Shifting boundaries

One night, I, once again, dream of death; a repeating theme lately. I am waiting for several people to die, and they seem to take ages to do so.  Slowly, they slowly turn into brownish-grey mud beings. I stand aside, witnessing it, left desolate.

It reminds me of a sentence I once read, “Now, in the middle of the journey of my illness, I am left alone and defenceless.”(1)

A realisation pops up that the dying people are part of me; the old me, from whom I want to detach, release or transform. As I am not totally ready to do so, in the dream I feel an uncomfortable sense of guilt towards them, as if I am betraying them. Letting them die seems as if they were not good enough, as if the old me maybe was not good enough? I have to tell them that they were, at the time, but that now I no longer need what they stand for: qualities of my pre-illness past, like impatience, direct sharp communication, and the multi-tasking workaholism. Let those qualities serve other people now.

Time for some homework it seems, as I then dream I am being forced into a gloomy cellar to clean the incredible filthy steps descending before me; a horrible task I have been given to undertake. Finally, after finishing it, I discover an old squeaking door in the cellar, which brings in fresh air and light. What a relief!

My old organisational skills are well placed to open new doors, I think. I would like to invite and integrate a new me, new personalities, as a gift on this journey of illness. Dissimilar to the old me in many ways. Not only physically older, but also wiser, with more experience on the inner. This physical condition teaches me new boundaries to what I can do, and can no longer. At other times, it forces me even to give up all limits and borders, depending on the shifting sands of my energy. It teaches me compassion, patience and slowing down, in fact a lot of slowing down. Taking this in, I realise I now want to live with an evolved set of boundaries, whether I am ill or healthy.

(1) from  The Alchemy of Illness,1993, by Kat Duff

Blog 43,  © text and photo: Adriana Sjan Bijman, March 2016

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Illness: Dark & Light

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