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Posts Tagged ‘acceptance’

#NoWayOut

Time was running out quickly

There was nowhere left to run

Nowhere left to hide

No way to reach the safety of the house

Or the safe escape through the stone circle high in the mountains.

The hunter they had brought in was too good

She had been harried and hunted

From the moment she reached the forest

Running and hiding at every turn

She had almost reached the end of her strength

As she hid near the edge of town once more.

Yet the yearning drew her onwards

More strongly with each passing second

With each heart stopping howl from the mountains

Her mate, her partner, her daylight lover

Waiting, ever more frantic as the minutes slipped by

As she herself yearned to be with him again.

The moon was full and rode high in the almost clear sky

The one blessing of this pain filled night

Scenting the wind she was sure she smelled rain

As low on the horizon lightning flashed

In the afterglow she could see scudding clouds rushing in.

The hunter was closing in still

She remained frozen in place, waiting for the moment

The moment she might escape.

Cool droplets of water brought a sharp tang to her nose

So much more sensitive in her wolf form

Clouds and rain grew heavier as time passed

The loamy scent of the earth growing stronger with the rain.

Carefully she stretched each limb

Bringing the blood flowing strongly through cramped muscles

The afterimage of the lightning flash temporarily blinding her hunters

The dark clouds and heavy rain masking her scent

She took her one chance and ran

Fleeing as fast as limbs too long immobilised

Were asked to be fleet once more.

As she slipped under cover of the forest

She heard a guttural sound behind her

The hunter had been waiting, but

As luck would have it this time

He misjudged his prey.

She loped off towards the mountains

Revelling in the blood coursing through her veins

In time she would reunite with her mate

The one who would become her lover come sunrise

As they moved to yet another place

To live free for a time before being forced to leave again.

Such was their life as wolf and human

Yet they would not trade it for any other

So long as they were together.

Together they now were, reunited at last

Their happiness all that mattered

Shared as wolf, or man and woman

Love knew no bounds

In the wildness of their world.

Blessings, Susan ♥

© Susan Alexander 2015

©Susan Jamieson 2015

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#The Midnight Caller
Death can be beguiling and enticing.

The Midnight Caller

 

Twas death himself, I know

Waiting silently outside my door

Though no door I’ve ever known

Could keep him away once lured.

≈ 

He held out his hand

Pale and slim

Yet somehow I knew also warm and strong

“Take my hand and walk with me

Away from all you feel

You know that’s what you want to do.

Leave all the pain and strife behind

No further hurt, no tears, no fight

Not even one more struggle

To suffer in this life.”

≈ 

But as ever before my answer came

To the beguiling words from death

“Even though I may be heartsore

I cannot follow you yet

My time to leave is not yet now

There are others here in this life

Who still need me on this side.

They may not know just how or why

But this light I have deep inside, knows this.

So, once again I say to you, No.

I cannot leave this life.

Nor ever desert them in this way

Though my heart bleeds daily for release.”

≈ 

This life is heavy

My heart bowed down

No way forward can be found

In despair I stand and pray for answers

Stubborn belief they can be found.

≈ 

I sensed a smile play around his mouth

A sparkle in the depths of his eyes

“I see you have not yet given up this fight

So once again I must bid you goodnight.

Remember though that I am always here

Waiting for your call

When midnight chimes awaken you

Remember, I wait for you too.”

≈ 

I cannot prove who called this night

At the stroke of the midnight hour

Yet the voice, the words echoed familiarly

And the essence I felt I knew.

≈ 

In my heart I know

Death called this night

And once more I closed the door.

Blessings, Susan ♥

© Susan Jamieson, 2014

Image courtesy of http://www.yeshairstyles.com

 

 

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#Sleep of the Damned
   If Only I Could, I surely Would

 

“Life is all about timing… the unreachable becomes reachable, the unavailable become available, the unattainable… attainable. Have the patience, wait it out; it’s all about timing.” Stacey Charter

I know about the sleep of the damned. It’s not quite what you might think. No diving into a hellish deep, tortured souls tearing you apart – perhaps it is for some, but not for me.

Mine lies somewhere between a light doze and wakefulness. It’s the lightest doze imaginable where my heartbeat plays time with my thoughts. Thoughts in colour and action to make sleeping a sometimes joke. Occasionally I’ll slip in the transition between the two and fall into sleep’s welcome embrace. Of late, it’s filled with vibrant dreams, some easy to understand, some so confused I’m not sure where the middle, beginning and end are. But that too is immaterial here.

For several weeks, I have fought a good fight against the effects of a niacin flush. Sounds like a fancy cocktail, but without the little umbrella! Instead, it’s a detox strangle – melodramatic, I’m sure. Yet I told “them” I was allergic to “B” vitamins. I’ve had to be careful for years, guarding myself against anything containing “B” vitamins which it seems my body cannot tolerate, all except B12, in which I am so deficient they call it ‘Pernicious Anaemia’!

So my niacin flush – beautiful blushes of sunset red or sunrise hues – more like sunrise I think, as it’s followed by the rising heat of the blush and a raging conflagration – akin to a wildfire. It cannot be quenched or put out, nor tamped down. I have to allow it to – yes, flush through my body.

Like most things it’s good and bad. The good is the benefit of the detox, removing those things harmful to me. The bad – oh just the crippling migraines, light sensitivity, crushing aches and pains as though my body is being torn apart.

Even this could be managed with good rest. Yet the pain, muscle, bone, head all combine to throw a huge barricade across that nebulous boundary between the twilight doze and real sleep, hence the “sleep of the damned”!

It’s frustrating since I crave organisation. I like my ordered routines. Poetry, stories, conversation and more, photos and sharing my thoughts. That has been tossed out like yesterday’s garbage, until my niacin flush has gone away.

If I find it frustrating, it may be worse for those trying to follow my blog, since you have no idea what or when I’m publishing. It pains me to say it, as so much else does at present, but I’m having to learn patience. It’s a dreadful curse, one I’ve fought most of my life. But I promise you this, I will be back on track, with my writing and my schedule, just as soon as I’ve put out my bushfire!

Since today was my day to visit my doctor and half a dozen hypodermics later, thought is a vague thing, and vision is blurry. You might say the spirit is willing but the body is weak. Hence this little explanation for you to understand my dilemma. Now I look forward to another night of the sleep of the damned again!

 

Blessings, Susan, ♥

© Susan Jamieson, 2014

© Executive Sorceress, 2014

Image from http://www.josephienwallart.co.uk  

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#Role Reversal

image from arbroath.blogspot.com                                                                        Role Reversal: The hunters gather for their meal in a cage.

~“Who doesn’t want to know that we notice them and value them? And who might respond to us better when they feel that they matter? It probably cannot be overstated – it matters…that people matter.”
Steve Goodier

           Valentine’s Day. (Today in the Southern Hemisphere)  A day when lovers known or unknown, exchange gifts, where dinners of seduction are planned and escapades dreamed up, flowers and chocolates by the score are bought to celebrate the greatest gift one person can give another, love. Yet not everyone is smitten by the God of Love. For some, the idea of love seems a far cry from their reality.

I have never believed in putting people into neatly labelled baskets and saying, “this group are gifted”, “this group are the workers”, this group are the drones” and “these we kick to the kerb because they are useless”. I know there are people and organisations who work in this way. I believe it is an old model which was used to enforce the class structure prevalent at the time.

#Role Reversal

image from http://www.glogster.com –       Class Structure –   Food for Thought 

We haven’t been able to leave the class structure behind yet, but I believe we will. When that happens there will be a new way of looking at people and there will be no elite or kicked to the kerb. Think about it, why should one group of people hold themselves up as better than the rest because they either have money or a “privileged background”?

In the same way I don’t believe it is right for knowledge to be hoarded when it can be shared for the betterment of everyone. Yes, there are people who need to learn or know something first and they are to be thanked, but it is the hoarding of knowledge which is used to keep people in the ‘class structure’ of the information age.

#Role Reversal

image from izquotes.com Who bought the rights to knowledge?

Even those who are ill have abilities and knowledge which can benefit others, yet they are more often downplayed to the extent that they cannot get people to look past the fact that they may be ‘disadvantaged’ in some way.  Why should anyone become a second or third class citizen because they have an illness or disability, or because they happen to have been born within a certain racial or social structure? Segregation in any way is wrong. History has shown that all too clearly.

There may be those who want to say that my opinions are coloured by the fact that I am ill at present. Truthfully, after taking revolting medication for years and seeing no improvements I am questioning if I have been given the right diagnosis and if the medication is not doing more harm than good.

#Role Reversal

image from http://www.npr.org                    FDR – would he ever have been elected if people had known he was ‘disabled’?

Even though I have been ‘ill’ for some time it did not stop me from being a part time carer for my Dad when he had cancer. All Dad needed was the support to go through with his journey and he asked for very little. When my ex-husband had a mental breakdown and became chronically depressed I was his carer for many years.  When my mother was diagnosed as terminally ill I was her carer for the larger part of the day. I never once, throughout these times thought I was hard done by, being asked to do ‘extra’ or that my parents were less than they had been. I would have been speechless if anyone asked me questions about my mother’s health instead of her.

Why is this important? It is important because of the way society thinks about people. Because I am ill and my husband is technically my carer, I am somehow lessened in the eyes of the establishment. He is asked questions about me, my health, and my attitude, my ability to do things, as though I am no longer capable of understanding or answering the questions. I have been relegated to a cipher, by society at large. I’m not the only one either.

#Role Reversal  ….image from http://www.budget.gov.au

~

Some people have the opinion that a spouse, particularly if it is the husband, has a particularly rough time if he is the carer. They also think that they should receive accolades for doing what a woman; wife would do for her husband as a matter of course. He is thought of as being a special person for doing this. Why, because we are crossing traditional role boundaries? Role Reversal is not a new thing?

#Role reversal

image from http://www.josephinewallart.co.uk Mystical Lovers

Today is Valentine’s Day and due in large part to the many accolade laden articles I have read, praising the husband for looking after the ill or disabled wife; I have been led to believe I shouldn’t think about Valentine’s Day in the usual way. (Not that I’ve ever given it a great deal of brain play in the past). I shouldn’t hope for a card, a flower, a coffee or dinner, a Valentine wish, because I am a lesser person. I’m not hale and hearty. I have failed to pass the mark to enter the halls of the acceptable.  It’s been a very distressing and demoralising week.

Fortunately, I know, that not everyone thinks this way. Yet those who do; those who have forgotten that each person is a valuable member of society, that each person is a beautiful spirit having a human experience, has helped to undermine me, and any other ill or disadvantaged person, at a fragile moment.

