Joan that was as always very eloquently stated. I
love your attitude especially the part about making someone laugh every day.
Dan
At 11:40 PM 2/6/2012, Joan Anglin said something that elicited my response:
Candle (I love your name, makes me think of forever hope and warmth)
I think that weâre all pretty much in the same
boat as you. Each and every one of us has had
to deal with loss on an individual basis. At
51 I still ran everywhere, we had 15 horses that
we were breeding, training, showing and selling
and I was the chief cook and bottle washer. We
also had four mentally handicapped children and
a teenage daughter at home as well as two
grandchildren that showed horses as well.
Our house that we had built by ourselves in the
seventies was a bi-level house on a bi-level
basement (three sets of stairs) and we had no
outside access from my bedroom area to the
living area. For several months after rehab
(and my husbandâs insurance would only pay for
90 days) the only way I could get up or down was
in a Manual wheelchair with two people carrying
the chair up or down the stairs. I got home in
January and did not get my electric chair Until
June! How many ways can you say depression and
totally feeling absolutely unnecessary and useless.
Eventually the family support and many friends
who rallied around me brought back my spirit and
fight and things started to get drastically
better. I found new ways to do old things,
learn that many things Iâd never be able to do
but I became very good at teaching others to do them.
As a C4 quad that has only a shoulder shrugs I
have had to learn to have some thrills
vicariously through other people. Amusement
Parks-I make an excellent child watcher while
others do their rides, and I get pleasure from
the fact that I can free up the parents so they
can also have fun. We still have four horses
and I can get to watch grandchildren and their
friends having fun just being kids with
horses. Yes, I do miss my horseback riding and
climbing aboard a warm steamy horse and loping
through the snow with absolutely no noise but
the horses breath and feet crunching the freshly
fallen snow! I hate, hate having to be fed but
it is much better than not living. J
Each of us has to find an inner place that we
can be comfortable with and what works for me
will probably not work for you. The last 3 ½
weeks I have been in and out of the hospital
with cellulites and the bowel blockage, but and
finally I am on the mend. I have been going in
for antibiotic IV daily and have had to realize
how lucky I am while I listen to the dozen or so
other patients who were all there for
chemotherapy and for several it is the third or
fourth time they have repeated the
treatments. How do they keep such an upbeat
demeanor I do not know, but it was a reality
check for me and I am going to continue (or at
least trying to continue) to treat each day that
I am with my family and friends as a gift and a
treasure and hope that I will be able to
continue making a difference in some small way
and making someone laugh each and every day.
I hope that you can find a place where you can
still regret what you have lost and move on to
what you can still do and be able to ride this
roller-coaster of life with more good days then bad.
Joan wondering what happened to winter but not complaining!
" You are not enclosed within your bodies; nor
confined to houses and fields. That which is you
dwells above the mountain and roves with the wind."
Kahlil Gibran
