Messing with my head

I'm having a really bad night tonight. I feel nauseated. My stomach is cramping and bloated. I am so exhausted but my brain is running on overdrive. I know all the meds I am on are a big part of the problem because they do mess with my head. But tonight is the first time I just want to cry and cry and I have no real reason why.

Of course I miss M and I feel like I've been having treatments for weeks not just days. I am trying so hard to stay positive and sometimes it feels like an unattainable goal. Part of me knows that I need to be, no scratch that, I MUST be here. But there's a smaller part that wants me to just pack it up and just go home. However, the fact remains that I have to be here. I have to fight all these infections because they are the root of my cardiac problems and I know that my heart couldn't take much more of that cycle I had fallen into where my pulse was either in the 170s or in the 50s.

I knew when I came here that this was not a "quick fix" or an "easy road". But I felt it was the only place that could get me healthy. When I am in the treatment room I look around and I thank God that I am not as sick as so many of the other patients. I pray for them in their efforts to regain their health. It helps give me perspective on where I am and I feel blessed to still be able to function as well as I am. But, it's hard to be around these people as they suffer because you find out some have been doing treatments for over a year and I cannot fathom how hard that would be. I know I don't want to find out either.

I try so hard to stay positive but today I felt so much negative energy around me, so much sadness, so much pain, that I couldn't shake it off. I've had some of the patients tell me that the Bicillin injections (like the ones I had yesterday) would really mess with their head, causing them to be moody or depressed. I'm hoping that's why I am feeling this way now because then it would mean this sadness would fade away in the next day or so. Of course, I will continue to get Bicillin injections every Friday until the doctor can get rid of the chronic strep. So maybe I will just end up having "weepy Saturdays" - who knows.

The IV antibiotics are no fun either with their many side effects like upset stomach, nausea, etc. Then there's the fact that all of these bacteria running amuck in my blood bring their own special treats to the party that's happening in my body - like the bone and joint pain, the muscle aches, and the headaches and exhaustion. Add to all that the Ativan, Valium & Benadryl and you can see why I might be crying right now.

I know God has a plan for me and as I've said before, I trust that plan. I guess I am just groaning right now. I am only human and so of course I wish that this was easier. Not just for me, but for M and for my family too. I hate these infections and I wish there was a magic pill that I could take to make them all just disappear, but there's not. There's PICC lines, IV meds, supplements and the feeling that I am among the living dead. I'm alive, but I have no life outside of my illness. I have no life outside of my treatments.

Okay, that's enough of that. I'm too tired to make sense and I'm too upset to write anything of worth. I just wish that my brain could function better and sort out the emotional side of this from the practical side. But for now they're all jumbled up together. I am trying to focus on getting well but it seems I keep finding myself being jealous of other people because they're healthy. That's a horrible thing to feel and I have to keep reminding myself that it's just a temporary emotion. I pray that God takes that feeling away because it wants to fester and it wants to grow inside me. I pray that God works in my mind as well as in my body. That He heals all of me. I pray He gives me the strength to just go through this journey one day at a time. Mainly I just pray that I feel His comfort and His love when I have nights like this where I want to just crawl under the covers and hide. I know He can do all things and I pray that He leads me in every step I take down this hard road to wellness. And that He carries me when it all gets to be too much, like tonight. I pray that He will direct my doctor and me in every decision about my treatment. Tomorrow I am going to try and not take as much of the Benadryl to see if I might feel a little more like myself. I may do the same with the Valium. I have to take the Ativan because without it I have the muscle spasms/seizure type things and you can't have those when you're stuck in a treatment chair getting IV meds for 5-6 hours of every day.

I'm sorry if this isn't the message you wanted to read. I'm sorry if I didn't find a way to make it uplifting. But if I am going to be true to my word, I said this blog would be ALL ME - the good, the bad & the ugly. So, I just unleashed some bad and some ugly and I can't apologize for it because I need you all to pray for God to show me how to get through all of this without falling apart mentally or physically. I don't know when I will see the doctor again - maybe in a week or two? I know they will take blood on Thursday to check and see how my body is reacting to the meds. Pray that my body will make great strides and that if it doesn't that I will be mentally strong enough to handle that too.

I will close with this verse which I just flipped to and found very fitting for my current state of mind:

"I am the Lord, and there is no other; apart from me there is no God. I will strengthen you."
Isaiah 45:5

I know this too shall pass. I just have to focus on the fact that this is not my life - this is my "temporary life" and I will come out on the other side stronger in all ways, physically, emotionally and spiritually. I thank you God for your comfort. I thank you God for friends and family who have continued to reach out even as I withdraw into unhealthy isolation. I thank you God for counting each one of my tears. In fact, that makes me think of a verse my precious friend, Christy, always shares with me:

"Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him." Psalm 126:5-6

It's amazing to me how reading just a couple of Bible verses can allow the Holy Spirit to calm me, to soothe me, and to comfort me. Because I started typing this weeping and as I finish those tears have dried. God's word works miracles. I trust in that and in Him.