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vandyke
I wanted to respect the fact that you want to close your thread.
But no on said I couldn’t write anything on my own…haha.
I love you man…just deal with…you are a good person and if you cannot see that right now then you need to tell that to your Doctor.
What do you want? Is the big question...
DO you want to wallow in self-pity? Try to be honest about it…I can say that there have been times in a lot of people’s lives when they have done such a thing…it’s only human nature….we are built it to find that love, and acceptance, and if we are really lucky you know someone that understands you.
You telling me that your thread is closed won’t stop me being your friend or try to help you or offer you support if I can.
It isn’t ME that old wounds are triggered in…I hope you don’t think so.
By recounting my own struggles I was hoping you would see your own pathway becoming more clear to you.
I woke up with my ear all plugged and in pain…like it fucking hurt…I just had to laugh like a fucking manic…because it cracked me up…of all the times to give me another thing that hurts…hahahaha. Still makes me laugh.
It’s absurd…there are just absurd things in this life and absurd things that life puts you through.
Sometimes it knocks you down really hard, and it takes a while to get back up again.
Sometimes it can even hurt you pretty badly and it takes time for wounds to heal.
The important thing is to find that part of yourself that is saying “Fuck you life…I will beat you.”
And if you can’t find the fight…then try to find that part that says “We need to try.”
And if all else fails find that voice that says “We need help."
What you do in your day to day is not ready clear Peter…there is still much I don’t know about you…but, what you have here is a tool I NEVER had at 19 when I felt like I was a mistake in the world…that I had nothing to offer to anyone…the despair and loneliness without any outlet.
You have made MANY friends on this forum…many of whom are INFJs though I’m sure many other types can empathize too…what you have here are people who can understand you far better than some…use this.
I feel like shit this morning…I slept on the couch…but I am happy for the fact that the sun will rise in a few minutes…the sun will always rise so long as I alive…the world goes on around us and it’s so hard to get out of our own heads sometimes…life has a nasty habit of throwing you off balance…or even just intimidating a person with the expectations of the world.
I can tell you honestly, that those expectations are your own.
Once you realize that you have control over your own destiny, then you will see the glimmer of light in your darkness.
There is so much you have not done and experienced…and I’m not much older than you, but I can say that in the last 8 years it’s been a roller coaster that I refuse to get off.
You just have to throw your arms up and scream for those scary parts…because sitting in the car scared to see the next turn will not allow you to enjoy the ride.
You have to learn that….that is hard to do…it takes daily thought and affirmation…but it’s possible.
Listen, set small goals for yourself…my goal in the next 6 months in to get well enough to at least hold a part time job and try to be more productive again.
Not because we are drowning in debt (though, get this…since I was employed by the hospital I worked for they also insured me…those last two months where I was really hurting and needed to see the Doctors to try to stop things before they got out of hand with my back --- those employers have sent the medical bills that I no longer have the money to pay because they fired my strictly for being absent too much ---they have sent my medical bills to a collector who tried to fucking take me to court!!! Can you believe the fucking gall of that?? The nerve…after I gave them five committed years and so many hours and late night trying to save dying people!!)
I’m a little angry at them still….I always had exemplary employee reviews…to even be considered to train on the Open Heart Team…you have to be not only super-knowledgable about surgery in general and be able to react to ANY problem without thinking about it…the whole surgery, if it goes correctly is a big choreographed dance that one must learn the dance moves too….I never counted the steps but let me just say…most lasted over 4 hours…generally 5-6…sometimes we would have one a day at which point we would go to the main surgery suites upstairs and help with whatever surgeries they needed us for.
Anyhow, I was saying…there were about 8 trays full of instruments…I have some pictures somewhere of all the heart surgery instruments all set up before hand.
We are expected to know this dance AND know the specific for the different Doctors who would come…we mostly worked with one main surgeon but there were 3 other Docs that we would see on call time…let me just say…my call time consisted of half the month…so for half the month they can keep me late (all the time) they can call you at any hour between 330 when you would get off and 7am - and they did!
You know…there is a point to this…I worked for like the last 10 years to be 1 of 4 out of 80 or so people who could first assist an Open Heart and do it well.
I can and have done brain surgeries for days man…broken bones…those are fun to fix (unless it’s a damn elbow…those are always a pain to fix)…I have delivered babies…once I had to run across the the street when I lived in CA because the tech who was supposed to come in on emergency call had a car failure….the cord was wrapped around the babies neck and it was in distress…the woman needed an emergency C-section…the others nurses had basically opened the trays and literally dumped all of them on the sterile field…it was a mess, but I put on my sterile gown and gloves and hopping in there because a baby was dying and because it was my job as well (though I didn’t work in maternity).
The baby was fine…the Mother was fine…it was scary, I will admit that…when they said run across the street I just about swallowed a brick…I had very little experience with maternity matters…but I just had to do what I had to do…because if I hadn’t, then who knows?
My two points I am getting at…okay maybe three….a shitload of stuff has happened in that period of time…I got really good at my job…the surgeons requested me frequently which always make one feel good. I probably helped save countless lives that I really have no clue about what or who they really are…some people come in with some many broken limbs and damaged organs, or brain…and you wonder if they will even live…many have ended up being a big surprise.
But there are those who cannot be saved…and I have done chest compressions on so many folks I cannot even give you an estimate….I stood there while they died, or while we frantically tried to save them, being a witness to that I think counts for something too.
So when I lost my job…I know I lost a huge part of what I considered my identity…for so many years I had worked toward being the best I could and I fucking made it!
Then I lost it all.
Depression…then when I finally started on my road back to feeling normal…that crap with my medication causing my heart to only beat 30 times a minute came along…then I started to get better and the insurance wants me to change pain meds (actually they didn’t even give the Doctors any notice…they just had a bunch of patients calling them saying they couldn’t refill their prescriptions) and that has really been rough…so waking up with an earache made me laugh…I just had to…I’m sure my immune system isn’t the best right now…when you combine stress and those couple of hits to the body I took, no wonder my sinuses attacked me…haha.
Listen, we don’t have to talk about my issues, or your issues at all anymore if that is what you wish…I would just hate to see someone so bright and kind and talented just give up because YOU don't feel worthy somehow…it’s a skewed viewpoint when you are depressed man…it isn’t reality.
I had no idea that I would be here right now, where I am in life all those years ago when I was 19…if I had known, I KNOW I would not have hurt myself.
Like I said before - So much has happened…so much I would have missed…the memories I have made…the love I have cultivated…THAT LOVE is what has remained while the rest of my life fell to shit…it was that love that pulled me through.
Just because certain parts of your life have not come to fruition yet, only means you have not grown those…they are like plants my friend…you decide what YOU want to plant the seeds of…then you wait…sometimes we wait a long time before we see the seedling beginning to sprout…and that is when they are most vulnerable…when YOU are most vulnerable…no doubt that people will come along that will make you think twice about your decisions - fuck them.
They don’t know you from the next guy…do your own thing…those expectation are only your own Peter.
You can be anything or everything…the choice is yours.
Much love,
Michael
:hippie:
