Saturday, September 26, 2009

Taken for granted

I'd say on any "normal" day I think about the things that people take for granted as I watch people get out of cars, walk into buildings, etc. All this becomes more evident when I have an MS exaccerbation.

First, my thoughts can be doesn't anybody notice I'm having trouble (and am I that good at hiding it)? Doesn't anyone care? Doesn't anyone want to help? Of course I am told I need to ask for help and admit that I am bad at that, but what to ask for when is difficult. If I'm in the beginning of one of these attacks, and my husband leaves town, then who can help me when I fall repeatedly on the floor, when I am totally exhausted to the point of not really thinking of reaching out, but instead thinking of how to make it minute by minute, second by second, with a 6 year old daughter.

Going back to the taking things for granted, I sat there, exhausted, Fri evening, waiting for my husband to return from his day with my steroids. I sat there, and through tears, pondered it all. What do I want? I wish people would be grateful for the opportunity to get out of bed in the morning without wondering whether their legs would allow them to do so. I wish people would appreciate that choosing a physical outfit for the day is not a contemplation on whether they have enough energy to set it out the night before, or if they will have the energy in the morning, and whether they will fall in the process of doing so. I wish people would cherish the ability to carry an open coffee container into work while carrying 4 other bags. I wish people appreciated the ability to come home and make dinner without thinking of what they could make that would require the least amount of energy and still somehow be healthy. I wish people would realize how easy it is to get out of their car and walk someplace. I wish people who do not have a disability would not compare their fatigue to mine. I wish there was a way out there to ask for help before I notice that everything is going to hell. By the time I notice, I get on steroids and am almost past the help stage.

So to sum this whole rant, I wish people would notice when I'm struggling, I wish they would somehow think of some way to help, and I really wish people would not take so many simple things for granted.

Maybe, just maybe, there's hope in this quote from John F. Kennedy:
"Each time a person stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."

Some way, I believe God is in the mix of all of this. Right now, I'm not sure exactly where, but I do know he's there.

1 comment:

Lisa Emrich said...

I have thought some of these very same thoughts, especially the "why doesn't anybody see that I need help?" But then, I so often feel like I don't want anybody to know that I need help. Very strange contradiction.

Hope you begin to feel much better soon.