My body has been letting me down consistently for more than half my life now. I’m nearly 23 and it’s been failing me time after time for nearly 12 years. I don’t know what it is to be normal. I can’t remember what it feels like to not be scared of getting a cold. I can’t remember the days before an alphabetty spaghetti of illnesses were bestowed upon me, making me evaluate every action and determine whether or not it was necessary.
I’m nearly 23. I should be basking in life, I should be going out and going crazy. Drinking and dancing and dating and doing things I probably shouldn’t.
I can’t drink alcohol because of the assortment of medication I’m on to manage the pain.
I can’t dance, because even one song makes me hurt for weeks and even 5 minutes of fun is not worth 5 weeks of burning joint pain.
I don’t date because I’m so broken I don’t want to burden someone with the mess I am.
And, my idea of doing things I shouldn’t? Well that’s staying up past 10pm or buying an extra book to get me over £10 in Waterstones.
Instead, I sit at home, with heat packs on my joints after a day at work, and fearing the day that I should get a cold. Crying because I feel too ill to go to my friends and watch Strictly Come Dancing and eat pizza. Working out what bits of my to-do list and routine for the next day I can let go because I don’t have the energy. Struggling to eat because even lifting a fork to my mouth hurts sometimes. Struggling to shower because my legs, even with their enormous thighs, can’t always support me. Struggling to wash my hair because my wrists hurt and I can’t actually rub the shampoo in. I can barely dress myself in the morning, and have had to start wearing elasticated trousers because my fingers hurt so much I can’t actually manage buttons. I have to get my mum to brush my hair because I can’t move my arm enough to actually brush it myself.
That’s exhausting. It’s embarrassing. It’s miserable. But it’s my life.
I somehow managed to get a degree. I struggled. I hurt daily. I missed a lot of teaching. I had to compromise on a lot of things - including lab work. I had extra time in exams and special circumstances at the end of it all with regards to my classification. But I got a degree and it’s the most incredible thing I’ve achieved. I don’t know how I did it. I really don’t, but I have a feeling that some of the people around me during that time might have to take some of the credit. But I can’t do anything with it in a practical sense because my body won’t let me.
I got a kidney infection. For most people that’s just drink lots of water, maybe some antibiotics, and they’re better. For me, it’s lead to agony. My immune system is attacking my body. Every joint is burning. Every muscle aches. Every bone in my body is making me cry. All this because of a kidney infection.
But now, I have a job. I have a full time job. It’s a desk job. And I am broken. And here I am, today, aged 22 and three quarters, trying to decide if my body is even capable of working this full time job. I can’t say I haven’t tried. But I can say it’s an experiment that maybe hasn’t worked. I don’t know what to do. I know I have bills to pay, but equally I have my health to worry about (or rather, what little of it is left).
My body is broken. The only thing it can do reliably is let me down. It can’t even fight off the common cold without being bed bound and in pain because my body decides to also fight with itself.
And I don’t know what to do about it any more
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