Hi everyone! Yes I’m still here although you’d never know it with how frequently I’ve been writing! I’ve been trying to get to posting but things are crazy right now and I’m trying to stretch myself in ten different directions. Never in a million years did I think that my advocacy efforts would take off in this way but they are. In a couple of weeks we will be holding CRPS Awareness Day(Nov.2) again and I’m happy to say that after only one year we are finally making a impact. Its been a really long road to get to this point but I’m positive that we are taking baby steps to create change!
As usual my health has been up and down one minute I feel good and the next I feel like I’ve been hit by a train! To give you all an update I’ve been dealing with a lot of extra pain in my neck and back as of late that’s been setting off flare ups with my CRPS. I’m working with my neurologist and team of care givers to figure all of this out. We don’t know a lot at this point however I am undergoing some testing. For the time being I’m putting all the tools I use to manage this illness into place in order to help me deal with the pain. With any luck I won’t need more surgery down the road. All I can really do at this point is pray and trust that God gives me the answers.
There’s no use in letting all of this drag me down because that’s not the way I live my life! I’m not sure if you ever truly wrap your head around everything that happens with a diagnosis of CRPS. God can however so I just give Him all the hard stuff to figure out! Yup this disease and everything it puts you through sucks! Without a doubt it will test you more than you ever thought possible! Sometimes however life doesn’t play by the rules and there isn’t much you can do about that. In a past post I said that living with CRPS was like climbing Mount Everest, you encounter storm after storm and at times trying to make it to the summit seems pretty much impossible. In my head I kept getting stuck halfway up the mountain as I was battered by storm after storm. For the longest time I felt as if I was pinned down by these storms as one after the other tried to knock me off the side of the mountain.
Honestly I really feel as if the weather has cleared and now I can keep climbing to get to the summit but its going to take work and determination to get myself there. For all I know there’s another storm around the corner. The will to push on has to come from within and that is something that can only come from me or you! When you find yourself up against storm after storm it can be easy just to turn around heading back down the mountain in defeat!
I know this message might seem a bit repetitive but I can’t stress enough about how much “you” the person dealing with chronic illness play a roll in getting better! You might be saying to yourself right now “but I can’t get better because I have no cure” however I don’t believe for a minute that you can’t. So why is it that there is no cure for CRPS yet I can feel so much better compared to when all of this began? Without a doubt the main reason is because I’ve asked for God’s help to navigate me through all of this. There were storms that I had to weather and it would have been impossible to get through them without His guidance. Did it mean that it made the storm easy to get though? No! Some of those storms have been the toughest things I’ve ever had to ride out in my life. What you need to take away is that God often has us walk through things like this to build strength or courage, and to learn certain things about ourselves.
I guess my question to you is this! Are you willing to do the work it takes to continue the journey and reach the top? Or are you going to turn and head back down the mountain? Its a hard place to be in and trust me when I say that I understand the fear of being stuck and all alone on the side of that mountain. Although you really aren’t alone because God hears your every thought! You just have to ask yourself are you willing to receive the help? I guarantee that He will help you on that climb but what I can’t guarantee is what that path might look like. So are you confused yet?
What I’m trying to say is that I can’t tell you what the rest of your journey is going to look like. You might have to deal with some stuff or go through a few more storms because God doesn’t tell us that everything is going to be easy all the time. What I can tell you is that a peace and strength has been restored in my life that I can’t even begin to understand! All you have to do is ask!
