What Grace can I share?

I've been sick with an upper respiratory illness since July 6th.

And panic stricken with anxiety for a while before that.

My blood pressure has also been on the rise.

I'm sleep deprived from waking in terror, at God knows what, 

at 3:00am every night.

I'm short tempered... more so than usual, due to that deprivation.

The grand kids, the lord bless them, have felt it more than anyone.

I don't like being sick. It worries me. Why am I always sick? Am I always sick?

Am I being overly dramatic and simply being a hypochondriac?

I post a lot about feeling unwell on this blog.

Write what you live...Live what you write...is this true?

What about this one ...What you think about is what you live with?

Or What your thoughts dwell on is what you will experience in your life?

Am I causing my own misery?

Here's the thing-

I don't like appearing weak. Or needy. Or depressed. 

Or dumb or stupid or lazy or wrong.

Or having anxiety.

I have had issues with anxiety most of my married life. 

I would like to place some of the blame for that on him.

We lived a volatile existence for nearly 28 years, him and I.

Too much alcohol and not enough talking or praying or trusting from either of us.

I did the best I could with what I had to work with at the time.

I will say the same goes for him.

But he got well...ahem..."We" got well, and my anxiety has remained.

I just worry about different things now.

Grand kids becoming ill or dying. Car accidents or maybe a relative getting murdered. Tornado's or house fires or dropping dead from a heart attack. 

What is this madness???

Friday at my doctor appointment I was offered an olive branch by the Nurse Practitioner.

I told ya'll about feeling dismissed by my doctor a couple of weeks ago.

How she only wanted to prescribe me anti-anxiety meds...how she said that some people just have anxiety, and how I didn't really agree with her statement. 

I wanted a diagnosis; a reason FOR the anxiety.

Plus, I was too afraid to tell her that I am afraid of anxiety meds.

How's that for a statement?? I have anxiety over anxiety medication.

Anyway the Nurse Practitioner sat with me and listened to me. 

I told her about the rushing sound in my ears. I told her that the sound of my own heartbeat in my ears is starting to drive me mad...like the story of the Tell-Tale Heart. 

I told her about my headaches and my sleepless nights and gasp! I even told her about my 3:00am anxiety attacks.

When she touches my overheated skin with her icy cold hands I feel relief.

I feel a healing element pulsing beneath the touch of her fingers.

And it feels like compassion. It feels like grace. And it feels like I want to cry.

She discovers both eardrums filled to the brim with a thick glue like fluid.

"Have you had this since July?" she asks me

"Well it's no wonder you can't hear anything besides your heartbeat. It's also why you're not sleeping. The fact that you have an infection in your ears from this fluid plus the aggravation from the noise of that fluid pounding against your ear drums is causing you to lose sleep.

You need to sleep" she tells me. "Not sleeping is also causing your blood pressure to rise."

She prescribes a strong antibiotic, and also Mucinex to thin the fluid in my ears and....klonipin.

Klonipin....the dreaded anti-anxiety medication.

"Try it" she tells me. "Just take one. I'm giving you a very low dose. 

And I'm only giving you ten pills.

See if it doesn't at the very least help you stay asleep so we can address this blood pressure issue." 

I stare at that bottle of pills for an hour after I get home before I crack it open.

Down at the bottom are 10 yellow pills staring right back up at me.

"Take one", he says from behind me.

But I'm afraid to, I tell him.

"Nothings going to happen except you will fall asleep" he says.

But what if I feel weird after I take it? I ask him.

It feels like a weakness to me having to rely on anxiety medication.

I'm stronger than this, aren't I??

Anxiety, the wretch, always has to have its say, doesn't it?

I take one with a full glass of water and try to convince myself that I will still be alive in the morning.

I am hopeful that I won't wet the bed due to my euphoric stupor of taking this anxiety pill and then finding myself too paralyzed by the side effects to walk and too drugged to do anything but lay there and drool.

Good Lord but I am a head case, right??

Want to know what really happened after I took that pill??

I went to sleep. And slept all night. For 8 straight hours.

No drooling. No paralysis. No wetting the bed. No dying. No anxiety.

So today when I had to go back for a recheck she asked me how was I doing.

My ears are much better! No more heart pounding! No more headaches. 

And the blood pressure is almost back to normal...readings are much lower.

"How's the sleeping?" she asked.

The Klonipin worked wonderfully I admitted. Would it be alright if I got a 30 day prescription?

And just like that I offered up grace to myself.

I decided that it doesn't make me weak or wrong or dumb or lazy or stupid or anything else, to need that medication. It also didn't make me feel wonky so there is that.

I'm not sure why I insist on judging myself so harshly over this issue.

But for the time being I am allowing myself to just take it one day at a time.

Hmmm....Where have I heard that saying before?

So. What grace can I share?

How about this?

Thanks for reading,

Love, Lolly