If Valentine’s Day is a celebration of love then it is not restricted by age, race, infirmity, colour, creed or faith. Love simply is. There are no passwords, secret handshakes or categories to say Love can only be for these people. There are many forms of love. It should be something which enfolds everyone and lifts everyone to new heights, with happiness and joy.

It is time to stop doling out acceptance or love based on someone’s arbitrary decision which is long outmoded.

#Role Reversal

image from idanceintherain.com –

It is not simply Valentine’s Day; it is the “Celebration of Love” Day and open to all. From my heart to yours I send wishes of love. May the day of love shine brightly in your heart.

#Role Reversal

image from stewartdesign.com –    Love and acceptance, makes the heart swell with gratitude and happiness.

Love comes in many forms, don’t be misled by thinking it has to be a people love…. animals unconditional love and acceptance of people have saved more sanity and lives than anyone can truly know. Let your companion know you love them back. It feel wonderful, Love Actually is wonderful..

Happy Celebration of Love Day 2014.

Blessings,  Susan  ♥♥♥

© Susan Jamieson 2014

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#Acceptance

image from mindfulnessworkshops.dk –

“I am my own biggest critic. Before anyone else has criticized me, I have already criticized myself. But for the rest of my life, I am going to be with me and I don’t want to spend my life with someone who is always critical. So I am going to stop being my own critic. It’s high time that I accept all the great things about me.”
C. JoyBell C.

One of the biggest lessons we have to learn is that of acceptance.

  • Acceptance of who we are.
  • Acceptance of who someone else is.
  • Acceptance that what has occurred is in the past, and if we let it go it has no power over us. Acceptance, it can be easy or it can be hard. Yet once we have learned it, we can be literally set free. Free from the pains of the past and released into a brighter today and tomorrow.

Part of my training through life has been to analyse everything which had or was occurring and determine what course of action should be taken as a result of that. Whilst that is good, as far as it goes, it can lead to an immense amount of heartache. In analysing everything for motive and purpose we can easily forget the personal, the individual in the events. Motivation for why things occur can muddy the waters even further, leading you in ever increasing circles until you reach a state of information overload and decisions, if needed, become even harder to reach. It  can also tend to make you hold o to the painful memories as a way of reminding yourself not to make the same mistakes again. We inflict pain on ourselves. Insanity!

#Acceptance

image from yogagoddess.us –

“Often, it’s not about becoming a new person, but becoming the person you were meant to be, and already are, but don’t know how to be.”
Heath L. Buckmaster, Box of Hair: A Fairy Tale

~

Acceptance of Who We Are.

That shouldn’t be so difficult, should it? Yet some of us twist and turn on the whim of others trying to find out if we are acceptable. In the never ending pursuit of finding ourselves acceptable, to ourselves or to someone else we forget the greatest gift of all, our innate selves. In this entire Universe there is only one person with our DNA, our ways, mannerisms, thoughts and feelings. We are unique, a fact we often overlook or are coerced into not seeing. We forget that we do not have to be measured by the rules or guidelines of someone else. We may not be perfect to them, but we are who we are.  Perfectionism may be an ideal to some, but it can be sterile and devoid of real feeling and emotion.  Accept who you are, as a work in progress and doing the best you can at any given time. That is all that is truly asked of us, and it is beautiful.

#Acceptance

image from rediscoveredfamilies.com

“Maturity, one discovers, has everything to do with the acceptance of ‘not knowing.”
Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves

 

Acceptance of who someone else is.

It is perhaps a conundrum of life itself that if we are able to accept who we are, then we are often unable to accept others, since we project the best of ourselves onto others and may find them lacking. Of course, the reverse is also true, in that projecting the least acceptable of ourselves onto someone else, may mean that we accept far less from someone than we deserve.  Life is a journey, at times straight forward and at others immensely complex. Just like people.  If we accept the premise that we, as an individual, are always acceptable, doing the best we can at any given time, then we must also extend that to others. How can we expect more of others than we are willing to accept and give of ourselves?  We are all human beings, but we are beautiful Spirits having a human experience. Learning can be messy and we can only work through the labyrinth one step at a time. Accepting the successes and failures is what makes is who we are. Unique.

#Acceptance

image from playingwiththeuniverse.blogspot.com –

“Learn this from me. Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves.”
Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven

~

Acceptance that what has occurred is in the past, and if we let it go it has no power over us.

So many people have scars they carry for a lifetime over what has happened in the past. Like a festering sore we allow it to continually stab at us, reminding us of failures, times we didn’t reach our best, times we let someone down and they suffered as a result. Yet the truth is, it doesn’t matter. We can only expect of ourselves, of others, the best that is possible in that particular moment. In That Moment!  In  fact we can only expect if ourselves, projecting our expectations on others is unfair as it takes away their free will and ability to earn.

What we learn in a day, a week, a month, a year, or a lifetime after that, cannot change what has gone before. Not by one iota. Why then carry this enormous weight with which to punish yourself? If you can say to yourself, everything that has happened, what I have done, what others have done, forms the fabric of my past. The cloth that I weave now may look different to the one I wove before.  Yet it is still perfect in its difference. It is unique, as I am.

The measure of life is change. Look back and read the lessons you have learned from your past. Not with regret or self-flagellation, or blame of others, but as a lesson learned and phfft….. let it go. The past has already gone and can no longer affect you unless you allow it to.

Face forward and greet the day. The present, the only portion of time we can have any effect on, for the future is yet to appear. Make peace with the past. Accept you, the people who populate your past and the fabric of your past. Accept all that has been as a lesson, and look to the bright future, armed with the knowledge accepting the past has granted you.  It has also released you from the chains which helped keep you shackled to painful memories. Acceptance helps remove the pain. I know because I have been there and can vouch that it works.

Acceptance – is the key word to having a wonderful life.

#Acceptance

image from lifecorked.com

“All that is left to bring you pain, are the memories. If you face those, you’ll be free. You can’t spend the rest of your life hiding from yourself; always afraid that your memories will incapacitate you, and they will if you continue to bury them.”
J.D. Stroube, Caged in Darkness

May you find your Acceptance in life and look forward to a bright future.

Blessings,  Susan ♥

© Susan Jamieson 2014

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#Pushed to the Limit

image from ogdenutahcriminaldefense.com

“Never esteem anything as of advantage to you that will make you break your word or lose your self-respect.”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

There are times when, irrespective of how much you try to do otherwise, you fly off the handle. These episodes are usually preceded by periods of intense pressure, things not going according to plan or life generally not playing out the way you hoped. Colloquially they are called “knee jerk’ reactions. They are usually regretted almost immediately as soon as the blood cools down sufficiently for coherent thought to return.

If, like me, that cooling off can be fairly quick, most of the time, it leads to a great deal of soul searching and castigation for behaving in a manner which isn’t liked. However, many times the damage has already been done. Trying to set things right is quite often impossible.

All my life I’ve been told I should behave in certain ways. I was “better than my protagonist” and so held to a higher standard.  “I knew better than that” and so should have controlled that impulse to retaliate.  When you are placed on a pedestal and expected to live up to everyone’s perception of who you are, it can be extremely difficult to find the real you.  You may not even recognise the‘real you’.

#Pushed to the Limit

image from cstl.semo.edu

There have been times, over the years, when that pedestal has rocked alarmingly as I tried to keep my footing living up to so many other people’s ideas of who and what I was. Can you imagine how difficult it might be to understand what you want in life when you are so busy living up to someone else’s ideal? The saddest part of the situation is that it all begins with the best of intentions.

Hard as it may be to understand I was a very shy and quiet child. Head down and mouth closed so I drew as little attention to myself as possible. Yet all the time I was trying to live up to firstly my parent’s expectations of me and later my first husband, my work colleagues, my brothers, and then it seemed everyone else. Everyone had this idea of who I was and how I would respond in certain circumstances.  My first husband had a whole list of ways in which I was allowed to behave and respond that I hardly knew who I was. Sad, pathetic but true. The fact that I did respond as they expected, because it was expected, simply cemented these thoughts in their mind. Sadly, very few of these personas held more than a grain of the real me.

Not wanting to disappoint anyone it was easier to continue to play the roles I was ‘given’. It was safer in one particular area to follow the ‘rules’ than to face the consequences. At the same time I was able to hold down responsible positions, firstly as a police officer, later as a bank official and mother, school chairpersons and so on. I wasn’t actually hidden away where it may have been easier.

Realisation, when it seeped in was the beginning of the real humiliation. Knowing I had been this milksop of a person when I could think, had opinions and could do so many things was quite devastating. The fact that my husband was a police officer meant that I had nowhere to go and no-one to go to. Who would believe me over a serving police officer? It simply didn’t happen, not when the domination is psychological and emotional.

It is still hard for me to write these words, to accept them as reality and realise what I allowed myself to become – a doormat. I was a slave programmed to perform to command. I can never look at a woman in a domestic violence situation and condemn her, man, woman or child in that situation because it can be started so insidiously that it is too late by the time you realise. I was a slave to my ex-husband’s drive to achieve financial stability. The fact that he failed to support his children after I left, usurped part of my settlement and told the children it was theirs, all added to the ongoing manipulation. He is still doing this to my children, though they are grown and through them he is doing it to me because he knows they are the only way he can reach me.

#Pushed to the Limit

image from paulissakippisms.com –

Why have I told you all this. Because if it happened to me it can happen to anyone and if someone reads this and recognises where they are in this cycle and can get out, it is worth my embarrassment. If it helps someone reach out, to me or to someone else it is worth the embarrassment. I am tired of allowing him this hold over me. I am taking my life back, all of it and I refuse to allow him the space in my mind, in my life ever again.

This is real. It can happen to anyone, at any time. Please, if you recognise someone who is drowning under this type of treatment, offer a helping hand. Tell someone in authority and help them before it’s too late.  Life is a precious gift and shouldn’t be destroyed by insecure bullies.

#Pushed to the Limit

I am a woman, flesh and bone, heart and soul.

