On Being Real

 I know not many people are reading this blog. That's okay. I'm really doing this more as a way for me to commit to a daily writing practice. It's part of my journey toward finding a way back to my inner writer.

Thus, many of these posts aren't going to the most inspiring, or the funniest, or the most thought-provoking because well, my life isn't like that. They're also not going to be edited much. What I write for the first draft is probably what you're going to get. It's how I'm trying to get rid of the inner editor. 

What but this blog is going to be is real. .

So what's real about today? 

I went and did about an hour and a half of shopping. Nothing too strenuous. I went to one store and bought a gorgeous new comforter for my bed, another store to look for a candle, and then decided to get a few groceries. After returning home, I washed the bedding, made the bed (which should be an Olympic sport trying to wrestle a fitted sheet on a mattress), and did the dishes. After that? I was utterly exhausted.

There is grief in having a chronic illness. Many people can go to work, run errands during lunch time, go back to work, maybe hit the gym before dinner, and do some chores after that and be just fine. They may be tired, yes, but not bone-deep tired. There's an exhaustion that is part of ME/CFS that is hard to explain. It's not an ordinary tiredness or fatigue. It is far, far worse than that. Sleep doesn't help. You don't wake up refreshed. If you overdo it, you pay for it - dearly.

I grieve for my life before chronic illness. It has stolen so much from me.

I didn't get in my treadmill time (it's been too cold to walk outside) tonight. If I'd pushed myself through that exhaustion, I would have ended up in bed possibly for the rest of the week, if not longer. So instead, I rested. I didn't work on my class paper - I had no mental capacity for such work. I hung out with my daughter and my boyfriend.

I still worry that I might wake up tomorrow and be in pain. 

This is my reality. 

There are days I can accept it and days I don't. 

But I will celebrate what I did accomplish today - and that includes honoring the commitment I made to myself to write daily on this blog, even if it's at 1:21 a.m. 

Go, me! 

I'll leave you with this incredibly important quote: