I have been struggling writing this post on patience this month. The reason I am struggling with writing this is because I lack patience when it comes to me. I am impatience when it comes to my health. I am impatience with my body and the lack of things I cannot do anymore or could never do. I constantly compare myself to others or have had others compare me to themselves or others. You are not flexible enough. You are too fat. You are too tall. You are too messy. You are not a blonde therefore you can’t be sisters with her. Or my favorite you are a woman therefore you are not deemed worthy enough for God to do great things in your life. I was taught to not love myself because it was not Godly. It was evil to love yourself and who wants to be thought of as evil. I know these statements are not truth. Yet they are still engrained in my brain.
Here is what I am impatience about in myself:
- Having tiny veins that the RNs cannot thread the IV in so that makes it so that I have to have a port.
- Having to have a trach tube that I have to take out and clean out daily in order to breathe.
- Having to wear a thing around my neck so that I do not get a dry trach tube because when it gets dry the mucus plugs are thicker and harder to cough out.
- Having to talk like a robot
- Having to plan out everything in my life including when to take my medications, what to do every time I get up to get something done, or when at what time I get out in public to get my shopping done so that I am not exposed to covid-19
- Having to rethink and consider not having a tracheal dilation because the hospitals are over run with people with Covid-19 and I cannot get the vaccine for 6 months because of a certain medication that I have had to have injected in my veins recently.
I could make the list longer but that would take me forever to write it all out. The point is I am impatience with myself.
The second part is what does patience look like. Here is what it means to me; it means slowing down. Taking the time to listen to my body and not treating it like the enemy. It means noticing when I am hurting physically, mentally, and emotionally and allowing myself the breaks that I need. It means listening. It means allowing myself to move slowly even when I feel like a 100 year old woman in a 47 year old body. It means not being in a hurry all the time. It means not comparing myself to others who do not have the conditions I have. It is also not allowing them to compare me to themselves or to others. It is also not beating myself up continually when I am meet with disappoint in my medical journey or non-medical journey. It is being kind and respectful when I want to punch myself in the face or anyone else for that matter. It is accepting myself warts, pains, trach tube, and mucus flying queen that I am.
I am still working on all of this. What does patience look like for you?
Please wait...