MaxedOutMama
Sunday, February 27, 2005
Brings Back Memories
Read this post at Michele Agnew's. Not only is it funny and endearing, but it brought back to me so vividly that period in my life, when my sense of myself was so fragile. And yes, everything, absolutely everything, could be about me if I weren't careful. Because of that, boundaries and privacy were so important.
You know, I had wonderful parents, a nice home, plenty of country to roam in, some friends I cared for, books galore, great grandparents, siblings I adored (and still do), my health. I had it all, really. What hit me today after reading Michele's vignette was that I really wasn't happy then. Yes, I had many happy and satisfying times and I have wonderful memories of that period, but I wasn't basically happy like I am today.
And that's incredible. Just incredible. Because almost every day I'm in considerable physical pain, and lord knows, at best, I spend three hours a day coping with my neurological problems and one on keeping my joints from locking. My mind and body are a wall of crumbling bricks, and I'm fighting to mortar in new bricks every day to shore up the wall. But I"m happy, really happy, contented, excited, and I get a wild kick out of it when I learn how to do something new. I love just getting up in the morning and drinking my coffee in the porch, watching the sun rise. I love coming home and chasing the dogs around. I love teasing Chief No-Nag. I love going to work. I love solving puzzles, and I suppose my life has given me a lot of them to solve. I even get a charge out of doing the dishes and scrubbing the bathroom.
The only difference I can see between then and now is that now I am in control of things. I'm certainly not really in control of things physically, so I must be in control of things emotionally, and that must make all the difference. Somehow in all of this I found my freedom, which is what I didn't have as a teenager.
You know, I had wonderful parents, a nice home, plenty of country to roam in, some friends I cared for, books galore, great grandparents, siblings I adored (and still do), my health. I had it all, really. What hit me today after reading Michele's vignette was that I really wasn't happy then. Yes, I had many happy and satisfying times and I have wonderful memories of that period, but I wasn't basically happy like I am today.
And that's incredible. Just incredible. Because almost every day I'm in considerable physical pain, and lord knows, at best, I spend three hours a day coping with my neurological problems and one on keeping my joints from locking. My mind and body are a wall of crumbling bricks, and I'm fighting to mortar in new bricks every day to shore up the wall. But I"m happy, really happy, contented, excited, and I get a wild kick out of it when I learn how to do something new. I love just getting up in the morning and drinking my coffee in the porch, watching the sun rise. I love coming home and chasing the dogs around. I love teasing Chief No-Nag. I love going to work. I love solving puzzles, and I suppose my life has given me a lot of them to solve. I even get a charge out of doing the dishes and scrubbing the bathroom.
The only difference I can see between then and now is that now I am in control of things. I'm certainly not really in control of things physically, so I must be in control of things emotionally, and that must make all the difference. Somehow in all of this I found my freedom, which is what I didn't have as a teenager.
