Healing, Loneliness, Tarot Cards and Pizza
I’ve not been feeling super well for about the past 6 weeks or so. Lots of fatigue, heaviness, headaches and chronic pain. Waking up every day feeling as if I’ve been clubbed is draining, debilitating and soul crushing at its worst and super frustrating at its best. It’s also incredibly lonely and isolating. I see the sun shining outside and want to go out and get in on the fun. But I’m so, so tired. Friends want to meet for lunch or drinks or nights out but I don’t eat “normal” food or drink alcohol and I can’t stay out that late without paying a price later on. I’ve been doing all the right things and it’s helping a bit, but nothing seems to be holding for long. It takes SO much effort, time and dedication just to have a baseline of wellness. 8 hours of sleep in a dark, cool room, hot lemon water, juice, juice and more juice, all the vegetables and supplements, meditation, movement, yoga, breathing exercises, morning and bedtime routines…ugh. Days are interrupted by appointments with doctors and healers galore. I hate inconveniencing others or seeming dramatic, so I keep most of it to myself and put a smile on my face when I’m out. But all I’ve been wanting is to be home alone. In the quiet. Just being.
Being sick is lonely and hard, but maybe healing is even more so. Because being sick is passive. It happens to you. Healing, on the other hand, is active. You need to make it happen. It takes time and effort. Effort that most “other” people don’t understand. Lucky them, they don’t have to. Healing, at least from most chronic disease, is not only medicines and doctors. After all this time, I’ve learned that the most important part is emotional and spiritual work. It’s digging deep and uncovering. Unearthing and shedding light. Challenging who you think you are and changing what needs to be changed. I think it’s coming back to who you’ve always been. The person that’s been there all along, underneath years of conditioning and stress and expectations. It’s not unlike polishing tarnished silver until it’s shiny again.
This week, I seem to be turning a corner. I’m starting to feel better for longer. But I’m also feeling sad and lonely and wistful. Chronic illness and the spiritual path tend to weed out a lot of relationships, situations., and people in your life that aren’t meant to be there. That’s definitely been true for me and I’m grateful for it. But, it’s still sad. It’s still lonely when you’re the only person in your circle that’s dealing with these things. It still sucks that you can’t eat (real) pizza and everyone else can. I wouldn’t go back to my old life for anything, but I’m still mourning the loss of it.
I’m not writing any of this to gain sympathy or to complain. I am very happy and grateful to be where I am at the moment. I bet some of you reading this are rolling your eyes like, “Bitch! You’re not working and you’re traveling and taking pictures of green juice all day!” Guilty as charged, and I’m not sorry about it! But it’s still hard and lonely. It’s hard to not feel well all the time and it’s hard to get better. It’s hard to let go of everything you’ve ever known. It’s hard to be away from home and it’s lonely on the road. It’s hard to say goodbye to the person you’ve been for 30 years and start fresh. It’s SO HARD eating vegetables when everyone else is eating pizza.
The other day, searching for answers as I always am, I was messing around with my deck of tarot cards that I still don’t really know how to read. The first card I pulled was The Tower. The image on the card is human-shape completely engulfed in flames, arms outstretched, seemingly reaching to the heavens in a plea for help. Seems promising! According to the book that came with my deck, the Tower is the “angel of destruction.” “The Tower cannot handle witnessing any falsehoods, and must tear them down…the card seeks reinvention. It wants a fresh start and must destroy what was before.” Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.
The only way out is through. It may be hard and lonely and it may really suck sometimes. Fire is destructive and it doesn’t discriminate. But it is also purifying. Working with the destructive force is the only way and what other choice do I have? I’ve got to ride it out and rise from the ashes. Whatever gets burned in the process was not meant to be there and is making space for what is. So many things have been burned. But other things are sprouting in the spaces they’ve left behind. And I may not know what the path is or when whatever is meant to be will materialize, but I do know that I am strong enough to see it through. Even when it’s hard. Even when it’s lonely. Even when it means I can’t eat pizza.