When he first said it, it took my breath away. No one has ever said that to me in my entire life. I had to sit there with it, to think on it. He was right.
“It seems someone is living with her glass half empty instead of half-full lately.”
I have never denied or hid the fact that I grieve over who I was before pain took over my life and then since CRPS entered me. It’s hard to even remember, to even believe I am a marathoner, for example.
Lately, the emotions seem to be taking me down to half-empty.
But what if?
I have sat with this idea for the last week.
What if this is all happening FOR me and not TO me. Maybe there is so much for me to learn, to make me a better person, to give me a stronger voice, to allow me to help others.
I sit here now somewhere between Ohio and home in the passenger seat with tears in my eyes in pain. I find myself remembering the mom that could do this trip alone, that could handle any task without asking for help, the mom who was so strong.
I hate feeling weak. I think it’s one of the hardest things for me. But maybe this is happening for me to show me it’s okay, that you don’t always have to be the strong one who always holds it together. Maybe it is so I see there is strength in weakness. Perhaps I need to show that feeling your weakness and then picking yourself back up again, is in fact, strength.
I know that one of my weaknesses has always been asking for help. “A strong independent woman” was how I would once describe myself; perhaps “stubborn” could be added in there too. Now, I find myself daily asking everyone around me for help including help in public. For example, the grocery store where I am then judged because you cannot see my “invisible illness.” Yet, to me, it’s not invisible.
Today I reflected back on the past four years that my daughter has been a patient at the clinic in Ohio. In those years, she has gone through so much. As I was always there holding her hand I saw those moments where my positive girl seemed to go missing and replaced by one asking the hard, frustrating questions. “When will I be better?” “Why is my body like this?”
Although in those moments, I always found the right words to help her, I now truly GET IT. I understand that she just needed to vent, she needed to be mad for a minute. She needed to cry and scream.
Today I feel like I’m a better mom. No, not in the ways I once was. Not the energetic mom who could do ALL the things. But, a mom with a greater understanding of life and its struggles. A mom who may, at times, need their help, but one that is hopefully showing them so much more to life.
Patience, another one of my greatest weaknesses. My life has been put on hold in so many ways over the past twelve months plus. I have learned to be patient with those helping me, with doctors, with medicines, with surgical dates and surgical recoveries.
Now, I sit here with a stimulator in my body that hasn’t been working for the past four days. I await until tomorrow when we try new programming. Let me tell YOU about patience when it comes to this thing!
So maybe. Maybe this is, in fact, happening for me and not to me. Maybe, the Krisha that comes out on the other side of the CRPS fire is a brand new person with a view and an understanding of this life than I cannot even imagine today.
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