Pain is Relative

Pain is relative. No, I don’t mean those unannounced visits from your family. I mean that when I think about my heart, I become very aware of it beating, my breathing, and the pain.

But when I am creating, I am absolutely pain free for so long as I remember not to realize that I am not remembering that I have pain (as she takes breath) and thereby ruin the fact that I wasn’t aware that I had pain. Um…yeah.

So my latest practice is to try not to think about my heart and maybe I’ll be less focused on my symptoms.

Good luck, me!

Out of my Comfort Zone

Algebra...(I hope I pass, I hope I pass...)
Facilitating Artist's Way on line
Physical changes

I am way out there where the magic happens...Bring it!

Some days this works better than others…

When life appears to be totally out of control this becomes the mantra of a certified control freak. "Whatever may or may not be happening to me, I can choose to feel exactly the way I want to feel."
Some days this works better than others…

How Are You Feeling?

How are you feeling?
More than a couple of people ask me that everyday and that is the reason I write…

I typically answer, fine but today I surprised myself and stopped. Today it was a tougher question. I wanted to say fine, because in a comparative way, I am. I truly have few complaints, but today I stopped short of fine because I am not. I have terminal heart failure, and although extremely grateful for my good days and all of the great health I have enjoyed I know what bubbles underneath is just like lava below the surface of my thin crusted well-being. So, I answer fine, even when it is not.

I am out of breath, swollen and tired all of the time. These are the parts of this disease that have become a part of my everyday life. Sometimes my chest hurts and is so heavy I think I am going to implode, but am afraid I can't tell the difference between my paranoid imagination and serious disease symptoms anymore. Then I wonder, does it really matter. It's terminal heart failure, it’s pointless to worry. And even though I don’t want to worry, I will worry just the same. Go figure @$%*@

I don’t know what condition my heart is in, because I don’t want to know, I'll only worry. Better or worse, good or bad, functioning at maximum capacity or not, I don’t want to know any more. I don't want any more degrading, toxic, invasive, nuclear exams that doctors deal out like a cheap deck of cards. Besides, a walk to the end of the block and a couple of glasses of pinot grigio and I can produce the same results as the high priced atom smashing machines. (There is a reason for those lead aprons!) Quite frankly, I’d rather get smashed by the pinot, then I'll send them my results and a bill.

Why do I need to know all of this information, I’m not sure I should…no, scratch that, I do NOT want to know. If God wanted me to have access to all of that information, I’d have a daily paper read-out spew from a bodily orifice somewhere.

So, instead of feeling sick, waiting for them to run tests to tell me I am not getting better or feeling well, waiting for them to tell I am still sick, I have decided to just be. I have discovered, without the aid of the medical industry, that the best way to feel better when I feel like crap is to force myself to get up and just create something. That’s one of the reasons I paint, draw and write this blog.

Now… who wants another pinot?

It's The Little Things!

It's the Little Things by India Arie

Love, Strength and Possibility

What if my limitations are illusions manufactured by my own fears?
What if my fear is not a circumstance of reality; but my own simple ugly pessimistic thinking.
Fear manipulates, controls, paralyzes.
Can fear continue to exist if I move my thoughts beyond it?
Can fear survive in the presence of love,strength and possibility?

....nope

Here it is Again

I have the most wonderful heart,
It knows what to do
I trust
It knows what to do
I am grateful
It knows what to do