Saturday, September 2, 2017

Article 3 : Living With A Chronic Illness

If you feel like a worthy person, you will have a reason to stay alive. Know that you are a worthy person; no matter what anyone says. You are worthy to enjoy the best life that you can under your circumstances. I am worthy of having my husband come in and talk to me for 30 minutes in the evening instead of watching television. I am worthy of a telephone call “I’ve been thinking about you. Is there anything I can do for you?” When I ask my husband to knock a nail in the wall (because I can’t do it myself anymore) or any other thing you need (and our needs are small – we are fully aware that we are asking a favour) – we are worthy of it being done. Surely we do not have to ask 5 times until we sound like we are nagging? This is written by a woman, but I am aware that many men also have the same problems although their needs may be different from a woman’s needs. We are worthy of asking our partners to please go to the chemist to buy our nappies we need. We are worthy human beings. Being chronically sick does not make you less important than healthy human beings.

I read a book written by Paul C Roud, called Making Miracles. It was an eye-opener of note. He was interviewing a woman who had been given 3 months to live and this was 10 years later. The interviewee said, “It’s ironic, but my sister and brother were jealous of me, jealous of all the attention I got: My sister admitted to me that she hated my guts because so much of my mom’s time was spent on me”. Well, that is what happened to me too. I wrote about it in my book Shattered. And these are not children – they are adults.

I loved the story I read in his book about the woman who came home from the doctor with bad news on her cancer. Her husband was lying on the couch and the first thing he said to her was “What’s for supper”. The next morning, she packed her cardboard suitcase with her clothes, took the little housekeeping money she had, climbed on a bus and checked into a boarding house. The next day she went to the lawyer and asked him to get her a divorce. When he asked her why she said, “I have been living with that man for 38 years. If I only have three months to live, then I want it to be a happy three months’. Her interview with Dr. Roud also took place ten years after that bad diagnosis. My advice is to do whatever it is that will make you happy. Don’t worry about what other people say – it actually is none of their fucking business.