So Where Do I Go From Here?

I'm just sitting around thinking over the past year while Roger runs the vacuum cleaner for the New Year's party.  I figured I might as well see if I can parse out what happened to me in 2010 and make sense of it all and get ready for 2011.

2010 for me, was defined by lack.  Lack of health, due to fibromyalgia.  And I've been honest about it, and what that means to future employers I care not.  Because it's there, and I will never have the luxury of waking up one day and forgetting about it.

****************

Even if I somehow manage to tame the beast, I will have to do something every few hours to tame it for the rest of my life.  Whether that means taking a pill, or trying to stay positive, I cannot ignore the elephant in the living room.

Lack of money.   I was lucky enough to get retirement through the State of South Carolina, my employer for many years.   But our kids are on reduced price school lunches. Our income has been drastically slashed. 

I've almost enjoyed it, in a masochistic fashion.  My parents trained me since birth to prepare for the next Great Depression, and I've enjoyed utilizing all the tips and tricks they taught me-like finding a zero percent credit card to finance the new washer/dryer set--to make do.

Lack of...income.   I was brought up in a home where it was assumed that I would train for a profession and practice it.  Maybe my parents thought I'd take off a few years when the kids arrived, but you could do that back in their day, in their field.  My field, academia, not so much.  There were a dozen jobs in my field in the entire state.  Now there are like--eight. 

***********************

I've tried to define my worth in a way that has nothing to do with a paycheck.  (I know--cliche).   To be honest, I've failed.  I feel unworthy without a job to go to every day.  I love every second of it..from slapping at the alarm clock, to climbing in the car, to cutting up with coworkers, to sitting in my office helping people (hopefully) to climbing in the car to go home feeling that I helped hold up my end of the family load.

I want to go back to work.

Lack of...finding a way to heal from fibromyalgia.  The AMA says there is no cure.  I've tried everything...if someone told me that I would be healed if I hung upside down, singing the Star Spangled Banner, and drinking camel pee, I'd do it.  Nothing has worked so far.   But stay tuned, because I plan to try everything on the face of the planet.  I'm still taking guaifenisen, and sometimes I think it's helping, and sometimes I think the Rohun healing is helping, and then right now my legs and back ache like crazy and I feel like nothing has worked and nothing ever will. 

*********************
 

Strangely enough, I found my faith again this year.  Maybe for the first time ever, I'm convinced that there is a God.  That's all tied in with the Rohun healing stuff.  I can't even begin to explain what it is or why I feel like there is a God, and why I'm not mad at God, but try Rohun healing and get back to me.   

Lack of...anger.  People have been mean.  People have been incredibly kind and loving.  I have to keep my mouth shut about mean people.   I want to spill out all the poisonous feelings of anger and hatred.  I want to point my finger at people and scream, "J'accuse!"  I want to point my finger at myself and scream the same thing.  Because somehow I feel like that it's my fault that I got sick.

***********************************

But I have to let it go.  Let. It. Go.  Forget about it.  Wish my enemies well.   I believe in karma and ultimate justice, and I believe wholeheartedly that stewing in righteous indignation is a worthless way to spend my life.

I'm working on it.

***********************

Lack of...hope.   By this time next year, I expect that my mom will have died.  In fact, I hope so.  She's dead already.  I can't even take the time to mourn her.  Every day there is a stack of bills to pay, a phone call about ordering diapers or a new drug, a phone call about a new twist in the never ending saga of a body breaking down.   I have no time to grieve.  I can't be there for her if I take time to wallow in grief.  I have to make sure that the complicated financial machinery that allows her to stay in a posh nursing home keeps running.

It feels awful and weird to say it, but I can't wait for her to die so I can grieve.  So I can remember the happy years together instead of the horrible nasty woman she was before she slipped into a world where she can't talk.    Alzheimer's takes no prisoners.    Three years ago, we celebrated our last Christmas together.  She was a little spacy but still there.  Now she cannot eat or talk.  I showed her the picture of the Christmas table I set with her china and she looked interested.    I wonder if she understood anything.

**************************

My inlaws are getting older and sicker also.  I hope they don't die...the Watsons have fantastic genetic material.   But that's just another ticking time bomb.

What will 2011 bring?  

I am going to close this by wishing myself, and you...not luck.   I don't put much trust in that fickle lady.

I wish you..and me...courage.