I'm still here...

2:00 a.m. Sunday morning, Aug. 5.
My sleep is screwed up: no surprise there.  I thought I would just get up and take some time to write.  Life is better, currently.  It is still touch and go with my health but on the whole, it is improving.  I have more and more days of feeling human.  Less sick means less depression for me so it really is a circle.  I am, however, constantly aware of how easily things go off of balance and spin out of control.
Having a diagnosis (Overlap tissue disease) makes it easier to deal with in a mental sense but not always in the physical.  This disease is sneaky and can pounce on me just when I think I have it beaten into its own corner.  Fatigue is my nemesis and can wrap its fingers around my neck and make me gasp in pain.
I am finally learning the lesson of live and let live.  There is no longer any choice.  I can barely live for me and my own family; much less worry about anyone else or what they think of me.
there are many things I miss.  I miss my own spontaneity. I miss the old Katie who could, just make things happen out of sheer force of will.  She's gone.  She has become planning and methodical.  Without plans, she is never sure (even with)that something will come to fruition.  It could just fizzle away while I stay in bed, flattened.
The one thing I am certain of now is that Health is no longer a right.  It is a privilege.  I much treat it with respect and yet let go of it to some degree.  I find this really difficult still.
I am much more clear on some things.  My family is who I have made and been fortunate enough to be in a reciprocal relationship of love with.  My family is not really my blood relations.  They are fine enough people but are not there, and are often at odds with  each other.  I cannot insert myself there and waste precious energy.
I miss my mom.  Each and every day I try to remember her kiss and her smell and her softness.  No one else feels the way my mama does.  No one else can ever hold me that close.  She is close by me and I know she and daddy are happy together.  I just mourn them and feel like the third wheel, left behind.  I miss Pat every day too.  I know sh e is better off and loves her new job of being everywhere at once but I am jealous of the old physical Pat that was here with me.
By some miracle I have Don, who loves me and Allie who is my companion in arms.  Their wisdom and love for me and my family is the sweetness that is left us.
I pray for forgiveness in my selfishness, understanding in my me need and wisdom in my pain.  And most of the time, I know I am heard and loved.  This is really all we can ask. Help me, Lord, to remember this.
Katie