“Every woman that finally figured out her worth, has picked up her suitcases of pride and boarded a flight to freedom, which landed in the valley of change.”
Shannon L. Alder
Everyone has the right to respect, like breathing, take it away and the soul dies. – Susan Jamieson

Blessings, Susan x

© Susan Jamieson 2014

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“The purpose of government is to enable the people of a nation to live in safety and happiness. Government exists for the interests of the governed, not for the governors.”
Thomas Jefferson

What a lot of Hokum for We The People.

~~~~~

I had originally decided to do a short blog and call it ‘The Spirit is willing but the flesh is Weak”. Yet the more I thought about it the more I realised it simply was a hoax. Most importantly I was simply fooling myself. It sounds so pathetic to continually say, “It’s been a bad week” or “I’ve had a rough couple of days” or any number of other platitudes.

That’s not to say that they aren’t true, it’s just that I’m tired of using the same statements as if I trot out one after the other when things are… challenging. I’m not sure quite where I am on this sliding spectrum which I use to gauge how well I’m travelling. Truthfully, I’m feeling more than a little sick and tired with being sick and tired and not really knowing if I’m on the right track.

For so long I dragged myself to the doctors and presented the same old symptoms, tiredness, aches in joints and muscles, my motivation slowly drained away as it became more and more difficult to do things. I’m a perfectionist. I’m also a control freak. I like things to be neat and tidy. I can find nothing wrong with being able to tell anyone exactly where to go to find anything they need in my home. At least I could do that a couple of years ago.

There are my detractors who accused me of OCD, but heck, at least I didn’t need to upend my home to locate a letter I need. I revel in my individuality and I don’t expect anyone else to follow suit – each to his own.

#What a lot of Hokum

image from frommylivingroom.blogspot.com                                      Everything in it’s pace and a place for everything.

Then I was told about Lyme disease. It seemed to fit so many of the anomalies in the symptoms I had. The medication protocols are – unpleasant. If Fibromyalgia causes Brain fog then Lyme – its co-infections and the medication to ‘treat’ it definitely increases it exponentially. But I’m no quitter. I’ve gone through the protocols, dragged myself in ever decreasing circles of confusion and despair trying to determine if I’m simply grasping at straws. And I’m still not finished.

I’ve blogged about it because I’ve struggled to find support groups or people who are willing to share information. How odd. Here is a disease the AMA refuse to accept is in Australia, penalise doctors who treat it and we cannot find anyone to give us recommendations to people who are helping the ‘sufferers’. Those who find these people, usually friends, or friends or friends, keep that information to themselves. Why? Is getting well to be a hoarded treasure? Bygone days of the privileged living and the disadvantaged fading away unnoticed.

#What a lot of Hokum

image from alternews.com –      Where did the floor come from?

I’m not simply tired, I’m exhausted. My arms scream at me in pain for typing, but this is my only outside contact. It’s lonely not being able to see or speak with people. One more day of crawling up the hallway is making me shake uncontrollably. Is this Lyme disease, Bartonella or Babesiosis or some other confounded co-infection I’ve yet to be advised of; or is it Fibromyalgia, ME/CFS or one of its familiars?

I was feeling blah this morning. I had several appointments and I’d had a rough night. In fact I crawled up to the bathroom and cried for about an hour. I’m not giving in, but where the hell do I go?  How do I persuade my GP to look at my symptoms differently – not simply hand out stronger pain meds that leave me FOGGY!!!

To be able to think is such a gift. To know you are making sense and perhaps helping someone who needs to read this… that is my impetus for continuing. I have no answers, just a zillion questions. I want answers because I feel the medical establishment owe us that much – and then decent treatment. I have a right to a quality of life that is good enough to let me do what I’d like without crippling me. There is no need for it. If the damned doctors and insurance companies had done their due diligence when I had my accident, my simple accident, I wouldn’t be in this predicament now. I truly believe so. I wish I could sue the bejaysus out of them.

For the first time today, I ‘listened’ to someone who had always presented a positive push for the treatments they were given, the illness that accompanied them and was able to do so many physical activities I dream of doing’. Today I listened to them bemoaning their shuffling gait to reach the beach, crying because of the brain fog, the inability to raise your head from wherever it lays, and not be able to DO anything.  I admire this person, but here they are, for the first time in my space.

I want to offer advice but I am unable since no-one shared advice with me, I have none to offer except to say, I understand, I am there still, drowning in this misery but determined not to let it win.

#What a lot of Hokum

image from http://www.bannerhealth.com                                   I’m right here, You are not Alone!

I am going to search for these mysterious support forums and try to find out if these diseases have the same symptoms or not and what works for them. I have a few answers from dear people today. Yoga terrifies me because the pain is well established but I’ll try. I may not have  an answer, but by heavens, I will control my environment as much as I can so I can enjoy, to the fullest extent, the life I have been handed. I will also pass on any information I uncover – as a reference only, to be talked over with your doctors so that perhaps, in the fullness of time, we can beat these blasted torturous diseases. Such is my hope. Such is my prayer for all of us.

#What a lot of Hokum

image from childrensbookshop.circlesoft.net         Here come the answers!

As human beings, as Spirits having a human existence we search for answers. This is a prime directive so that we can learn. There is “a strange new world” out there, “new life and new civilisations” and, even more important, “The Truth is Out There”.

#What a lot of Hokum

image from aliens.wikia.com

What more could we ask for?  Who was right, Spock or Kirk?  Does “The good of the many outweigh the good of the few” or Does “The good of the one outweigh the good of the many?

