I Ain't No Nastia Liukin; Balancing Chronic Illness and Life
I always promised myself that I wouldn't be that blogger. You know, the one that rarely posts updates and only shares life with readers haphazardly. Yeah. Well. It turns out I am that blogger, at least recently. I'm not really ok with that, but sometimes things happen in life that you aren't happy about, yeah?
So why have I been so distant? The fact of the matter is, life has gotten in the way. I've had a lot to deal with recently: a lot of medical situations that I've had to juggle and balance with my new "healthy person" activities. As someone who has been seriously ill for the past five years, this balancing of my newly found "life" and health has been a learning experience. This is a completely foreign world to me, I'm not going to lie to y'all. I've been so sick in the past, that my health was my life; it was all that I did and thought about. As my health has slowly improved, I find myself filling time actually living life. I'm going on picnics with my nieces. I'm spending weekends with cousins. I'm riding a motorcycle and reading on the beach and going to farm markets and attending festivals.
I'm incredibly thankful for the opportunities and experiences I have now. I love it. However, as a few medical situations have emerged, I've struggled with prioritizing and fitting the sickness puzzle piece into my life. In other words, in the balancing act of life, I ain't no Nastia Liukin. No Ma'am.
Puns and self deprication aside, that got me thinking about those of us with ongoing, long-term health struggles. As chronically ill, we are essentially living two lives. We have a sick life, and a healthy life. Our sick lives revolve around medications, side effects, surgeries, limitations. Our healthy lives contain working, volunteering, going out with friends, exercising. Trying to find and maintain a balance between our two warring sides is like a full-time job.
All this goes to say, be patient with yourself. Life was crazy and exhausting before we were even sick. You have permission to be tired, to be quiet, to cry, to be distant. Go watch that episode of Gilmore Girls and relax. You're doing just fine.