I have been quite sick, but at the same time my life has been going ok! I really try to keep myself from going into a tizzy. The hardest part is that I don't feel I can discuss anything with my family. They freak out a lot more than I do. There is just a strong prejudice that I'll be useless, "Omg your life is over!", when that really isn't my situation. I haven't stopped working or anything else.
Just within the last few weeks I feel a sense of peace, rather than anxiety. I believe if God wants me to go through something I'm ok with it being part of the story of my life. I understand I just have to stay upright and face it like a man. But I still don't feel like I'm strong enough to witness my family freak out about it. So, my own weakness does drive me away from my family.
Also about 50% of my friends totally fucked disappeared because of me getting crippled. People will talk your fucking ear off, "Oh they weren't your real friends then." Who are YOU to tell ME who my real friends were? I'm here to say that people are not infallible and sometimes people just can't do it.
See, my own family has also been in that "not able to handle it" camp. I hope people would understand that that doesn't mean my family "doesn't REALLY love you." It's just that they're also mentally ill white trash and that's just the tough world I live in, ok?
So that's my gripe. It's not appropriate to tell people "They weren't really your friends if they fail you!" because it invalidates the fact that I did enjoy their friendship.
In the last two months I've made a few new friends. When I was younger I really hated this concept, but as an adult, I do actually think that
sometimes when your life changes radically, you just can't take everybody with you. I.e. if you move schools or jobs you just are going to lose all those buddies and that's just the way it works. So similarly, if your family member is murdered, or your house burns down, or you have a stroke, or something like that happens, one of the consequences will probably be losing people in your life, because they can't walk the spiritual path with you. Again, it doesn't mean they're evil, though. It sounds so evil when a woman is divorced by her husband and loses all her church friends because she gets breast cancer, but it happens all the time.
I was never a guy who got in a lot of fights or could sustain anger. I never raged at video games or stewed over things like you see people do. I was more of a sad person. Somehow between the ages of 18 and where I am now, I have drifted from being a "blue sad" person to the start of what I'd call resentfulness. I do get feelings of anger that last several hours and stay in the back of my mind as I feel a great tension and disappointment with getting crippled. I think a lot about how it's impacted my family's expectations of me, and the implications on how the next generation, like my nieces, nephews, and potential own children will see me. I really feel okay when I'm by myself and slowly get angry when I'm around people who don't understand. Even when they're literally little kids who "don't know better", I think, "This is horrible that this is who I am to them." And I feel angry at the world, just hanging out with friends and family.... not good. Not very Zen of me.
So, this is another new thing for me: When I was younger, it made me very angry to be around other people with health conditions. It's even part of why I got into lolcows, because I do like to laugh at clowns and freaks. I used to say I absolutely did not want to be associated or introduced to other disabled people.
I only wanted to be around people that I could look up to.
However, something switched in me. I randomly saw a youtube video of somebody in my situation who was married with kids. I recognized he knew things I didn't know about the way the world works. And I realized, "You have to learn how to be the cool, mentally stable disabled person from
other disabled people."
I realized the feelings of resentment totally go away if I'm around other disabled people and I should probably befriend them, even if "
nobody really understands." I have to just kinda suck it up and be humbled and recognize that in these groups,
these other people are generally wayyyy more successful and well-adjusted than me. I look up to them. It is
I who is the incompetent, maladjusted cripple, the thing I fear. And some of that I did to myself by trying to avoid these labels and people for so long.
I'm still so touchy I'm not even saying my diagnosis here because I don't want anybody to make comparisons or have some response that will get me in a neurotic thought spiral. I really don't want to share that piece, but I did want to share this "growing up" piece as I thought it might be useful to some other guy in his 20s.
I did actually see a counselor a few times recently (I have had so so so much talk therapy in my life- so none of the concepts are ever new, I don't need any more "tools for the mental toolbox"), but indeed I found it was actually just aggravating me and sending me into thought spirals. I really didn't find it therapeutic, not even in the sort of "oh tough love and you'll make it through the other side." Nah, it was just ineffective and pissing me off!-
not every mental problem should be addressed with talk counseling. God I wish people would get that.
This is my preemptive attempt to get people to not gently suggest I see a therapist as if the idea has never come to me.
I am not indicating a desire have somebody tell me my situation is valid enough to seek professional help. I am just stating my current internal situation in the hopes that it's relatable to somebody at some point in time. I will accept album suggestions at any time, though. I like Black Flag and Meatloaf.
will you get unemployment?
