an update, of stoked-ness.

life has been so incredible lately. i don't know where to start!
although i am still physically exhausted and my illness is still quite active, i have been able to make it through work each day. this in itself is a miracle. every morning i wake up thinking i just can't do it again that day, and i do. i love my job so much, but it's physically taxing almost beyond my capability to handle. i KNOW the lord is lending me strength because i am where i'm meant to be.
i'm so grateful.
i also have been so much more positive about my UC. i know it will improve with these infusions. it will just take time and adjustment.

this week i cold-turkeyed off of a pain med i have been prescribed since october. the pain has lessened enough that it doesn't keep me up at night without the med, and i decided that i'd rather deal with what's left of the pain than be on the medication anymore. it affected my moods and personality. for the first time in MONTHS i feel like myself again, and i am so happy! i pray every single day in gratitude that i have been able to cold-turkey off of the meds without horrible withdrawals. i feel like ME again. i am realigned spiritually and it feels amazing.
i am living a Christ-centered life and i could not be more happy!


with that all said, i am SO GLAD it's almost the weekend! i want to sleep, sleep, sleep!


love to any and all!

the yearning for a normal life.

i hate to complain, and i really don't like feeling like someone who whines about the hand i've been dealt...
but sometimes you just have those days, and this is one of them.

i didn't go in to work today because i caught a bug from one of the boys i work with. that's another aspect of my illness, by the way. my weakened immune system is too busy destroying itself to fight off bugs the way it's supposed to, so i get sick a lot easier than most people.
oh, and the chemo makes it even weaker...so between those things....if someone breathes on me and is sick, i'm pretty much guaranteed to get sick, too.

anyway...today i just keep thinking about having a normal life. when will i have one again? or will i at all? i had so much hope a couple of months ago when i began chemo treatment. that hope has gradually transformed into discouragement and even fear as the chemo has not helped in the way i was expecting. i'm afraid i'll have to end up getting surgery. but when i think of living the rest of my life this way, surgery seems reasonable. i don't like having to miss work. i don't like how exhausted i am at the end of every work day.

i don't like how many things i miss out on. this friday there's a big get-together for this group i'm part of on facebook. it's in park city and is the kind of get-together that will take energy i just don't have. not only that, but not knowing where the bathrooms are and being around a bunch of people i don't know just make attending the gathering impossible for me.

but oh, how much i want to go. how much i just want to do "normal" twenty-something activities without worrying about energy levels or bathrooms or pain.

it brings my thoughts back to dating, and how impossible it feels with this illness. who wants to be with someone who can't do normal twenty-something activities? who wants to hear about an illness as gross as mine? who would even want to bother? there are plenty of girls out there who would be so much easier for a guy to be with. not only that, but at the rate i have to "ditch out" of plans i make due to my health, i'm never going to get past a first date anyway.


i just want a normal life today. i want to go camping, and hiking. i want to have late nights watching movies. i want road trips and plane trips and backpacking through europe.

i want to get off of work, and NOT have all of my energy for the day already used up.

and there's my little boohoo for today. now that i've gotten that out, i need to remember all of the reasons i have to be positive and hopeful. i need to do some scripture study and prayer, and remind myself that this too shall pass. or at least get easier to deal with as time goes on.

fingers crossed.

hmm.

you wear your desperation like a mask
and it's all i can see.

sometimes...

i just would like someone to take me out on a really lovely date. just for fun, and because it's been awhile.

days that need to end...

sometimes, i just don't want to do it anymore.

i am surrounded by amazing people. but they are always the ones i end up hurting.

the fluctuation of my illness exhausts me emotionally. just when i think i've taken a step forward, i fall back three. i am tired of trying to be optimistic about it, tired of shrugging it off. i am tired of getting my hopes up and then having the door slammed on them. the constant rollercoaster of my health brings out the ugliness in me. i am short-tempered, snarky and selfish. and i despise it.

i deactivated my facebook account. this is the second time i've done so in all of the years i've had it. i hate the idea of anyone thinking i did so so that people would worry about me, or to get attention. i deactivated it because it is just too tempting to post a bunch of negative junk and wallow in the fact that everyone else my age has a life so different from mine right now.

when i feel i have a little better control of my emotions, i'll be back on. until then i just don't want anything to do with it.

sometimes i feel as though the only way life will get better is if i wake up one morning as a different person.
not likely to happen.


well, bed time for me. here's to hoping tomorrow is better.

of talents and potential.

lately i've been giving a lot of thought to talents, and how to make the most of them.

at twenty-four years old, i am aware of a small handful of talents. i have fallen out of exercising many of them, as the demands of serious illness have taken over so much of my life.

i don't like it.

i always had the feeling when i was younger that i had a vast capacity for many different things. people were always talking about my potential, my potential. i heard about it all the time. and i was pretty good at most things i tried, and developed a real knack for playing the violin (i started writing music on the violin pretty soon after i started to play) and writing.

unfortunately, being someone who had things come naturally to me often actually put me at a disadvantage. i got frustrated really easily when i wasn't good at something right away, and tended to quit. it wasn't all the time with everything, don't get me wrong. but still, i was a kid, and so i figured i'd have all the time in the world to develop and nurture my talents later.


well, by all means, it's later. and i've been thinking about things that i love, that i want as part of my life and that i want to be better at.

music has had me interested for years and years. i remember as a kid how much music would affect me. my mom told me that when i was only a few years old i used to start bawling when barbara's streisand's "wind beneath my wings" came on the radio. hahaha. music has always been such a huge part of me experiencing and coping with life. my violin sits in my closet unused, and i really want to pick it up again. not every twelve year old girl writes violin music the way i did. i need to recognize that as a TALENT! i walked around with music of my own making constantly in my head. even now when i take some quiet time to myself, i hear it. it competes for "air time" with the characters in my novel, which have definitely received more love. ;)

also, watching my sister develop her talents as a songwriter has been very inspiring to me. i feel like that's something i could have in me, too. and if i have a knack for music then it's time to use it! if i could create something musically that touches others the way other people's music has touched me...that would be amazing beyond what words can express.

my writing is another talent that has suffered since the onset of illness. i have been writing since the moment i knew how. jenn and i used to write books and read them to each other. i wrote poems. short stories. all sorts of things. i have an aptitude with writing that someone who studies writing for years couldn't develop, because it is a natural part of me. writing is SO many things to me. it's not something i'll ever give up, and something i've missed the last while. i write here and there, but nothing like i used to. i owe it to myself and my characters to tell their stories. i have been given talent in an area many people would love to have. i will make the most of it.

as for other talents, there are several small ones that are here and there and factor into everyday life. i'm making it a goal to seek them out, to learn to understand them and to exercise them until they become some of my greatest strengths and assets as a person.

why? because life is richer that way. not just for me, but those around me. those who i share my talents with.


and life ought to always be rich, fulfilling and beautiful.

easter...

one of the most important days in my life. a reminder that i was bought with a price.

a reminder that this life is only a small part of our existence.

a reminder that we're loved.