No Fight Left
I once had a writer friend of mine tease me about my ancestral heritage. I call myself a J.I.G. I am part Jewish, part Irish and part German. He said the German in me wants to fight all the time, the Irish wants to drink it over first and the Jew just feels guilty about the whole thing. Since I have been diagnosed with Meniere’s disease, he and many of those I have shared this with tell me to hang tight to the German side and fight. I am done fighting. Due to the medication I take, drinking is out of the question (though I really wish I could just drink it away). I will, however, feel guilty for the duration of this illness. Since there is no cure, I will feel guilty the rest of my life. The guilt is what I feel for being a burden on anyone. Whether it is trying to talk about it all the time or having to get someone to fill in for me at the last minute because I cannot tolerate the pain or off-balance that comes my way.
I am constantly getting comments from people, usually when I make a post about the pain I am in on Facebook/Twitter, saying I am in their thoughts and prayers. Generally speaking there is nothing wrong with this. People think that it helps to bring comfort to those who are ill or in pain. For some perhaps. I, however, am over it. I started spinning again last week. I haven’t been to the doctor since September due to no income and no insurance. I scraped the money together and went since I knew something was wrong. I was scared, nay, terrified. I had to drive in the snow (since the first snow I drove in was a blizzard, I am always scared driving in snow. That is coupled with the fear I have driving period since having a vestibular condition) and was severely off balance. The pain was also hitting me hard. There was no one to drive me. When I IMd a friend to let her know (not that she could really do anything since she is in California) she was telling me to have fun in the snow and kind of missed the point of why I was letting her know.
I was anticipating never returning home from that appointment. My two doctors and the two nurses could see how scared I was. I got a few hugs and arm rubs from them in an attempt to reassure me. They had to repeat the procedure to re-insert another grommet into my right ear. Unless you have had this procedure done, I cannot explain how it feels. But since I usually scream for the duration, that should be some indication to you. It is during this that I really realize how alone I am.
It is nice to tell someone you are thinking and/or praying for them, even if you are not. But during these times, it would be really nice to have something or someone other then my stuffed teddy bears to hug and have hold me to reassure me that it will be all right. Each time I go through this, whether the weather related issues or needing to have the procedure repeated, it strips away more of me. I have no fight left. I have no strength left to even thing about fighting. I have come to the conclusion that it takes people really being there for you (not just in word or thought) to help you replenish your will to fight and your faith and belief that what you are fighting can be conquered. Galar will defeat the damsel in the rewrite of my short story The Damsel And The Dragon. Meniere’s has won the war.