Seattle's Black Cloud...

It's raining again in Seattle...go figure! Gone are the hot and sunny days we've been having, which were abnormally warm and a true fluke this time of year in the Puget Sound region. It just wasn't "right" to have that kind of weather here in May. It made Seattlites way too joyful and seemingly content...and it screwed up my inevitable depression!

I say "inevitable depression" because I was wondering WHEN the reality of my current medical circumstances would finally hit home in my tiny, little, (albeit lesion filled) pea-brain! I have been having rather content swims in the River De Nile for several weeks now, keeping myself oblivious to my current situation: My Multiple Sclerosis has become aggressive.

Yesterday, I had a total melt down at work. I did some controlled yelling at the "Big Boss"...that's right...I had a hissy fit! I hit a professional wall and waltzed into the "Big Boss's" inner sanctuary office and spewed my venom. It felt good...temporarily. I was completely red-faced, jaw pulsating, and threw up my complaint all over her neatly organized desk. In simple descriptive terms, my complaint was this: "You are asking me to do more work with less and I can't".

Now, that is a pretty scaled down version of my venomous complaint, but the simplification is very accurate. And besides, details here are unimportant. My point is I "hit the wall" and I splatted very hard at work...I'm not one who tends to "splat" at work. I'm not one who tends to "lose it" at work. I'm not one to bare my fangs and spew venom at someone who signs my paycheck. Yesterday's display of festering anger was not like me at all.

"You are asking me to do more work with less and I can't". That simplified statement, in itself, is quite benign. But as I lay awake this morning pondering my actions of yesterday, I became acutely aware of just how pervasive that statement is in my life right now and WHY I have been avoiding looking at it recently.

In my little microcosm of the world, I have now been told my "MS is aggressive", which means it is spreading in my brain and spinal cord at a more rapid pace. That's why the chemotherapy has been suggested, the monthly steroid infusions are on the table, the IV Tysabri (if it ever returns to market) is looming in the background, and why my symptoms of my last relapse are hanging on as if they've found a new home. My body is not able to keep up right now with the demands I place upon it. It is weak, fatigued, pained, and not the reliable source of strength I have based 41 years of blind faith upon. I am now asking my body to "work more with less" and it is quietly (and sometimes screaming at me) telling me it can't.

I am a big believer in the psychology our outer worlds are simply a reflection of our world within...what we project into the world is what we are inside ourselves. It's not a big leap to conclude my venomous anger at work is simply a projection of the anger I have about my physical situation. I am asking myself to do the impossible: "to work more with less". I can't. And it pains me and depresses me to admit this to myself. I feel somehow my body's failure is a reflection of my total being. I am defective somehow. I simply can't "rise to the occasion" and push myself harder to accomplish what used to take little effort. I feel tremendous loss and sadness with this reality and realization.

Perhaps this rain in Seattle is a good thing...the drops are cleansing the air and washing the dirt from the pavement. It is necessary to have periodic showers and dark clouds...nothing will grow without the rain. And I will not grow without my tears...