I’m a writer.
I’m a neat freak.
I’m a poet.
I’m a daughter.
I’m a college graduate.
I’m a fiancé.
I’m a friend.
I am many more things,
but I never thought
I would be epileptic.
In 2014,
six months after I graduated from college,
I woke my boyfriend and brothers up
with convulsions,
not a soft snuggle
or a laugh.
I answered questions
I don’t remember being asked.
I didn’t know who people were,
the important people.
I was sent on a tailspin
with no idea if it would ever stop spinning.
I walked through my days afterwards
as if a monster was following me,
waiting to jump out at me
and have a good laugh
as I fell to the floor.
I began to experience
something new as if I’d done it before.
I began to understand
how much of an influence medications have.
I began to fight
for the person I once was
and
for my voice to be heard.
I began to be my biggest advocate.
Until my family understood.
I let go of who I was
and started living for who I am.
This illness is a small part of me.
Now I’m ‘me’ with a different perspective
and a fighting heart willing to let the world know,
“Don’t ever underestimate me!”
Much like a puzzle
we connect the pieces with meaning,
and focus on the bigger picture.
Time is our friend for once.
We begin to live in the moments
not the future.
We find something we thought we never had.
For me it was my support system,
my need for independence,
and the love for myself
at my weakest and highest moments.
Anxious or not,
I’m getting to know myself again
with each passing day
as if I were a child
that never knew they could fall.
Leave a Reply