A Prayer of Sorts

My brightest smile while holding a baby goat at Sugar Roots Farm

Yesterday I had a fibro flare from Hades due to a period of poor sleep while my daughters were sick on rotation. How many times can two kids pass a virus back and forth?!

It was a TV binge, wear Husband’s b-ball shirt from the early 90s for comfort, Uber Eats pity-eat, and CBD cream + medicate the aches and pains and slur my words from the meds kind of day. I had some of the worst pain I’ve experienced recently as nothing I tried would ease it. When that happens the only fix is to wait out the day and hope for a good night’s sleep, which I finally got!

Today will be better, or at least I refuse to accept it being worse.

I was able to fall asleep without difficulty and no kids woke in the night, yet my fibro body woke me for the day before 5. Huh? Body, why? Today colors are brighter and tight hugs from my daughters don’t hurt. My pain level is more of a hangover from yesterday: my back and knee fibro points are calmer; my head is heavy from taking a final flare-level dose of meds to ensure it’s over; my heart is sad that this is my and our life, yet hopeful and looking forward to events to come.

This new life on the fibro rollercoaster = unpredictability; often feeling helpless though I know my inner strength is unbreakable (I’ve tried to crack: I can only chip); trying not to further worry my daughters (major contributor to the helpless feeling); inconsistency; and frustration.

My Prayer

‘Herstory has its eyes on you…’

With that I offer up a prayer of sorts. My frequent fibro lows occur in between or in tandem with the times I’m happiest: unforgettable moments with Husband, Junebug (we’re hanging on to her last months of delicious semi-toddlerhood before she turns five) and Rosebud, 6.5,(she’s in a rough patch: no matter what I say or do, at the first sign of me lagging she thinks I’m dying…); and rarely but happily, surprises.

From the joy of finding a Monarch butterfly chrysalis hanging securely from a milkweed stalk in the garden yesterday…to waiting in line for many hours to score a last minute Hamilton ticket in 2017 in Chicago during the early, innocent months of recovery from my necessary hysterectomy that resulted in a bladder injury with complications that later lead to fibro…to volunteering at a farm last month and being given the gift of holding a baby goat for the first time.

I’m grateful I can still feel surprised. I’m grateful I can find joy of a personal nature and of a maternal one. I’m grateful that giving and helping still gives me pleasure. I’m grateful that nature, animals, and the right words (also a gift), can still lift me.

I’m grateful that starting this blog on a whim has connected me to a network of sharp people, other blogs, organizations. and fibro advocacy. I’m grateful that these connections help me stay on top of the latest fibro research, feel supported on a bad day, or support another in need.

I pray that if my fibro worsens with age that the new treatments on the horizon work for me. For all of us.

I hope that having a disabled mom gives my already empathetic daughters great resilience and depth, but also that they can find lightness. That they can let their parents carry the heavy load that is fibro while they blossom and bound.

I hope for fewer days like yesterday; more routine, “fibro-normal” days; and surprises of nature, kindness or luck every now and then.

Tomorrow will be better, or at least I refuse to accept it being worse.

Amen.

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