We all deserve a better future.

Blessings, Susan x

© Susan Jamieson 2014

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#Imperfectly perfect

Heavy orchid spray                      I love my orchids

Imperfectly Perfect
“Excellence is the Result of Caring more than others think is Wise, Risking more than others think is Safe, Dreaming more than others think is Practical, and Expecting more than others think is Possible.”
Ronnie Oldham
 ~

Doing anything half-heartedly gains you very little except dissatisfaction with life, and the reason is very simple; it is because you are settling for second best. There are hundreds, if not thousands of quotations, some by the rich and famous and some who would like to be. What they all have in common is to tell you what you should do to reach the top, whatever the top happens to be for you.

It seems difficult for me to acknowledge that today is Friday, that the ‘end’ of the week is almost here. When I sat down to type I suddenly wondered where the week had flown and what I had achieved during that time to make it appear to have vanished. An entire five days vanished almost without me being aware of it.

#Imperfectly Perfect

image from anndr.deviantart.com                 In your imagination anything is possible

Of course I could make excuses and blame something or nothing for the ‘loss of time’, yet the sad fact is, I don’t have a good reason. What I think may be of even more concern, is the fact that I don’t feel that I’m on my own with this. Would you say I was being “Mindful” or that I was “Being present” in everything I had done?

Strangely enough the answer is yes. I complete my Gratitude Journal every morning, refresh my Affirmations and send my healing to those I know and those I don’t. I complete my Life Change 90 program each day, all reminders of times passing and making the best use of it for myself and others. And of course, I write. When I have completed my morning ritual I think about writing and I write, whatever it is that has made an impact on me or whatever ‘comes’ to me.

#Imperfectly Perfect

image from aniisah.wordpress.com –   Time where does it go?

Today, time was concerning me. The fact that I felt I was losing time… great chunks of time which I couldn’t really account for. Was my mind taking a siesta? Were my subconscious busy planning things for me to do in the future? I’m not sure and that lack of surety has made me feel uncomfortable. Have I been losing time that I haven’t been aware of? That is a truly scary thought.

Thoughts of Alzheimer’s, blackouts, seizures, or other malady which have no name, just visceral fears, ran amok through my mind. The fear of losing one’s faculties is a great one since there is usually little chance of coming back from such a problem. “Accepting what is”, as I have read previously, would simply not be something I could comfortably acquiesce to.

#Imperfectly Perfect

image from http://www.josephinewallart.co.uk       Bubbles of time floating away

I have to add this little incident which occurred moments ago. My husband told me he had a rather unpleasant headache, something which is unusual for him. However he is off in his little den with computer, doing heaven only knows what.  Since there was silence in the house I called out to him – and since he is concerned about my welfare he came to see that I was alright. Checking on his ‘timetable’ to the days close I asked him if he had taken his little blue headache tablets. He replied in the negative. He had become caught up in whatever he was doing and his headache was still thumping away, something I can validate only too easily. In a mock stern voice I said, “Well, you’d better take some immediately, and I mean that with the utmost infection!”  Infection? The moment the word escaped my lips I knew it was wrong and he fell into gales of laughter. Charming! It is said that laughter is the best medicine, but take it from one who had some dreadful headaches, laughing with a headache is to be avoided. At least for me it is.

#Imperfectly Perfect

Pre Lyme meds

Taking the humour from the situation, I ask myself where my mind was. What was I thinking about? Was I thinking? Was I being courteous, mindful and present with my husband? I was thinking about him, his headache, and his little pills and hoping he would be finished soon, so he could rest. So what caused the slip?

Truthfully, it is a little unnerving, a little frightening, and preys on my mind. I can blame ill-health, the brain fog, the medication, but is it? Is that the cause of these slip ups and loss of time? I believe there is nothing serious wrong, but it remains an unanswered question.

I question whether I have the right diagnosis since I feel no better after nine months of treatment than before, in fact I feel worse, much worse. New horrors are affecting my mind, my stability, feeling as though my spine will fall apart like a domino stack at any moment, cracks and creaks and severe muscle and joint aches. All these should surely be getting better by now – or at least some of them?

#Imperfectly Perfect

image from gardeningwithconfidence.com     Because beauty hides the pain

Today I looked at some photos taken just two years ago, just after we became engaged. Happy days! I have some photos taken just a couple of weeks before my Lyme diagnosis and all the medication I began taking. In both instances I looked happy, full of life and energy, and slim and smart. I know people say being slim is not a benchmark for how your life is and “If you’re fat, you’re fat – accept it”.  No way! Not this little black duck. If I had been overweight previously I could say it was a fair comment. The only difference is the medication and my worsening physical state.

So I’m left with a conundrum and many questions. Perhaps that is the reason for the slip. I hope if any of my ‘fellow Lyme sufferers” or the “Fibromites”,  or fellow bloggers I have come to know, have any insights, suggestions, or anything to calm overwrought nerves, I would be more than simply grateful. In fact, if anyone has any words of advice to offer I would listen since I know that solutions come from many strange and otherwise discounted places.

#Imperfectly Perfect

Orchids, always Perfect

I know I am “Imperfectly Perfect. I might also be “Perfectly Imperfect” and that is how it should be. I am who and what I am. I care, for the people I have come to know, their hopes, their dreams, their problems and hurts. You, my readers, have become dear friends and I trust my dear friends to tell me the truth, their truth as they see it. From there it is my responsibility to find my truth.

