When you have lived with chronic illness for many years you become rather adept at forging a new you. You realise that you can no longer do many of the things you used to do so you stop, and start doing things differently. Illness changes you, and chronic illness is akin to a process of chronic change.
There's a major shift in how you view yourself too. I often mourned for the person I was when my body was whole and healthy. I missed who I was. Recent events in my life have caused me to shift from the core of who I had always thought I was, shaping me into someone I do not quite know how to appreciate just yet.
Life shattering events do this. It's like being in a cauldron, and the dross has risen to the surface. You work hard at removing the dross from within the cauldron, constantly aware that more is being produced. When the refining process is over you're poured out into a mould but it's a new shape. A new you, forged in the fires of life's difficult seasons.
Today, on my morning walk, the thought came to me that I must stop mourning for the me that is lost and gone. I will never be the same person I once was. I must accept who I am now and look forward to who I will become. The old me died.
While illness limited the things I could do, deep pain, hurt and grief affected the way I felt about life and everything in it. I think of the years I spent in that cauldron, fighting change, and now I realise it is a better me poured out into a newer mould.
The idea of a mould seems to imply being set in one's ways, however, and I realise that life is filled with a series of cauldron type events that change us forever. In recovery mode from my last cauldron, I just hope that I get to understand who I am and how I truly feel about so many things before any other cauldron events. I need space and time to heal, and to come alive again.
Finding my way slowly, and hoping I can love the new me better than I loved the old me. For one thing... the new me isn't tip toeing through the tulips playing nice any more or trusting anybody naively or believing in everlasting anything. Nothing lasts forever. Nothing. Change is the only constant. Cauldrons are good things, learn to embrace the heat. Don't get too comfortable in your freshly minted mould, Pav. Be kind to yourself, and love yourself. The truth is, nobody else really will. That's life.
Thanks for reading,
Pav
5 days ago
