HeartStrung

Clone 2 read  Conversation with Myself  the other day and asked, "do you really hear and talk to yourself like that, Mom?" Yes. I really do. I have two sided conversations with myself as if I'm actually talking to someone else. I don't know what the conversations other people have with themselves in their own heads sound like. This is just the way I do it. I've always done it this way, though I will admit the dialog has changed in recent years. It used to sound very much like there was a bully in my head. But that is changing. I've been trying to learn to be my own best friend. Part of my reason for this is because right now, I'm really the only person who can provide for myself exactly what I need. Other people try but for the most part I can't be satisfied. For example: I don't want people to ask me how I'm doing because I don't want to complain, I don't want to freak out the healthy people, I don't want to bore the heal

Me: I can't do this anymore. Brain: Yes you can. Me: No. I can't. Brain: Yes. You. Can. Me: You don't understand. Brain: I do  understand. I'm the only  one who truly does understand. Me: Fine. But I still HATE feeling this way and I can't do it anymore. Brain: It will pass. You'll feel better tomorrow. Me: No I won't. And so what if I do? It's just going to come back again another day. Brain: You don't know that. Me: Yes I do. It always comes back. Brain: You make a good point. Me: Thank you. Brain: You're welcome. But still, it will pass before it comes back. There's a good day coming. Can't you just look forward to the good day? Me: No. Brain: Why not? Me: What good is the good day  when it's constantly being replaced by another bad day ? Brain: Well, the good days give you hope. Me: No they don't. The good days suck just as much as the bad days. They m

I'm tired. I can't do this anymore. If I never felt this way again, it would be too soon. This illness has changed my entire life. Every relationship I have or had, the things I can do and how I do them, my conversations, my accessiblity, my relatability. Nothing has been left untouched. I feel like I've given up so many things I love. Just for today I wish I had something identifiable. Something surgical. Something treatable. I'd even take something terminal. At least there would be an end to it. No one understands. No one can relate. I've never felt so alone, so unsupported, so much like an island. Most days, I can handle this. I can deal. I can find a smile, a joke, a lightheartedness. I can find somewhere positive to focus. I can distract myself with making something. Knit. Crochet. Sew. Write. I can find something beautiful to look at, to take a photo of. I can call a friend and let their joy be my own joy. But not today. Today I have nothing p

It is incredibly frustrating to have symptoms that have to be described but never can be seen. You might think that it would be easy for me since I'm a writer. That I would welcome the opportunity. But the symptoms I experience are just about the most impossible things to describe. I once tried to describe my dizziness to a doctor by saying that I felt like 2 minutes ago I had played dizzy-bat. So not the immediate dizzy feeling but the leftover one. She just stared at me. She had no idea what I was talking about. Initially, I suspected that Dr. Carry was an alien. I also suspected that she wasn't really a doctor because after listening to me she googled my symptoms on her little pink phone. Yes, you read that right. She  googled  my symptoms in front of me and then prescribed an antibiotic for an ear infection I didn't have. I never went back to her again. I also never described my dizziness like that again. Apparently dizzy-bat is not a universally p