Love, Life + Chiari

It’s a bit ironic that I keep coming up on articles about love and heartache. This topic is particularly complex for me because love is a topic that – in my opinion, many have different views on. I live with Chiari + Syringomyelia which like any condition can be lonely. This is why many may experience a bit of depression and anxiety. This all can get in the way of maybe allowing others into your personal space and by this, I mean everyone, children, spouse, you name it, preventing you from loving. So, how do you love, when you are trying to love yourself and accepting the new you? I don’t know your answer to that. It’s no secret that I’m still trying to accept my own personal struggles with the 2013 diagnosis, so much so that I decided to seek help. If you’ve read my Chiari + Mental Illness you’ll know that the help came in form of my therapist.

Since my diagnosis I’ve felt that I’ve wanted to go back in time, thinking that maybe things would be different. That’s such a lie, isn’t it? Because the Chiari diagnosis would have come regardless of where my life would have gone, if not where I am now, it would have still been the same. I have my highs and lows, I suppose like anyone living with a health condition and chronic pain, and trying to come to terms with it. I say that while wanting to believe I’ve accepted the diagnosis. Like it’s OK! Or is it?! But, why do I want to go back in time? Maybe because I haven’t fully accepted my condition, to really say, I have Chiari?! Ugh. Those dreaded words. It’s at times overwhelming – exhausting!

And just like the feeling you get from the loss of a love due to a break up and heartbreak, I’ve felt that feeling of wanting to come up for air. I’m gasping for air and I’m trying so hard to stay above waters. I’m definitely treating Chiari like a long lost love, the only difference is that, I’d rather live without it. All this reading on love and heartache has brought back some memories of when I was younger and in love, carefree, in love with life, in love with my plans for the future – Chiari wasn’t there. I went through such a bad heartbreak at a young age and feel it’s all molded me in who I am today – maybe not a person I’d want to be, but it did change me. I was and continue to be a work in progress because of the emotional damage. My husband has had to help me unpack all this baggage that I’ve carried with me – willing to or not, he’s had to deal with it. A love, past or present has a way of marking your life, to touch it, to influence it. I read somewhere, “Love is Pain.” It is, so if you’re willing to love, you’re also willing to go through the pain it can possibly cause. And if there’s a breakup – and you loved them, you continue to love that person because of whom they were with you. However, as time goes by that person is no longer the same, because time has gone by and they’re not the same person you knew. Or are they? How do you let go? I don’t think you do, I think time heals a broken heart but I think that person will forever remain in your life, in form of a memory – in the memories you both shared. A connection you build with someone you fall in love with is incredibly strong, and you can say it isn’t so, but believe that there is someone out there that you will connect with in such a deeper level that they will change the course of your life. Love – true love, is something that not many experience in their lifetime. If you lose it or still have it, it’s something that not many get to experience in their lives. And if you haven’t, have hope that one day you will.

And when you do, when you find true love, you will experience one of the greatest joys life has to offer. And that is what life’s all about!

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Photo: John Jennings