Snippy & Bitchy

Oh I was in a mood today! I was particularly snippy and bitchy, annoying even myself! It was one of those Beetlejuice days where that extra head would spring out of my neck and say horrible things and all I could do was stand there and watch it happen, mortified! After battling my husband to NOT pick up weekend shifts to bring in that oh-so-badly-needed extra money (in order to preserve his thin grasp on sanity) and finally winning, he finds himself privy to my short tempered snaps and condescending reactions to anything and everything he does. How he puts up with me I just don't know, I can barely put up with me! It is so hard to be nice while suffering...just plain hard. As much as I hate to admit it he is bearing the brunt of the emotional effects of my illness as much as I am. I believe that is what prompted him to turn to me in frustration this morning and say, "When you are on a new drug I feel like I am on a new drug!". How sad for this poor man! He just happened to fall in love with this chica loca when he was 22 years old and now his life is pretty loco itself! I try to make a conscious effort to stay positive, and when I am in one of my "moods" stay as far away from him as possible. I can quickly turn into one critical nit-picking nightmare of a woman. In a matter of minutes I will dissect our life, pointing out everything HE has done to piss me off or set me back. Yeah, so its best to stay away, far...far...away, until the storm has passed. And he really does give me the space to get through it even though I know it hurts him when I withdraw. And once again that brings me back to that all too familiar feeling of guilt...always so much guilt!

On our latest Costco trip (warehouse grocery plus everything else store) he suddenly stopped me mid-aisle and turned to look at me with love in his eyes, asking if I remembered when I was at my worst and we would get halfway through the mega-cinder-block three-football-field sized structure and I would throw on the brakes. I was so sick and there was so much stimulation and too much to choose from and way too much square footage to cover. I had hit my "wall" and was done. So we would leave the store, shopping half done, and head home to put me to sofa-rest. It was also during this phase that he would come home on his lunch break from work and carry multiple baskets of laundry down 3 flights of stairs so I could coin-op in our complex, too weak to get the laundry there myself. He has picked up major slack in our lives to compensate for my illness, all the while holding jobs he did not like, fending off potential friendships because the reality of our financial situation could not afford new friendships, foregoing living his life because he did not want to live it without me right next to him...and continuing to love me and support me with all of his heart.

I believe we have made it as long as we have and through as much as we have because of sheer determination. We were a blessed match from the beginning, and despite MANY setbacks and wrench-dented roads we have not taken that gift and squandered it. He is a man of integrity and honor and still loves me very much (one of those few that love their crazy-blonde-firecracker hot-mess wives and would not have it any other way). We have worked so incredibly hard to put our relationship first and make it the priority of our lives. I feel like there are 3 of us in this marriage; me, my husband and the marriage. She has taken on her own identity and is the primary focus, coming long before our own individual needs. It is returning to this philosophy time and time again that allowed us to push through the rough patches and make it to the other side. But I have to give myself some credit here as well. When my health and sanity failed in a BIG way I spent the requisite amount of time wallowing in typical self-pity and misery, and then got mad and refused to play the victim, grasping onto the non-optional sheer determination that I was going to recover from this, I was going to get my life back. How much I could not tell, but was insisting on at least enough that I could exist in the outside world in some form or fashion. My quest to recover, or manage Fibromyalgia was/is long and tenuous, but I have restored a quality of life that I see so many of you are still searching so desperately for. This is not an illness that you will manage easily. No doctor is going to give you a magic pill or prescription for absolute healing. Fibromyalgia is scientifically unknown at this juncture in the PRACTICE of medicine, but that does not mean there are not ways to treat it and gain some of your life, your passion, your laughter back. I cannot tell you how to do it, we are all different. I can just tell you what I did and that it can be done. I know that if I had not made the decision to refuse to accept life disabled I would still be there today. I tapped out every resource available to me and utilized many alternative theories and practices to get here. I set my mind on not living too sick to live and it has paid off. Oh yes I still struggle plenty, but when I take a second to pause and reflect am amazed that I can not only make it through the entirety of Costco but then come home and put everything away!

Thanks for joining,
Leah