Today is labor day! My plans: I'm going to sew, and get as much as I can done on this one cassok job that has been giving me nothing but stress since the day I got it. I've had a hard time focusing on numbers and such lately and the job is pretty much a design job which I WAY underbid...sigh. I have to make so many customizations on the pattern that I just don't feel like doing....I need to get my brain in gear for it and "git er done" as we say here in Kentucky.
The reason I'm pushing myself to sew is that I've been feeling pretty sick lately and that's not going to go away anytime soon. I want to get out from under my current pile-o-jobs and then stop sewing for a while. Heartbreaking, isn't it? But with the mono and the fibro and all that, I've gotten myself into such a BAD PLACE, physically, that I need to put myself on some sort of regimen to rebuild my fitness and my health. And that includes exercise and rest. And in order to exercise, I need to a) have time and b) fob off my other responsibilities such as house work onto the rest of the people who live here.
So, I must get the sewing done and then I'm going to actually pack away the sewing machine for a while...or maybe I won't. Maybe I can't bear to do that. But no more big jobs for awhile.
Meds: Going back on the Guaifenesin protocol for fibromyalgia. It bites, but it must be done.
And exercise: I'm not talking about any massive workouts. Oh no no! My level is to painfully walk A MILE, if I can without my muscles burning too badly (it's a fibro thing) and then perhaps end up in the exercise room for some gentle recumbent bike work. Level 2 resistance is minimal but gives my muscles a bit of something to do. Level 1 is merely movement with no resistance at all. I alternate between the two. That's what I did yesterday. I'll do it again today, and maybe a bit more. The whole point of fobbing off the house work is to get out there and do the "physical therapy" as I call it, without actually GOING to a physical therapist.
And diet: Back on the hypoglycemia diet to help control the upward slide that is my weight. It's so depression. The main difference though, is that this time I'm not going to get on the scale. I'm doing this to help my cholesterol levels, to help my pain levels (it really does help) and to manage my energy better. The hardest part is not having bread for breakfast and not having a glass of wine at night. I'll manage. At least for a time.
So, that's the other half of my life, other than the "dark night" stuff I wrote about.
Church is so weird these days. On the one hand I feel so disconnected, and on the other hand, people are so kind to us and say things like "don't leave, you are such a part of us". I don't get it. Perhaps my love receptors are broken. I think they are. I know they are. God have mercy on me a sinner.
And lastly...here's a video that nicely sums up my battle/lack of battle with "the passions". As a matter of fact, I often go round humming "Kill the passions, kill the passions" in the same tune as "kill da wabbit". I battle them, and then I end up falling in love with them again.
Comments
It's a battle to be among the living; it's a battle not to feel sorry for one's self; it's an uphill battle to get well again; and sometimes it's a battle just to resign oneself to God's bigger plan and accept the obvious and go with it: that the condition is chronic and means a different norm for the sufferer. My norm is severely limited to debilitation most days and it generally comes on the heels of having just been given a few days of reprieve from pain. It's a cycle that is sure to repeat and there seems no getting off the roller coaster.
I get tired of being sick; that is how most see me. "She's sick again", my children say. And not just my children but my husband and my church friends.
I wish I had the answers to how to respond; or for that matter, how to live with this. I'm no better with my own chronic illness after 5 years than I was when it all began. But I can certainly feel your heart when I read. I doubt that is much comfort to you but perhaps it's nice to know that there's one more cyber friend in this world who can completely identify with your inner struggle as well as your physical one.
I want to be well but it pleases God to leave me as I am. So the question for me is, How can I be of glory to God in the condition He has allowed me to live in? As long as it brings glory to Him, who am I to argue with His plans? I just wish I knew how to do this better. I give no glory to God when I'm miserable. But how do I live like this with the sincerity of one who is completely at His mercy and has surrendered?
Exactly! I think THE spiritual struggle towards God in this life of chronic illness is to do just that: give glory to God even when we are miserable. The sincerity is an act of the will and only happens by God's grace, I think.