You Can Succeed In Life

RE: RE: You Can Succeed In Life

Submitted by Gretchen on Sun, 2005-01-23 - 18:09

Thank you for sharing your poem. It says so much of what I also believe but it did take me some "trials" to get there.I know now I've had life long E but didn't know it. I thought I was weird, sometimes nuts my entire life. I posted elsewhere my mother had me treated for 10 months for generalized epilepsy when I was 7, was concerned about the discriminatory practices towards E's in the 50's, I'm 56, and insisted it be called "hyperkinicity" aka ADHD but the doctor's notes states mother insists general epilepsy is hyperkinicity. Both conditions were treated wth phenobarbitol. I don't blame her. She had a maybe misguided attempt to protect her daughter from the practices towards E's of that era. Then she removed me from pheno and all the weirdies of my life came back. I remember the medicine taking away odd sensations, remember them disappearing by taking white pills, remember them all coming back when I quit taking them enough I sought my old childhood medical records a few years ago. Still she took that knowledge to her grave. I never knew, she knew, I had epilepsy. I don't know what she thought epilepsy was. When I was 17 my father developed severe epilepsy but I wonder now if she saw symptoms in him long before that, thus in me too. 6 years ago I was diagnosed with full blown, and it is severe epilepsy. My father was deceased by then. My son was born with it, then one of his daughters, I found two cousins in Sweden who have it too, and suddenly my family clearly had inherited epilepsy with many members effected. I had secrets thoughts my family was having the plague. I have a very large family too, so the implication for the uneffected others is a heavy unspoken burden of worry for us al. It certainly is for me and particularly since my 9 daughters are of child bearing age and of my 3 g-children now, one does have epilepsy. But many of my daughters are adopted, in this case thankfully.I was a high energy, high achiever type person all of my life. I was at the apex of my career I had scrabbled and earned to reach and making some major bucks. I earned that. Epilepsy didn't care. My husband and I worked hard throughout all our adult years. I really don't remember a time I worked just one job, had 11 children, lost one, we spent, but we saved too. Had a good retirement going. Invested in valuable civil war antiques over many years. We were SET! I thought. Then, in a month he had quintuple coronary artery bypass surgery, other dire diagnoses, I exploded with epilepsy on the second day of this finally obtained lifetime career sought job that my employer allowed me to construct, with my own budget, autonomy, high salary, and it all went to pieces. Neither of us were employed then, thus no health ins. unless you can pay $600 premiums for COBRA, with no income and I can easily say the very nice cushion we thought we had went very rapidly. When a person is paying a lot of money for up front health care and no money is coming in, savings, retirements, eventually pawned off antiques collected over a life time? Eventually anything we could pawn. All the savings, possesions, evaporated. We became homeless for 7 months. Don't gasp. That is not the worst experience of my life. I found out most homeless are not dirty old men living under a bridge in a paperboard house. We met some terrific and eclectic people. Some are still treasured friends. We stopped and smelled all those flowers but never had time to before. It wasn't a priority back then either. Surprisingly I had terrific experiences I wouldn't have taken the time for or felt I had no time, perhaps I really didn't. I can't remember now. But? I don't want to ever go through it again. It was extremely hard and a total different way to try and live. My health went to he** in a hand basket. I found out hunger physically hurts. Trying to launder clothes without money for a laundromat at first seemed impossible until I learned from other homeless how to use a little soap and sand. I hadn't been to a laundromat for so many years I didn't even know how much they cost. I, of course, had a home, my own w/d. Suddenly I'm hand scrubbing clothes with soap/sand, on a flat rock by the river? It felt like living in mists and mirrors, often. Fishing for our own food didn't seem impossible, it was practical, and free. Having no stove to cook fish with wasn't impossible, we learned how to build camp fires and let the wood settle to simmering coals. Sleeping outside and looking up at the sky for sometimes hours I found out there are an impossible amount of stars. I never realized how many stars were in the sky. Before I only took passing glances to the night sky to check out the weather, never star gaze. Well? We learned survival skills. Too many to mention. I developed a new respect for myself eventually too. It was truly a sink or swim situation. I chose to swim. Impossible things became not only possible, but often enjoyable, confidence boosting and I do take pride in learning many things I never would have knwn to do, and surviving that and showing those naysaying doctors it was not impossible for me to live without walls. That raised my self esteem, finally drug me out of the depression I was in. Doctors said I'd have to enter an assisted living facility. I never considered that. I'm glad.I did learn this from that experience and it is now something I've tried to share with a few others although anyone has to be receptive to new concepts I think, to embrace them and so far I've found few who want to hear this, maybe they're not ready to hear it too, but it's a credo I now live by. What I found out was a new definition for the word ***Impossible***. That strong word