I've been apologizing for a decade, I'm sorry I'm sick, I'm sorry I can't work, I'm sorry I wasn't the wife I should have been, I'm sorry I can't keep up, I'm sorry this is hard for you, I'm sorry I make you depressed, I'm sorry I'm unreliable, I'm sorry I'm tired, I'm sorry I'm not the person I was, I'm sorry I can't be cured, I'm sorry you have to accommodate me, I'm sorry I talk about it, im sorry for it all. Sorry Sorry Sorry.
This illness more than anything I've ever experienced makes me feel guilty, like it's some kind of physical expression of a mental flaw, like if I was a better person I could handle this gracefully, I could still work and be "normal" and it makes me feel lazy and whiny.
That above all else is the hardest thing for me to get past. Why? I'm not sure. Maybe I am a narcissist and I need to feel special or liked or whatever. Maybe I'm a little scared that I actually am lazy or whiny and don't want it to be true. Maybe I just feel like I'm not accomplishing things and I need to feel useful. I ask myself these questions all the time. I also wonder do all illnesses affect people this way or is this particular illness more doubt inducing than others?
I need to stop apologizing and just start being. It is what it is and whether it's a character flaw or not I need to accept that this is who I am. I can accept this, my life is forever changed but I can adapt. This is my thing and I will not make it anyone else's any longer, I don't mean I am going it alone -in fact, I feel more support now than I ever have, but this is my burden and I will stop making excuses or apologizing for it. I will stop believing anyone can truly share this with me. I think I always expected to have a partner in this, when really I am on my own, always have been. I don't mean to say that I've been abandoned or that no one cares for me that is not so, just that no one can fully see it from my perspective and that's ok. If I can let go of that crutch and the need to be understood than I can embrace this life as it is and stop trying to make people see what I see, take heart in the fact that everyone has a different experience and a story to tell and that sometimes, most times, we don't end up playing the part we thought we would.
Everyday I wake up I try my best and if my best can't get out of bed, so what. This life is mine and I will do with it what suits me, I'm done pleasing and apologizing, it's time for a little selfishness, maybe this is an opportunity to figure out who I am and how to feel useful as I am.
I am striving to strike sorry from my vocabulary.