid... then they might have to look at their own, too. Most people are just not willing to do it. Ever.
May:
Shingles, our nerve endings exposed. BP, our neurotransmitters exposed. A different pain, one surface, the other deep. Both resident in our system, leaving us raw/vulnerable. Shingles runs it course and lays dormant for the next attack. BP never sleeps.
JL
...But still waits for its next attack.
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