That, to me is what a community is all about. It is, I hope, what our WordPress community has become. I have been welcomed, in my idiosyncrasies and that is a great gift, one I willingly reciprocate because friendship is a great gift.

I can live with “Imperfectly Perfect” since I accept I am a “work in progress. We all are.

#Imperfectly Perfect

My Dancing Lady Orchid.

“When science discovers the center of the universe, a lot of people will be disappointed to find they are not it.”  ~Bernard Baily

When the world seems full of imperfections, and answers are hard to find, there is a perfection in Orchids which soothes my heart, my mind and my soul.

Blessings,  Susan x

© Susan Jamieson 2014

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#My Husband, # My Lover, # My Friend

Ray and I on our wedding day May 11, 2011

“This is what our love is––a sacred pattern of unbroken unity sewn flawlessly invisible inside all other images, thoughts, smells, and sounds.”   Aberjhani, The River of Winged Dreams
My Husband, My Lover, My Friend

It’s been a rough week here and although I’ve tried to play it down, inside my head and in my posts, there have been times when the thought of simply ‘giving up’ wasn’t far away.  It’s very difficult to remain positive when you wake up and the moment of consciousness brings the awful knowledge that your entire body is screaming in agony.

It’s becoming a real nightmare, a waking nightmare and this morning was the worst to date. Let me explain, although it’s really hard for me to write this. I cannot move my legs, body, head or shoulders. I am fortunate that my hands and lower arms appear to be okay. I wake up feeling as though I’m in a roasting oven, on well done!  I cannot push the covers off and I cannot get out of bed, (I can’t move).

#My Husband, # My Lover, # My Friend

image from autobio-blogs.plazilla.com

I’ve tried everything I can think of to get out of bed without waking my husband, especially as sometimes I wake really early and I’m ruining his rest. He needs it, he has to look after someone who is cranky because she can’t do the things she has previously done alone and I’m not in the right head space to “give in gracefully” and acknowledge that for the moment, this has to be my reality.

#My Huasband, # My Lover,#  My Friend

image from http://www.123rf.com Is this what is coming?

So let’s go back to this morning. I had a magnificent sleep, six hours of deep sleep. It’s a shame it was drug enhanced but I can’t fight that any longer either. But, I heard Ray get up and that was enough to wake me.  It was a world of hurt and I had no idea what to do. My entire body was locked in this agonising position and I had to move. I simply had to.

From a mental angle it is full on despair, a waking nightmare I cannot banish. Giving in is against my entire world view. I have always stood my ground, but that has become a joke since I cannot stand. Not first thing in the morning.

The first challenge is getting upright and Ray has to hold my hands and when I say “Pull” he has to pull me upright quickly. This morning I screamed as he did this.  (Going slowly is more painful.) Ray has to slowly pull each leg around until I can reach the floor and then once again, pull me to my feet. He has to make sure I don’t fall backward or forwards or I’ll be on the floor. I’ve mentioned the ‘damned stairs’ before but this morning they almost defeated me. But he wouldn’t let go, nor would he give in and we painfully made our way along the corridor.

#My Husband, #My Lover, #My Friend

image from owlsandorchids.com       Is this all that’s left?

It has brought home the simple dignity chronically ill people suffer which is taken by others as something they just have to get used to. I wonder if, in the same position, they would find it so easy or welcome! Well, we made the journey, back to bed and sitting back brought another stifled scream. (I have some pride left). It was not going to be an easy day. I swore I wouldn’t take the tablets but I was afraid, seriously afraid I might have to call the ambulance.  Maybe it’s the meds but that’s tantamount to throwing in the towel and I’d rather the unthinkable than that.

So, doped up and basically incoherent I remained in a land somewhere between reality and who knows? I do know that after Ray had left I felt someone sitting down and then a cuddling into my legs, but that’s another story.

We decided on a bath, detoxing again, but with added special things Ray thought up. He helped me to the main bathroom, (when we build I’m having a bath in the en suite!) and the most beautiful sight met my eyes. My special bath salts, lavender-scented had been liberally placed in the bath, extra Epsom salts, my coconut body wash, coconut scented body cream, candles, my bath pillow and my iPod. I could have cried. It was exquisite – and I forget to get a photo so this will have to do…

How can something so wonderful be so painful? Getting in and lying back caused another loud groan, but I wasn’t going to let it stop me. (Note to self – larger bath needed in our en suite). It was hot, as it needed to be and as I felt the warmth slowly seeping into my body, I felt a wonderful feeling enveloping me. I got my iPod and some meditation music and I was left in peaceful silence.

I came back to myself as the water lost its heat but over an hour had passed and I was a wrinkled prune – almost. Helped out and dried off and then the final surprise, the beautiful coconut butter lotion… He carefully and slowly rubbed it in from my toes to my neck and down my back. I had the most incredible massage of my back. His magical fingers caressed the painful knots and tender spots and relaxed the rest of my back. I was covered from head to toe with lotion and I felt amazing. Every muscle had turned to jelly.

Helping me dress and back upstairs we had a beautiful cup of tea.

I realised how lucky I was. I found in one inexplicable gift from the Universe, my soul mate who is my husband, my lover and my best friend. The pain notwithstanding, I realise I’m so darned lucky. To be loved and accepted by such a wonderful man, someone who not only stands by me, but helps me through my nightmare is a rare blessing. I don’t make it easy on him at times and my guilt becomes another torment. I feel stuck in this limbo, yet supported by a magical earth angel.

What more can I say? Love is beautiful and found in unexpected place and at unusual times. Enjoy it anytime you can.

#My Husband, #My Lover, #My Friend

image from 2guysphoto.wordpress.com

