I am living in the twilight, in the middle of
a journey. The door of the past — with its healthy body in a very busy life—
has been closed and it is not clear where the road will take me.
“Illness is a simple though painful reminder
that we are not the masters of our bodies and our lives” writes Kat Duff (1).Illness
is a humbling experience and as such I think, can bring some gifts in disguise.
Insights wrapped up as setbacks, in the Game of Life.
After seven months of gradually increasing
symptoms, discomfort and pains, instead of a slow or quick recovery, I have to
accept and learn to live with this, like many people with long term illnesses
have to. It has turned my life upside down, thrown me out of my comfort zone
and the fulfilment of a hardworking busy life. It makes me stand apart, in
another category, that of the ill, the weak, the elderly, the non-productive.
It is a different journey. It feels like that, even here, in a community on a
spiritual base, where most people always seem to be so busy and often are on
the edge of being burned out, trying to do so well, to save the world or at
least save our community. Or simply trying to earn a living and be able to
control the ongoing incoming stream of bills. Like I did over the last decades.
At first this big change brought up feelings
of tension, guilt and questioning “Why me?” Feeling a bit of a victim. At times
I even blamed myself for it from the point of view of certain schools of
psychology, that ‘with our thoughts we create our own reality’, so why did I
create this? And why can’t I now immediately create a healthy body. It is easy
to stumble into that pitfall of being at fault and responsible for illness
ourselves. These thoughts are absolutely not helpful to me now. It does not
mean I am not willing to look at a deeper personal cause of what my body is
doing and how I can help to get out of this predicament; how to make my journey
towards a better life. How I can make peace with the symptoms. How we can
become allies instead of enemies and how we can start to work for the same
goal. For me a goal of balance.
Since I was a young girl, my whole life has
been an experience of learning how to have and maintain independence. Although
I now know we all are inter-dependent, it is a tough journey to learn to ask
for help. I can already feel grateful for and see the advantages of newly
learned qualities like patience and slowing down. The ‘being dependent’ and
compassion are in progress, so to speak. I’ve always been a multi-tasker, a
quick thinker and doer. Slowing down, especially to prevent more accidents with
my vertigo-dizziness and only partial eyesight, makes me clumsy. I walk like a
drunken sailor. Out of doors with crutches, for my own safety. Constantly
having to balance myself is exhausting but also contains the lesson of
balancing the way of life. How to bring more balance into my, our lives? How to bring some light in the
darkness? The light of keeping up my spirit, my hope, my goals of renewed good
health.
Simple but at times exhausting survival
activities like washing, getting dressed, shopping nearby and cooking easily
fill my days, next to time to rest.
”How did I ever have time to work?” I grin and wonder. Too tired to pick
up a pen or pencil during the daytime, texts like this only come in the
sleepless dark hours of the night, scribbled on and in between the lines, which
I can hardly distinguish. It does not matter: I recognised the words and pass
them on to you here, as part of my journey. On my way to more light.
© text and photo: Adriana Bijman. photo in the bus at the A96 to Inverness, along the Moray First Coast, 2015.
(1) The Alchemy of Illness, 1993 p 59.
Blog 42, Winter 2015/2016
