This game of awareness is very intricate, nuanced. The hidden grace of suffering so difficult to coax out of pain with any lasting clarity.
I arrived in Vermont on the 17th, a day after my birthday which was surely the best day of the year for me, overjoyed by how epic and surprising and magical it was, surrounded by people I love, co-creating a celebration that was so special and multidimensional. The first day at my parents I woke up violently ill. Vomiting the majority of the day, with cycles of diarrhea, my usual back pain amplified to the point of constant throbbing. Around my 7th time vomiting, Audrey had left the house to go for a walk because every time I went to the bathroom, violent purging echoed throughout the house. As I’m kneeling in front of the toilet in that awfully beautiful place, where I feel so nauseated in every cell of my body, but on the threshold of the after-vomit release, bringing some light heartedness to this mess, I yell to my dad in the other room, “Fire in the hole!” I explode, stumble into bed and within minutes the nausea creeps back in, and I’m faced with the decision to lay in that half bearable place of doing nothing, or pounding some more water in cycles so I can rid my body of this terror as quickly as possible.
“Do you want some Advil or Tylenol?” My mom peeks in as I’m lying in bed too dizzy and weak to do anything but lay there in dark agony.
“No.” I muster. “I don’t want to thwart my body’s healing process.”
Later that night as my throat is raw, lined with traces of stomach acid, my body empty and barren of vitality, the nausea finally drifted away, and then I couldn’t help but relieve myself with some Tylenol, and appreciated every second of the pain killing properties as I fell into a decent but disrupted unconscious escape.
The next day I slowly gained a little appetite back, and continued the long string of moments of not being able to do much of anything but breathe. Trying to be as neutral as I can. It’s just passing show.
In the evening I gently crawl into the bath, and minutes after it is all full, an impending nausea starts growing rapidly. The water is too hot. I feel sick, and I don’t want to puke in the bathtub. In a daze, the water drains and I stand up to spray some cold water all over my body, and a dizziness overtakes me so completely that I fall to my knees, in a sudden state of panic, I feel that I’m losing consciousness. Uncontrollable fear takes over and I find myself desperately crying out to the Universe for help. The icy cold water brings me back into a semi conscious state, as my whole body tingles on the edge of blacking out. I manage to focus on the task of exiting the bathroom and taking a hard right to my room. I stumble into bed, body soaked, in water and calm relief.
A few days later as some of my strength returns, I wake up to a nagging headache and a strange tension in my right eye. It progressively gets worse, swelling grows, little red veins spread throughout my eye, puss oozes out of both sides, and an uncomfortable heaviness pulses around my eye socket.
I ride it out. Continue to enjoy quality family time regardless. Day by day my eye gets worse, and then as fate would have it, a dry scratchy feeling slowly envelopes my left eye, I look in the mirror and see red veins creeping towards my pupils, like mycelium traveling through shiny white soil.
My right eye is almost completely shut it’s so swollen and inflamed, and now my left eye wants to bring in some equilibrium, I guess.
A few more days of no improvement so my Dad takes me to the hospital. The doc prescribed some antibiotic eye creme, which is all I wanted. The nurse, squeezing some of the jelly out under my eyelid, my eye now takes on the new role of a skillet on broil, searing this creme into my pus soaked and inflamed inner eye. This stuff is so harsh it dries up my eyeballs like juicy grapes that somehow fell into the Mojave desert at noon in the middle of Summer, transformed into dry old crackly raisins instantaneously. My vision is fuzzy for a few hours. I joke to my Dad on the way home, “so this is what your vision is like aye?”
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. Bring my awareness into my body. Be with the sensations.
Another day of some prime skillet work from my eye, followed by more trips to the Mojave desert, and here I am. My right eye is finally inching in the direction of homeostasis, and my left eye, well, that’s debatable.
Soon before going to bed tonight, I feel the internal temperature of my body heating up, a slight nausea, and deep fatigue. I press a hand to my forehead. I have a fever... again. Whooptie-fuckin-doo.
As I lay in bed I unconsciously grab my phone, looking for a distraction from my back pain that is starting to flare up, half shut blood shot eyes, and an inner volcano of heat rising quickly. I know with this fever I may not be able to fall asleep for an hour or more, unless I take some Advil. I pause, remembering something I wrote in my journal a few days ago,
“Feel all your feelings, acknowledge them, and always remind yourself of your wholeness. Don’t buy into the ego trip of thinking you need to fill the void.”
I then place my phone back where it was, sinking into all the sensations of the moment. Anyone that has been around me the last 19 months, knows that at times I can be restless due to ruthless back pain, to the point where I’m constantly moving around, stretching, elevating my legs, changing positions, trying to find relief. In bed I set an intention out load of “finding some peace and equanimity in the discomfort.”
As I tossed and turned, deepening my breath, letting go of trying to change anything, my body relaxed. Bits of resistance flared up here and there, but I sunk into it. My body vibrated and tensed up, and then I exhaled. Tears streamed down my face, sounds of a deeply distraught human oozed out me, emotional pain finding expression through the liquid. I’ve been so controlled by pain for so many months that I don’t know how to perceive it in a more positive light. I don’t know how to not feel disempowered by the heaviness of daily pain. Even though I want to believe that everything I’m experiencing is for the highest good of my evolution and the evolution of All, and I will find a way through this, a part of me just can’t accept that as truth. It’s too bleak. The road too rugged and barren.
I feel like a walking paradox.
A deeply wounded healer.
I share this to help the pain find the expression it needs in the moment.
I’d prefer it if you would leave your sympathies somewhere else. Thank you ♥️ and thanks for taking the time to read this saucy peace of suffering.