I feel my love flowing to all my friends out here, and to all the people everywhere. Love will eventually change our world. It is too great to ignore forever.

Blessings and love to all.

Susan x

© Susan Jamieson  2014

~

For the Love of My Life and for the Love of Your Lives, whoever they may be.

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#Today

image from lionhearteagle.blogspot.com –

“Finish each day and be done with it.  You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can.  Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.”  ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Today

Today I gave in. For one brief moment which lasted an eternity I gave in. My body keeps going but my mind, that part which recognises the pain and despair; it had decided it had more than enough.  It said, “No More, Enough is Enough”.

Am I a quitter, I asked myself? I always thought I was strong and capable. I believed I could handle anything. I’ve heard of worse things than people should ever be expected to go through and felt their pain as I listened. I’ve seen some horrors I never thought I’d see and dealt with them as I needed to. I blindly walked through the path of domestic violence because I refused to believe it was happening to me.  I handled what was put before me and came through scarred but still me.

How do you explain to someone that, you thought that, being married meant “supporting your husband” and that everything he said you “had to do”, you had no choice in? I’ve carried bricks like a brickies labourer, carted cement like a concreter’s labourer. I’ve carried and rolled thousands of square metres of turf, barrowed topsoil and leveled it, built walls, sawn and carried timber and a hundred other things because, that’s what being married was all about. Doing things together and supporting your husband. It meant I was a slave to someone’s “ownership of me”.  Until the day my eyes were opened and I finally had enough and left.

#Today

image from facebook.com

What caused my back problems?

Yes, I’ve had two ‘minor’ car accidents and according to the ‘experts’ I had two “minor” whiplash episodes. They were so minor they refused to accept how much pain I had nor would they perform an x-ray. For years they refused until one day they relented, just to shut me up. Too damned late then and being proven right didn’t help at all.

Is it irony to acknowledge that in the beginning I was young and fit? Is it irony to say that because I went to the gym regularly, not only for fitness but as a stress release, that I damaged my body by doing too much exercise?  Is it irony to now say that my condition is age related? Are there any more excuses they can think up?

I believed, for one brief interlude, that being diagnosed with Lyme disease might answer all the questions, and eventually see me well. Now, since Lyme disease does not exist in Australia, (so say the powers that be), and my doctor, who specialised in infectious diseases, is actually registered only as a General Practitioner. He made a video announcing his treatment of his Lyme disease patients which caught the eyes of the Medical Association. Well, now he is restricted (banned) from treating anyone diagnosed with Lyme disease. They must be referred to someone else for treatment. Excuse me, treatment? How can they do that if they deny it exists in Australia? How much irony can one body take?

#Today

image from http://www.josephine wallart.co.uk

In one sense it doesn’t matter whether it is irony or not. No longer can the facts be argued. But what can never be ignored is the fact that they now say there is nothing they can do except load me with pain killers which rob me of the ability to think or act as the person I really am.

This morning I had reached the end of the road. At the moment of waking, a screaming throughout my body, of the pain of lying still, of having the chain mail weight of a light sheet and blanket over me was too much. Having to plead with my husband to PULL me quickly upright instead of gently brought an anguished scream from me.  Enough I thought, I’ve had enough.

But the end was too far away. If I didn’t want to soil myself I had to reach the bathroom. No dignity here.  Each painful slide of a foot forward speared pain up through every part of my body and into my brain. Two damned, bloody steps up that I loathe more deeply each day and then fifty agonising steps to the bathroom later, there is more pain. By the time I reach the vanity basin to wash my hands, I would breathe a sigh of relief, but I tried that once and it hurts too much. So I just think it instead.

The retracing of my journey is the same except going down those two damned stairs becomes a farce. ‘Enough’ my mind screams at me. ‘Enough’ I say! I would cry, but self-pity is useless and apart from that, crying is too damned painful. More irony!

I want an end to this. I want to be able to walk again, just like I used to. I want to be able to laugh and smile and not know that it is just a cover for how I really feel. I want to not feel that I’m an ingrate for complaining when so many are worse off than I.  I have too much to be grateful for.

I have a husband I love more than I would have believed possible. I have two wonderful children who have become incredible adults. I have a roof over my head. I have a beautiful ocean to see from my deck (if I can get there) and I have my beautiful orchids which are flowering again. I also have ‘my’ owl who visits me even here. I have too many things to be grateful for and no right to talk about giving up. I am reminded daily of how many wonderful things I have in my life to be grateful for. I have a journal I complete daily to remind me, if I should forget. I am grateful.

Today, I have had enough. Today this is too much to handle. Today I want an end to this. Today I want an end – not in some unknown future but now. Now. Today.

In the event that anyone needs an explanation; the beautiful pictures from Josephine Wall Art are to symbolise that I recognise that even in the midst of a shitty and awful day, I know that beauty and Spirit exists. It is there to help me to grasp that reality and find an even footing to go forward with. I hope it may help some of you also.

Today is almost over and tomorrow, my new today will be better, if only because I have coping mechanisms in place to haul me out of those depths before I drown. This is my fervent hope.

There are those who will understand my words, inexpertly written as they are, yet this is not for them alone. It is for everyone who decides to read it.

To those I say:

Blessings always,  Susan x

© Susan Jamieson 2014

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