Persistent Illness Is The Fire Swamp

"Unless I am wrong, and I am never wrong, they are headed directly for the Fire Swamp."-Prince Humperdinck

Or me, whenever my thyroid decides to stop cooperating with the rest of my body.

Warning, the Princess Bride references will continue throughout this post.

It may not seem like it at first glance, but navigating a long term persistent illness is a lot like hiking through the Fire Swamp. Even if you have been here before, and even if you know the way out, traveling the the depths is still hazardous to your health

The lightning sand is the sudden and unexpected fall into depression. One minute you are walking along, maybe noticing that the trees are a little bit uglier than normal (no matter what Westley thought) and the next minute you are trapped and cannot breathe. Sometimes you may feel that the harder you struggle to get out, the deeper you fall in.

But the choice to sit and wait for someone to dive in and rescue you is not available. So the struggle continues until you escape to the edges and find solid ground. Even then, you will be walking gingerly for a while, staying away from any spots in the soil that looks like it could swallow you whole. Still, there are times you guess wrong.

The flame spurts are the moments of extreme anxiety that flare up with little to no warning. Possibly also the accompanying spikes of high blood pressure that precede or follow those moments. Over time, you may learn to recognize the warning signs and avoid getting burned. But despite your best efforts, depending on the frequency and intensity of the flare ups, you are still left with scars.

The Rodents of Unusual Size are the sometimes well meaning people (and sometimes not well meaning people) who do not understand how you feel and insist that your illness, physical or mental, is all in your mind. They shuffle in and tell you that you simply need to be more positive or more active and all of your problems will go away. No matter their intentions, you are left bruised or bleeding by the time they leave.

Truth be told, because of your hyper vigilance and various other symptoms, medications, and side effects, you vacillate between over anxious and completely blank. The swamp has dangers, both real and imagined. It leaves you so tired and distracted that you cannot even enjoy the things you normally would. Like reading. Or writing.

So you numb yourself with mindless repetition. The games. The television shows on endless repeat.

And there is no Buttercup here. Life becomes all of the Netflix and none of the chill.

There is also the thoughts that linger in the back of your head. They tell you that even if you do escape, no matter how long it takes, the six-fingered man is waiting somewhere to punch you in the thyroid and take you back to the Pit of Despair, where all of this starts over again.

I would say that it is like Groundhog Day, but I do not want to mix my movie references.

Despite all of this, there is no surrender. You tell yourself that you will defeat and overcome any and all obstacles. Maybe it will take a miracle to be fully healthy, but you do not stop trying. You take the chocolate coated pills, you gather your wheelbarrow and cloak, you find your Brute Squad.

You take on the sixty men at the gate, and sally forth to rescue yourself, with the help of your friends.You do this because there are people that love you. You do this because you understand that you also need to love you.

You hold onto the hope that maybe one day the world as it is will come closer to being the world as you wish.