This is NOT a Pity Party

Imagine getting up every morning and feeling as though you have no control whatsoever on which way you’re going to go, even though you’re telling your body what you want it to do. Imagine every time you lay down, sit up, stand up, pull up covers, kick off covers, or look over your shoulder it seems like the world has completely fallen off-kilter. Imagine being a healthy 30 year old and then arriving home from work one day and that being the beginning of the end of normal life for you. That is, as we speak, the life that I am living. I can barely walk through my own home, the one that I have lived in for the past 24 years, without holding onto a wall, couch, chair, or busting out a cane in order to keep myself from falling face-first onto the floor. When I leave the house, someone has to drive me and, whomever that person happens to be, gets to be the lucky one that leads me around because I am too unstable and weak to walk a long distance on my own.Imagine something that you LOVE doing. Something that you have done for so long that it has almost become an extension of yourself. If you love make-up, you more than likely ALWAYS have tons of make-up in your purse. If you love to sing, you more than likely don’t even realize that you are constantly singing, no matter where you are and who is watching. Imagine not being able to do that. Imagine that, whatever this strange sickness is that has caused you to become dependent on others, has now prevented you from doing the very thing that you love doing the most. That has also happened to me. I LOVE to read and write. I carry paper, pens, and books with me AT ALL TIMES (that’s why my purses are huge and weigh 47 pounds), but, as a result of or in accordance with whatever it is that is making me sick, it has caused my eye sight, something that was already pretty horrible to begin with, to go even further downhill. Eighty percent of the time I cannot read the words in a book and, the worst part is, it doesn’t matter how big the font might be, I still cannot read it. As I type this I have the font set at 16 and the value of the document at 100% so that I can make out some of what it is that I am typing, but, by and large, I am lucky that I fiddled my way through typing in high school and can type decently.Every day is a crapshoot on how I will feel. It mostly goes on a cycle of one day dizzy and off-balance and the next day it’s a headache and off-balance. This week every day has been headache, dizzy, and off-balance. I take my medication and end up sleeping away most of the day because the meds make me so drowsy. Do they help the symptoms go away? No, but they knock me out or make me so loopy that I could really care less. I know that to most, I appear as though there is nothing wrong with me. I don’t appear “sick” and I might be putting on the best front that I can of being the normal Christine, but let me tell you: inside, I am miserable. But, I have been told, by people who only know me in passing because I might frequent their store, that they can tell that there’s something going on with me. Apparently I have been slurring my speech some and I forget the name of the most mundane things. Yesterday I couldn’t remember what chicken was called or what the oven was called; but, according to the neurologist, there is nothing that has shown up on my MRI or my CT Scan that shows anything that would be causing this to be happening. It’s very frustrating for me since I am used to being the human dictionary and thesaurus within my family and circle of friends.I am doing the best that I can to not allow whatever this is to get me depressed. By and large, I think I have been doing pretty well in that department. I have tried my best to maintain my signature Christine sarcasm and humor; but, naturally, there are some days where I just cannot do it. There have been days where I have had to cry myself to sleep because I feel THAT sick or THAT frustrated. Believe me, I have not lost faith and know that God is in control. I know that there has got to be something good that will come of this, maybe not for me, but maybe for the greater good of humanity in general, I just don’t know. But, if I’m completely honest with myself, I feel sad because I almost feel like I have been forgotten by some people. I know that we all have busy lives and I DO NOT expect people to drop everything in their lives for me, but a simple text saying that you care can do wonders for someone that is hurting. I am not pointing fingers, blaming anyone, and trying HARD to not have a pity party, that is NOT the intention behind writing this, but I think that we all, myself TOTALLY included, become so involved in what’s going on in our own lives that we forget about our hurting friends. I, myself, will try to work on this area myself and would like to ask all of you, my friends, to consider joining me in this crusade of sorts.At this stage in the game it is up in the air about when I will be able to go back to work. The last day I worked was March 8th and I have no idea, not even a ballpark figure, on when I might be able to get back to those crazy little kiddos that I love so much. I worry that they think I have died or abandoned them, but I am not allowed to visit them on campus, so I have been relaying my status to them through the classroom aid. Pray for them, that they will be able to understand that I am only very ill right now, but that I am not dying, at least not any more quickly than I was before all of this nonsense started.On a semi-positive note: I have lost around 10 pounds since all of this has started, especially since my visit to urgent care that landed me with an IV in my arm and fluids being pumped into me. I live mostly off of Saltines, iced tea, and Ginger Ale. I have attempted chicken and soup, but both instances ended in my doing a very realistic impersonation of Linda Blair, so it’s back to Saltines, tea, and Ginger Ale for me. What I “have” is not contagious, so if you ever feel like taking a drive out to the country, you’re more than welcome to come on out!