Living within the limitations that MS hands me, I have learned some amazing things that I CAN do. I credit this understanding to the extra time spent thinking that would have otherwise been filled with endless high-energy activities. (Nice spin, dontcha think?) This sweet rationalization includes both my writing and my non-profit, MSSoftServe.
I had never known that I had (have) a talent for writing, nor had I the confidence to pursue anything. Both turned out to be true. My blog is both a conversation starter and a catharsis. I write my essays and I have found quite the release by putting my emotions out there on the www. The positive feedback makes it hard to ignore; it apparently isn’t only me getting something out of it, and that furthers my warm-fuzzy-factor.
The non-profit has become my life mission. I’ve developed a non-profit that provides a new, customized way to learn about MS while you’re living with it. It grew out of my master’s thesis (I never thought I could get a master’s degree!), and from day one I’ve never considered NOT doing it. MS SoftServe has a Board of Directors, a strategic planner and grant applications in its not too-distant-future. And all I can say is Who Knew?
So tell me, what have those two letters taught you about your capability?
MS and capabilities...kinda sounds like an oxymoron on the surface doesn't it? Well your right Amy, it seems that for every loss "we have" we gain a new perspective on abilities we never knew(or would have known) we had. A Blind person learns to use their other senses to appreciate things that those of us "sighted" people never even notice...did you ever wake up in the predawn hours and although it's dark, you notice things you don't in the light? Birds just waking up, crickets chirping, the sounds the house makes...ticking clocks people and pets in the room breathing. It's comforting, well at least to me it is.
ReplyDeleteSo I guess, my capability is that I have learned to slow down,and listen to the rain or the birds, to watch the sun come up and see the dark velvet sky change hues to oranges and pinks and silvers.
I have learned that each day is different than the one before it, yes new challanges await but so do new opportunities.
I am sure most have heard the phrase, what doesn't kill us makes us stronger...
Stronger how? I can't lift a car, heck I can barely lift my purse anymore.I know they(whomever they are?) meant in an emotional aspect. I don't feel I am getting stronger, emotionally or physically, most days I feel as though my thread is going to unravel and the only thing left will be this pile of thread on the floor that MAYBE somone MIGHT get around to picking up, but then I hear the laughter of my grandson or my granddaughter comes to me and gives me big squeeze, and I realize there is a reason Im not a pile of thread on the floor nor am I in the little room with the hug-myself coat on, it's because I am strong and I am fighting maybe not consciously but internally.
There is a war going on, the one inside my body, fighting itself, and the one in my mind fighting, the one in my body. I AM capable, for the most part, and as each day passes and I force myself out of this dark cloud of depression, just a little bit more of me realizes that, it is a phase I will overcome, it is a stage in which I may return to but, I will come out of it again and I will be a better person for it.
I am trying to learn that this disease is not my life, I am trying to put things in order and I am (cap)able of doing so, it's just going to take time. I need to make new friends as the old ones have moved on, I need to socialize with others both with and without MS. I'm just having trouble figuring out how to do that, I will though, when the time is right and when I am ready to be able to have a conversation that doesn't revolve around doctors and tests and symptoms and...the list goes on.
I AM capable in many ways, just a bit slower at it than I used to be so I will learn how to relearn how to interact with others and then my capabilities will come flooding back and the person I am (as I never quite got to know her completely before the symptoms took her away) will come shinning through.