The reason why I consider it to be the best Summer ever was due to that specific time being my final season of normal and complete health. Later that Fall, Rheumatoid Autoimmune Disease, then only known as Rheumatoid Arthritis, set in and took over my body, mind, my life. Eighteen years have passed since that day, multiple RAD treatments tried, many ups and downs with my health and my choices in life, Natalie passing away...all of which culminated in my realization of Acceptance that I cannot allow this disease to destroy my heart, my mind, my soul, nor my hope. I must survive and live despite this disease.
I first noticed something seemed off later along in the Fall semester of gym class. The start of gym class always comes with an adjustment period for the body due to the introduction of regular and regimented physical exercise. It was an aerobics class, step included and I steadily adjusted to the exertion. I felt great! I could stretch, jump, bounce, step up and step down and move! And then towards the end, I noticed that I felt stiffness. My body was not responding as it normally should with each movement. I could not bend as easily. I tired out easily. And I ached, even though I was past the point of the usual aches that come with starting to exercise. I remember thinking that I just felt weird. Something just seemed off but I knew I didn't feel sick. I just felt like my body was moving backwards in how it should feel after exercising. I had no clue just how big of a deal these symptoms would become.
Over the course of the school year, my symptoms steadily grew worse. Keep in mind that this was before the ability to "Google" everything. I had stiffness, inflammation, pain. At first, my parents thought that maybe it was an extreme case of growing pains. Maybe it was caused from a too old childhood mattress, which was promptly replaced. My symptoms continued. The fingers of my hands did not bend easily, joints inflamed and stiff. It was difficult to get out of a seated position, along with it hurting like hell in my hips. I used to be one of those kids who could dart promptly out of the classroom at the end of class. Not anymore. I became the last kid to leave class. School took on a whole new meaning for me due to the cycle of getting to class, sitting down for nearly an hour, getting up to go to the next class/locker, sit down for nearly another hour, and repeat. I can still recall the memory of some senior jock making rude comments from behind me while walking in the hallway "why is she walking so slow? Come on!", etc. But even in my embarrassment, I could not walk any faster. It hurt so much. Honestly, I was lucky that I could walk at all.
I knew I was steadily becoming crippled and there was not one thing that seemed to change it. My parents knew something was going on but it was not until my Mother saw the nodules on my finger joints that she knew without a doubt as to what had happened within my body. In my family, we knew of one cousin on one side of my family who had been diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis earlier in childhood. So we knew that the possibility existed that my immune system had activated such a disease. So off my Mom and I went to the doctor for a possible diagnosis!
The doctor, being as she was a general practitioner, stated that it seemed likely that it was Rheumatoid Arthritis, judging by my symptoms. I would need tests and likely need to see a specialist. Unfortunately, that had to be put off for a little longer as we were in the midst of getting ready to move and my Dad knew that the Rheumatology department at our new locale's base was known to be fantastic. So the solution for my symptoms in the meantime was a prescription of Naproxen...which hardly put a dent in relieving my body of symptoms.
Being diagnosed with a new health condition can be a traumatic experience at its most base level. It is normal and perfectly healthy to experience the 5 stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance.
At first, I did experience emotional relief, a temporary acceptance. I had an answer for my symptoms. I now knew why my body was reacting in such debilitating ways. I felt so relieved to know that it was a known disease and not my imagination. And then I got angry. I was raised Catholic, so the "Catholic guilt" played well into my anger: "What had I done that was so bad as to deserve this disease?!" I know I was stubborn as a child (apparently during my early years, my Dad nicknamed me Bronco after Bronko Nagurski) and did not enjoy authority over my childhood whims, but did it mean that I deserved to feel so much pain? What had I done to deserve this? Keep in mind, I was a teenager. If I was home alone, I used that as my time to scream at God about why this was happening, what had I done and to please, please take it away. I promised to be good. I promised that I would obey my parents, I would do better, if God would just take this disease and all of this pain away.
Thus began the stage of bargaining. Maybe if I was better, maybe it would go away? It didn't. What this disease showed me at the time was that everything that I thought I was and could be was gone. I was not healthy anymore. I could not climb trees anymore. I could not ride bikes anymore. It hurt to get up, get dressed. I couldn't get my arms up high enough to wash my hair, having to bow my head down to make it easier. I could not bend my fingers, especially far enough into a fist. It hurt to walk. It hurt to sit. It hurt to lay down. It hurt to even sleep. I spent many late nights sobbing my heart out over this disease and its pain. I stopped caring about my future. Honestly, I did not believe that I had much of a future. Everything that I knew of who I was seemed no more. There was only this constant pain from this stupid disease that had no right to take over my body, my life. I had to resign myself to live with a disease that destroys. And for so, so very long, I let it destroy me. I couldn't escape, body, heart, nor mind. I couldn't stop breaking down.
Florence & the Machine - "Breaking Down":
No comments:
Post a Comment