Down But Not Completely Out

I have been too sick to leave my home since December 22. Too weak, too tired, etc...
In fact, there are some days that I get out of bed, eat breakfast-- and crash from exhaustion. Between the antibiotics and the infections I am fighting, I have problems standing up without being dizzy.

I did read a fantastic book today. Listening to the Rhino: Violence and Healing in a Scientific Age, by Jungian analyst Janet O. Dallet. It's as much about visionary healing as it is about the American shadow that is behind our nation's epidemic violence.
She makes a great case against certain classes of drugs that are misused.

Which brings me to this:

I am often asked why I resist taking all the drugs that have been prescribed to me, which include dextroamphetamines, and ergotamine (LSD),and myriad anti-depressants. I am chemically sensitive and have to be very, very careful what I breathe, or ingest.
Ultimately it is summed up well in this passage quoted by Dallett (page 125), from Huxley's Brave New World. The character Savage is speaking: "I don't want comfort, I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.....I claim the right to be unhappy."

Irony

I have been to Urgent Care this week and I am too sick with simultaneous infections (both viral and bacterial) to even write about being sick. :-(

Have you tried....

Often, when I explain my disabling condition to others, they immediately chime in with
"Have you tried _____________ ?". I understand that they think they are being helpful. Underneath the helpfulness is a common misconception: Somehow, by being chronically ill, I have failed. Failed to "accept healing", failed to "allow myself to be well", failed to "do what the Dr. tells me", failed to "find the right healer". Endless assumption of failure. In reality, my chronic illnesses is not a failure.

Especially in New Age circles, there is this idea that some one who is sick is somehow "giving themselves a lesson", they are "thinking the wrong thoughts", they are "not accepting THE LIGHT".
These ideas and assumptions of the sickness ( and death) as failures are actually toxic. They are of no value to the sick and the dying. These ideas allow people to ignore what really happening right here, right now. In other words this way of thinking is a form of avoidance of suffering.

There is a wonderful essay explianing these misconceptions entitled Spiritual Healing, Holistic Healing and the White Light Fascists by Caitlin MacKewen. It's in a book called Stricken: voices from the hidden epidemic of chronic fatigue syndrome by Peggy Munson. (I have it pictured in the Amazom.com sidebar here on this blog.)

In a future blog, I will list all the healing techniques I have tried in my journey toward wholeness.

It all began...

It all began in 1979. Suddenly I was so sick that the act of getting out bed exhausted me. What started out as a case of mononucleosis became a devastating life changing event. I would never be the same. Life as I knew it ended, before it even started. I was 19.

Here is a brief synopsis of some of the diagnoses I was given as the illness progressed through the years:
*Mononucleosis
*Chronic Mononucleosis
*Epstein-Barr
*Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/ "yuppie flu"
*Chronic Strep Infection
*Systemic Yeast Infection
*Environmental Illness/Asthma
*Multiple Chemical Sensitivities
*Functional Hypoglycemia
*Interstitial Cystitis
*Adrenal Exhaustion
*Depression
*Fibromyalgia
*In 1993 I h=gave birth to my 2nd daughter, who was born terminally ill with trisomy 16p. She lived 22 months.
*Hashimoto's Disease

(at this point it was brought to my attention that an "unknown organism" was causing my immune system to attack my body)
*ME/CFIDS (Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/ Chronic Fatigue Immune Deficiency Syndrome)
*Sjogren's Syndrome

Ironically, I was one of the lucky ones: I didn't get diagnosed as mentally ill, or as a hypochondriac. Sadly, this was how most patients like myself were treated during these years. In October of 2009, something changed all that. The Whittmore-Peterson Institute announced their study findings: "We have detected the retroviral infection XMRV is greater than 95% of the more than 200 ME/CFS, Fibromylagia, Atypical MS patients tested."