June 21, 2011

It has been awhile since I’ve written in my blog. Since the last time you’ve heard from me, I have had an anniversary. Not a wedding anniversary, but the 4th anniversary of my illness. So much has happened in my life since then. I can hardly believe it was 4 years ago that I got sick. I don’t let myself think about that time very often because it was such a scary time in my life, but recently in a Body Talk session I was told I was carrying a lot of grief; grief for the loss of my good health. I was also told I needed to release that grief. The practitioner explained that I had put on a positive face with my illness, which wasn’t a bad thing, but in the process I hadn’t let myself grieve what I had lost. Since then I have allowed myself to feel the loss of my good health and have released a lot with some good crying sessions. I am now ready to write about it and share with you in the hopes this exorcise will help with my grieving process. It might take a few blogs to get through it so please bear with me.

In 1907, the day my husband took me to the hospital, I was feeling fairly positive on the drive to the city. I had been sick for a couple of months and was looking anorexic, not having been able to keep food down for weeks. My family doctor hadn’t been able to discover what was causing my symptoms but my latest blood work showed that my kidneys were in trouble. At that point I thought I had a kidney infection and the problem would be resolved after a visit to a specialist and maybe a prescription. It wasn’t that simple.

At the hospital they poked and prodded and asked all kinds of questions. They too were stumped. They told me that my kidneys had failed but they didn’t know why. I now realized that something was seriously wrong with me. It was at this point that I felt the first stirring of fear. That kind of fear feels a bit like an out of body experience. I laid there hearing the doctors and nurses but it was like they were far away, a bit like turning the volume down on the T.V. to where you have to strain to hear it. I felt a burning ball in my stomach. I wanted to cry but couldn’t: (Writing about this has me crying right now though!). I remember looking over at my husband and son who were sitting beside my bed. The look on there faces reflected my concern. Everything went into slow motion.

It’s funny the things you think about at those times. My mom had passed away a few months before and it crossed my mind that it was good this didn’t happen when she was alive because she would have been so worried. At this point it crossed my mind that I might be joining her. I was very scared by now.

The doctors put me on emergency dialysis by attaching a small plastic tube in through my jugular and out through my chest with a couple of ports on the end. This tube became my life line and 3 times a week, 4 hours at a time they attached the tube in my body to a machine that removed the blood from my body, filtered the toxins out of the blood and then put it back into me. These treatments made me feel better than I had felt in months but at the same time they made me feel like hell! I found that whole process very hard but it was keeping me alive and so I was grateful for the opportunity.

After a week of my staying in the hospital, of testing and getting no answers, the doctors finally did a kidney biopsy and that is when they discovered the P Acnu Vasculits that had destroyed my kidneys. The day they delivered my diagnosis was another day of extreme fear, although I tried my best to not let it show. My husband and daughter who were in the room at the time, were also trying not to show their fear and while we all tried to be strong for the other, each of knew that our lives were about to change. This was uncharted territory for us and we would have to take baby steps to learn how to deal with what lay ahead. That day when the doctors sat on the edge of my bed delivering “the news”, I remember very clearly looking them straight in the eye and asking if they were giving me my death sentence. Let me tell you I was very relieved when they said no, and I then asked what I could do to make it better. I didn’t cry then either, got to keep on that brave face come hell or high water!

That is where my healing journey began; starting with a book my daughter brought me called, The Secret. I have come a long way since then. I have a long way to go. Here I am 4 years later and I am finally at a point where I can release all this. That isn’t to say I’m not scared anymore; I have my moments. I still wear the brave face but I do take the time to work on letting go of all the emotions and beliefs systems attached to an illness in a healthy way.

I have attracted so much help along the way, in mainstream science, alternative sciences, and people from ordinary walks of life and in the many books about balancing your life that I read. I have taken a long look at disease and realize I was very naïve about where it came from and its causes. After much thought and reading and discussion, I now believe it doesn’t just appear because you breathed in chemicals etc, etc; it manifests from someplace deeper than that. I have noticed that even though we have come a long way in the health care world, we have more disease than we ever had. It has occurred to me that we will always have disease in our life until we deal with the real root of it. The doctors fixed me for the time being with medicines and surgery but I’m kidding myself if I think that’s all there is to it. In one way it would be easier because I wouldn’t have to do so much soul searching and I wouldn’t have to take responsibly for my health. But that would only hold the wolf at the door for a while and the next time things would most likely be much worse. The universe keeps giving you nudges until you pay attention, small at first and then with much more impact. I will take heed. I believe it is up to me to dig deep and work out the why of it so that I can live a future free of disease.

Until next time, take care.