I Made It Through the Winter

WAHOO! I made it through the winter. Believe me when someone tells you you may only have six months to live, living a year is a very big deal. I saw the pulmonologist who was shocked at how well I was. I'm working with one lung but that's much better than they initially expected. You have to be below 50% lung capacity to even be considered for a transplant. I feel like I spent the entire winter trying to climb out of a deep well and now I've finally got my fingers on the edge and may be able to actually pull myself out soon. First, all jokes aside, let's hear it for Prozac. It has literally been a life saver for me. It ain't easy when you're feeling suicidal and there are two, count 'em two high bridges within walking distance of your house. So to avoid the bridges I spent most of my time curled up in my bed watching DVDs including the complete seasons of Sex and the City. I've even got parts of conversations memorized. I know more about the characters personalities than the actors do. lt always amazes me how easy it is to lose muscle mass when you stay in bed for even a brief period of time. Of course my wonderful devoted husband took his usual extraordinary care of me. Things got so bad that at one point he had to feed me. All I could eat was applesauce because of an infected throat. A long time ago a therapist told me "Never underestimate the importance of just being able to get out of bed in the morning." I totally didn't get it back then but I sure do now. The first thing I did (after I took a much needed shower)was call a good friend who works at a non-profit and say "I need somebody to help." I'll be volunteering for two hours a week helping...wait for it...the disabled. Since I've been fighting the label of disabled for ten years I find this particularly ironic. Don't tell me the God's don't have a sense of humour. I know that helping others for those two hours is going to be really tough physically but I've got to get outside of myself, if you know what I mean. I've got to be reminded that there are others who need help, who are in worse shape than me. So maybe I can help them by just talking.

You remember my promise to myself to get financially straight by the end of the year? Well I paid off a major credit card this month. I'm trying to not look at my debt as a whole. Its too overwhelming. So I started with the lowest credit card and am working my way up the list. I don't care what the economic pundits say, there ain't no jobs out there! My husband has been searching for nine months now and so far had only had three interviews. So many people showed up that it's almost not worth the effort. But he keeps trying and I'm deeply grateful for all he does. He went to a job fair in February and there were close to 3,000 people there.

Many thanks for the kind and supportive emails telling me to hang in. Things like that really matter when you're down. It keeps you going. I've spent three years trying to pull myself together for this journey. I think the journey's about to begin.