took on a new meaning. Many previously impossible thought things became a choice, usually, a challenge. I found many things are doable with ingenuity, elbow grease and determination. Impossible became too - A theory. Only a concept. Not always a fact. In many situations "impossible" was as strong and directing to me, as I let it be.My doctors told me I couldn't live homeless. We thought it'd be a few weeks, it stretched to a few months and finally to 7 months, but I not only lived? I thrived, grew, expanded who I was and had many delightful moments. Can I share an example of one of my magical moments, homeless? It was murderously hot that summer and we spent a lot of time in the beautiful Arkansas River cooling off and one day while floating in the river I saw a small little head coming from the far bank, swimming towards me. This is a river of beavers and otters and I couldn't decide which one was that small little head, struggling so hard to reach me against a strong current. A little head bobbing back and forth barely above water line with such determined effort. I dove under water to see what animal this was, and to such a surprise to me - it was my kitty! She was growing, expanding herself too and decided to take her first swimming steps. Total determination to reach me, because she wanted to, and she decided that she could. Her little legs were going every which way under the water. Her beginning attempts at swimming and house cats don't like water "they" say? Who says? Who knows so much about any of our potentials? I had such pride for her brave decision, hard work, determination. Her head barely above water line. It was a long journey for her. Sometimes she would go under for a second, struggling against the current of that river but she made it to me because she didn't consider it impossible, I could see that, hard, not impossible. After that maiden voyage of hers, we became river partners. I realized later I never doubted she'd make it, and I didn't offer to help her. It was very hard for her, especially that first time, and she obviously had fear, but she didn't turn around and go back either. She had choices to go in either direction. She decided to make it to me, not turn back. She deserved that chance to succeed. I let her struggle, and have her successive. She'd swim out to me often after that and perch on my head and a shoulder and we'd float in the river together. One day a small green water snake floated to us and rested on my other shoulder. I felt such wonder and awe at this entire impossible scene in my life I would have never thought I'd experience, it felt not of my world, impossible, but it wasn't impossible, it was an occurrence. Before tha time in my life? I would have rushed to my kitty's rescue, not let her stretch her boundaries, screamed and shoved the snake off of me, and missed that now treasured moment - of the impossible. I learned many things to stop and enjoy, appreciate. What I described is one of my really special memories I would have felt impossible to occur, any of it, before we metamorphsed. We were learning new things about life, living differently, because we had to, we were homeless. It is has changed my entire way of looking at life, at myself, and others. "Impossible"? That word couldn't have a place in my life then or I wouldn't have made it. The word, definition to me of "Impossible" became instead just another challenge. I realized a self defeating out look in many things, all those before thought "impossibles", certainly not all situations and I know there has to be realism, were not "Impossible". That word I realized can become one of the most self defeating, pessimistic thoughts I could have. What some thought for me would be impossible, homelessness with my health, wasn't. What were my options? It was hard, but not impossible. "Impossible" things I had considered all my life were only as "Impossible" as I allowed them to be. I had to change with my circumstances. It was a choice I realized later. Sink or swim thought my kitty, and so must I. Believe many things pr impossible, or challenge the theory?I've said it before, will say it again, it takes grit to have epilepsy and all of it's ramifications. We are very tough people and often that toughness of us all too creates an empathetic softness towards others. In some, unfortunately it creates bitterness, and I've had that too. I will never again be able to think of many things as "Impossible" now and while I've always been one to push the envelope, I realized how important it was for me to defeat the mind set of - this is impossible. I've tested the theory that "Impossible" is often a state of mind, self defeating opinion. I don't succeed at all I attempt, but I don't consider that failure now, at least I did try, and that to me is success because I didn't start out assuming it was "Impossible". I don't like to admit this but I was a shallow person in some ways than I want to think about before I got this. My life's goals were very materialistic. My life's goals were often based on what the Jone's were doing. The competitive life of suburbia no longer exists for me yet we're now living in a nice place, my husband is in a nice job and I'm now on disability. It didn't seem we'd ever get out of our homeless position as each month presented a new set of problems to overcome, to gain housing, and it grew tedious, frightening but it wasn't impossible. I learned to adopt more patience too. Epilepsy has taken things from me. More than I could ever willingly give up, but it's given too. One is a realization of how much farther I can go to survive, a new type of inner strength I had to develop and "impossible" is often as "impossible" as I allow it. I like that change in me. It's liberating, not confining.