A New Chapter in My Life

Sixteen years ago I started a new chapter in my life with the birth of my oldest son. Over the years it has been added to and the outcome of the story rewritten with the births of 3 more children, the loss of 3 pregnancies, and the bringing of my stepchildren into my life. Other chapters unfolded alongside this one, all penned carefully in the tedious manner of my perfectionism, detailing various jobs, the love and loss of my mother, the coming and going of friends, and the final acceptance of myself as being who I really am and not who everyone else thought I should be. The story could have gone on in this manner for years, adding more and more, all the way to an "and they all lived happily ever after" ending in the book of my life.

Today I closed that chapter and opened a new one, since that life was shattered and no longer existed. The uncertainty of the outcome of this new story lurks in the lower recesses of my psyche and threatens the sanctity of the first in the face of a seemingly more menacing future.

This story begins July 30, 2007.

I received the results of my most recent MRI scan today, beginning my new tale. No one can really say how the story will end.

IMPRESSION: At least two areas of abnormality in FLAIR signal situated in the periventricular white matter on the right side, in the parietal and occipital regions, demonstrating no significant enhancement after contrast and having a nonspecific appearance and can be seen with multiple sclerosis in an appropriate clinical situation.

After being told "it's all in your head, you need to see a psychiatrist," 12 months after the onset of my symptoms I find out that it really IS all in my head - just not in the way it was attempted to be forced on me back then.

This is why it is so important for each of us to be aware of our own bodies; and if we think something is wrong, we need to pursue it to its conclusion and not just accept the word of someone who can never walk in our shoes. Had I just nodded my head and played the game according to their rules instead of my own, taking that referral to a psychiatrist, I would never had made it this far in this misadventure.

I'm not dead yet and I don't plan on giving up easily or lying down without a fight. I WILL win, you wait and see. I will use my pen and all the gifts endowed upon me by the Lord to rewrite this chapter to that happily-ever-after ending, not only for my own sake but for my children's. This iceberg has a long journey ahead in the warm ocean currents before melting away, but I know I will not be forgotten - I will live on, like the berg that took down the Titanic.