There’s a family meal today and I’ve had to cancel. I love my family. I am very, very lucky with them. It is sad I can’t see them today or be with them.
I’ve been cancelling plans for 15 years. Sometimes it feels fine; my health is beyond my control. But sometimes it doesn’t feel fine.
Often it’s felt like a step back. Like I should a) know my limitations by now and not commit to things I might not be able to do, b) have made physical progress with my health so that plans no longer have to cancelled.
But this time I just see it for what it actually is; a week where my body can’t do something it could have done two weeks ago. A day where my body isn’t up to something it could well be up to tomorrow.
Hardly a groundbreaking realisation for someone with a fluctuating illness and a dynamic disability. Yet some days that is groundbreaking.
And it’s all okay. It’s okay if a change in plans brings disappointment, confusion, relief, guilt, peace, pride in knowing what is best for my body…
Just as the physical side of things waxes and wanes, so too does the acceptance and the desire for some kind of consistency.
But is it not admirable, and brave even, to still hold on to some kind of hope by making plans that may well have to be cancelled. Disappointment after disappointment, but still (perhaps sometimes foolishly!) sometimes saying Yes to certain things, incase the planets align and I can be there. To see how fortunate I am to have this kind of variation in symptom-severity that means sometimes I can, even when sometimes I can’t. To, each time this happens, bear the weight of other people’s sadness when they hear I’m too unwell to join them.
IMAGE: Anna’s feet in fluffy navy socks, on her bedding. A mug of coffee is infront of them.
'M.E. myself and I' by Anna Redshaw 