Pressing Play

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For the last six months I have been scared. If you asked me in person how I’ve been of course wouldn’t just come out and say it, but while my mouth was busy saying “Oh, I’ll make it.” my brain has been shouting “I’M FREAKING OUT MAN!”.

Getting defibrillated shocked me you guys. Pun intended. It was not something I had on my radar or schedule. It knocked the wind out of me, pun again intended, and for a long while I have really been just kind of coasting along. I’ve avoided anything I thought might have even a slight chance of bringing on anything like that again. I have been through about five overhauls of my meds. I’ve been to therapists, I’ve meditated, I’ve tried just about everything to stop freaking out and over the last few weeks it seems I just have. I’ve stopped freaking out. I’ve been searching for something to make me feel better these last six months, something to make me feel safe in my own body again, and have found nothing. It seems to me the answer wasn’t something to be found through medicine or mental health care (though both are super important). I think it just took time, six months to be exact.

It’s taken six months to get in my car alone and drive across the state to see my mom and gramma. It’s taken six months to feel like I could make a single plan without first considering all the potential risks for another doozy of a heart rhythm. This has happened to me before. Something bad happens and I just stop moving. If I hold very still perhaps the bad thing will go away. I press pause on my life and retreat in to the places I know I am safe. I cocoon better than anyone you’ve ever met.

After six months being in my cocoon I am ready to go again. It doesn’t matter to me that soon my ICD will start singing me it’s critical battery song. I’m still going to St. Louis for a dear friends wedding this weekend. It doesn’t matter that for some reason I cannot seem to get extra fluid to get off and stay off, I am going with my aunt and uncle to a Garth Brooks concert in a couple weeks. It doesn’t matter that I have to get blood work at least once a month (but more like constantly) forever. I am going to that NWSL soccer match I am super excited for.  I doesn’t matter that I know I am going to have to schedule a device change in the next 8-10 weeks, I am still going to have a happy birthday, a fun family vacation and whatever else I want to do until then.

Am I sad I’ve spent the last six months on pause? Not really. I firmly believe that my body and mind know exactly what I need to do to get through anything. I actually have no evidence to the contrary. I have survived everything life has thrown at me thus far, and my plan is to keep up the good work. play

Circle

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Two months ago I had the wind knocked out of me both literally and figuratively and since then, things haven’t been quite the same. It shouldn’t have been a surprise when after four years living with my ICD (internal cardiac defibrillator) it finally had it’s first go at “thumping” me.

I was on a photo shoot, I was playing with a kid getting him to smile in spite of his instance not to, he was good but I was better. Sure, that smile only came as my physical comedy got more involved but it came and once I had it I was determined to keep it going, my body however had another plan.

Silence. That is what I remember, it was just so quiet. All the noise of cars going by, and the kid laughing at me, and my fellow photographer talking, it all faded to nothing. My vision went from bright white to deep black, and then at once came back with a tremendous thud in my chest. It hurt, it hurt like nothing I’d ever felt before, not the worst pain of my life kind of hurt, but a hurt I had never experienced and couldn’t describe to you accurately if I had unlimited time and words. The best I can come up with is hitting your funny bone, with a sledgehammer, while grabbing hold of an electric fence, while licking a nine-volt battery. It was impact and electricity at once.

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1 Comment

mo-artist-drawing

My instinct, with a title like that is to immediately type the lyrics to either an Adele or Lionel Richie song but I don’t think my passionate vocal interpretation of either song could be done justice via text alone. I will spare you. This time.

My name is Monica, but you can call me Mo. If you are currently reading this site, the odds are good that you already knew that. If you are new, hello! Was it me you’re looking for? That is an actual question not just a song lyric, did you mean to click this page? What brings you here? Did my mother send you? She can be overly proud sometimes.

Anyway, new friend, old friend, unknown being from planet Blurg who is reading this for a school report on humans in the year 3048, welcome.

I’m not sure what I’m doing here, but I’m here and really that has been my story from the start. I’m just someone who see things a little differently and sometimes likes to write those things down. My sister once described me as the type of person who wears a cape with her roller skates, I think that is as much of an introduction as anyone really needs.

Welcome.