Archive for the 'coping' Category

Jun 03 2009

Profile Image of Katie

Poetry From the Playground

I wrote this poem today as I waited for my daughter to get out of school.  Anyone who uses a wheelchair (or other mobility device such as a scooter) to get around will understand it.  If you don’t use a wheelchair, remember that in the chair sits a human being.

View From The Chair

You walk by me
As if I am not there.
My legs may not be strong
But my mind is.

These wheels do not shield
Me from the world.
They do not make me blind.
I see you as you pass me by.

My body reminds you
Of your own mortality.
Yours reminds me
Of my own.

You find temporary escape from truth
As you pretend I don’t exist.
Yet when you close your eyes
Mine are open wide.

91 responses so far

May 19 2009

Profile Image of Katie

Talking To Myself

It’s been a rough couple weeks around here in the fibromyalgia department.  It never fails.  Just when I think that I have at last found something that is really helping me and I start having visions of a semi-normal life… ding dong – big ol’ flare calling.  Man. Way to slam a girl down to earth you big kill joy of an illness.  hrumph.

When I cam back from France I was riding a wave of high energy.  The weather was so much better – so much dryer. Even though it rained part of the time, the atmosphere was less damp.  What an incredible difference it makes to how I feel.  I even took a few short walks!  Walks people!  I don’t take walks except a stumble from room to room in my house these days.  But in France I walked – for more than a few feet at at time!  That alone had me feeling like I could take on the world.  So when I came back I knew that it would be hard, I knew that I would have a post-holiday come down.  But I felt so good that I made a point to keep riding the wave of optimism and energy that I caught down there.  And for the first week or so I was able to keep it up.  I worked in the back garden, I worked in our allotment doing things I wouldn’t have believed I did if I didn’t know I did.  We had a party at our house over the May Bank Holiday weekend and I trotted around the place with only my walking stick and the occasional wobble.  Everyone said how good I looked, how great it was to see me up and about.  I agreed – I felt great! I celebrated what felt like a new beginning to something fantastic and exciting.

And then I crashed.  Hard.

In the weeks since I crashed it has been a struggle once more between my will and my body.  My will is intense and strong, and it is not at all pleased that my body is once again calling the shots, and the directive is: stay put and do nothing.  Not pleased at all.  So I pushed with all my might and in my best little engine voice cheered myself on as I struggled to get out of bed and do something – anything- to prove that I was not losing this battle.  I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.  I got back out to the allotment and dug in the dirt.  I sowed seeds and planted starts in their new beds.  Inspiration and visions came to me while I worked.  It was incredible and I felt that finally I knew how to live with this illness, that I had found that something I was looking for that would push me —-through—- the pain and into life.

But then I crashed. Even harder.

I didn’t get up this time.  I tried.  I got as far as the kitchen where I realized that making my breakfast -at 11:30 – was all that I could handle.  Even that was overwhelming. I ate and needed to go back to bed for a rest. By 1:00 I was flat out fast asleep.  Woke up at 5:00 (yes, that is a 4 hour nap) only to eat and crawl back in bed where I fooled myself into feeling like I did something by putzing around the internet. And so it has been for the past week.  Me sleeping late, doing nothing, and sleeping some more.  My body aches and screams when I push it each time I climb the stairs.  My own personal Everest those stairs are.  But no one is cheering when I get to the top.  Just me, letting out an exhale of relief that it’s only flat ground until I reach my bed.

This is a downer of a post.  I know, and I apologize.  It’s posts like these which I avoided writing for so many months while I have been neglecting this blog.  I promise I won’t write too many of them.  I do believe that I have found that special thing that is needed to keep me going forward and living with this illness, living with this body and not fighting against it.  Part of that is being honest though. Honest about my joy, about my struggles and honest about my victories as well as my failures.  They are all important. They are all me.  They are all divine and they all keep me crafty – looking for a new way to do things, creating a life worth talking about.  Even if I am just talking to myself.

47 responses so far

Apr 30 2009

Profile Image of Katie

Back Indeed!

Back to the same bad habits it seems.  If not posting to my blog is counted as a bad habit!

I know there are a few of you who stop by in hopes of finding something new, only to leave shaking your head in dissappointment.  I appreciate your loyalty and want you to know that I hear your knocking and I am not ignoring you.  It is just that I get distracted on the way to answer the door.  Countless times a day I think to myself “I should blog about this.”  only to be squashed by the giant killjoy in my head that says “Not now, do it later. And only if you can make it really interesting.  Which it won’t be.  So don’t bother.”  Either that or the trickster will fool me into thinking I am too busy to stop and write.  Because refreshing facebook again to see what my friends’ Top 5 Favorite Pickle Flavors are is top priority, you know.

I don’t really have anything in particular to write about today, but since I have been trying to get my twitter list going and realized that I had linked this site from my twitter that I should either get things going again or consider abandoning it all together.  Not being able to stomach the thought of abandoning it all together I am here now – babbling about nothing.  Hoping that this little babble will turn into more babble and that more babble will be able to silence (or at least babble louder than) the ‘voices’ (don’t worry, they aren’t real.  Not all of them anyway. ;)  )  and maybe even I might start writing for real again.

What I do know is that I will never post a “I’m back” post again because doing so is a guaranteed assurance that I will not actually resume posting.  So let this be my first official “I’m not back” post.  If I prove myself wrong by actually writing then hooray for me and reverse psychology.  If I don’t, well then – I told you so.  I’m not back.

96 responses so far

Jun 24 2008

Profile Image of Katie

It never fails:The pre-holiday making madness

I do this every time. No matter where I am going or how long I am staying, during the time when travel is imminent I get an unstoppable urge to make stuff. I thought that I would get past it this time because I have just not been feeling up to doing too much sewing wise and normally it is a pre-trip sewing frenzie when I realize I have no travel clothes. I had already decided to do some *gasp* shopping when I got stateside since the exchange rate is well in our favor. (I am thrifty as well as crafty. ) Yes, I thought – this will be the trip where I just casually stroll over to my closet and effortlessly select a few simple items. I would relax before this trip.

It was with great amusement that I found myself making this yesterday. Because I needed it. Now.

chinese lantern set

I made it to go with this dress:

IMGP3669

Which by itself is a great idea and it will look stunning. But when you consider that I have had the dress for 2 years (though it didn’t fit properly until recently since I have lost weight) and I have had the beads for nearly a year, the folly of it becomes apparent. It wasn’t until I was struck once more with a bout of pre-holiday making madness that made to order jewelry became an imperative. It is oddly reassuring that everything is right on track, and despite being far from where I had hoped to be physically for this trip my old habits and routines have survived in tact. I am thankful that I have creative outlets for diffusing stress and energy. I know I should probably be trying to be more still and reserving my energies for the upcoming journey, but truthfully I think if I were to try and sit still I would waste way more effort fighting the urge to be active than I would just surrendering to it.

The big blue beads were brought back last year by a friend from her summer in India. She gave me a beautiful silk bag filled with gorgeous glass and stone beads. The small pink and green beads were purchased on our trip to Barcelona last year. I love the idea that I took beads from other travels and used them to make something to wear in a time of traveling.

Tomorrow I am going to be doing some long over due showering of love to some of my most recent finds and favorites in the web world these days. I’ve made some great new discoveries, like Barb over at Craft Therapy, who is not only a fellow crafter but is after my heart with a blog by that name! She gave me an award last week and its my time to give some of my own out. So be sure to stop by tomorrow when I share some Divinely Crafty Finds!

30 responses so far

Older Posts »