Topic: first day of work..........i miss the old me
cantgiveupyet
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 8165
posted
So, i went back to work today. Everyone was so happy that i was back. I have to say most of the day i surfed the net....and just tried to adjust to the new me at work. There really wasnt much work to do at all...and in the past most days i surfed the net.
I miss the me i used to be......walking thru the halls i remembered when things were different....i wasnt afraid to pee...and my coworkers werent afraid for me.
I am the missing link to my group....and i sat there today....tears in my eyes surrounded by healthy people. People planning what to wear for the holiday gala....and there i sat wrapped in my blanket...wondering when and if i will ever get better.
Everything is different at work, i have a new desk, new people to work with....so much adjustment....new procedures etc. A lot fell thru the cracks while i was gone.
My LLMD's words played over and over again..."we will get your life back" and then the mucous in my throat and trouble breathing krept in....yea it was that time of the day.
Right now i still cant breathe right...well i feel like i cant...i know it will pass its just getting to that point.
I so want to be well again.
-------------------- "Say it straight simple and with a smile."
"Thus the task is, not so much to see what no one has seen yet, But to think what nobody has thought yet, About what everybody sees."
-Schopenhauer
pos babs, bart, igenex WB igm/igg Posts: 3156 | From Lyme limbo | Registered: Oct 2005
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You can do it... Doesn't seem like much now, but trust me.
Before I got LD, I was a sailor. It was my life. I still tear up thinking about all the places I've been and people I've met. I don't know who I am without the sea. When I got sick and was actually told that they didn't know how to keep me alive (that was back when I had meningitis AND encephalitis), I would call my placement officer on a daily basis to let her know I wouldn't be in that day, but I'd try the next. I did that for five months before I finally got my doctors to sign me off (seemed everyone had to call to ensure I would not be stuck out there if I got sick). I figured that since we were talking about my livelihood, I should be the only one to say I couldn't do it. I had to prove to myself that that chapter in my life was over.
For five months, I worked every single day, 4 hours on, eight off. It sucked, but every day I got a little stronger, and a little prouder that I was able to work through the worst of my Lyme moments. It wasn't until I was showing signs of another bout of meningitis that I came home, and even then I wanted to stay and fight my body.
This may not be very encouraging since I was ultimately declared unfit for duty, but everything I went through out there made me stronger. Every day I got up because calling in sick was not an option was one more big f.u. to this horrible disease. In the end, I feel like I won. Lyme couldn't keep me down. I can't feel one side of my face, or my right hand. I can't see straight on most days, and I can't stand for more than a few minutes without wanting to fall over, but for four hours at a time, I was as normal as some one living with a dibilitating disease can be.
Hope this was at least a little helpful... It won't be fun, and you may feel alone at times, but you can do it. I have faith.
-------------------- Sometimes when I say �Oh, I�m fine� I want someone to look me in the eyes & say �tell the truth�
Andie333
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 7370
posted
Great thread.
Thanks so much, AP, for your post. I think realizing the lives that have been put on hold or radically changed as a result of this disease is one of the hardest things for me.
I went through a period of thinking about all the places I'd travelled in the world and the extraordinary things I'd seen and people I'd met. It was just too hard to think about.
I'm slowly getting better, slowly increasing my work. I work with children now (which, in many ways, IS like travelling to a foreign country every day you spend with them -- and I mean that in the best possible sense). Next week, I begin working with a new student, and I've only lost one since the worst of it.
Also, Cant, I was asked to work three days a week from mid-January through late-May. I haven't accepted yet, because so far, my work has been flexible. Nobody has expected me to be someplace at any specific time, and everyone understands it when I have "bad" days and need to change the schedule.
In this new position, that won't be the case. I will absolutely have to show up and stay there. It makes me nervous, but like AP said, I don't want this disease to win.
I'm so much better now than I was 6 weeks ago...and I have to believe I'll be much better 6 weeks from now when this job starts.
...not to mention the fact that we really really need the income!
Cant, when you said, "I really miss the old me" that touched me so much. I knew just how you feel.
I'm determined to beat this disease. I'm not sure how far determination will take me but I'm banking on that, prayer and one heckuva good LLMD (oh, and my great SO and my friends...don't want to leave them out).
Andie
Posts: 2549 | From never never land | Registered: May 2005
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cantgiveupyet
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posted
Thanks AP and Andie.....im sitting here crying reading your posts. to find someone who can relate means the world to me tonite...so i thank you.
I never looked at it as the lyme winning...but now that you put it that way it makes me even more determined.
You know the best part of my day was my lunch. We have a cafeteria at work with food i used to love to eat. But today i sat at my desk...took out my salad(romaine lettuce and olive oil with some pepper) it tasted very good...then i had my eggs and a sweet potatoe. The lunch was one thing i didnt miss about the old me. I snacked on almonds and before i knew it i ate half the bag!!
Anyway i just wanted to thank both of you again for making me see that it can be done and somehow we just keeping fighting.
-------------------- "Say it straight simple and with a smile."
"Thus the task is, not so much to see what no one has seen yet, But to think what nobody has thought yet, About what everybody sees."
-Schopenhauer
pos babs, bart, igenex WB igm/igg Posts: 3156 | From Lyme limbo | Registered: Oct 2005
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AP - your determination is very encouraging! I've been fortunate in that I work with my husband. I'm able to adjust my hours as needed when sick.
cantgiveupyet - that's a great choice of name!! I need to work..to feel useful, just for mental state of mind. I'm not the type to tolerate lying around for too long. When I absolutely have to stay home, I do it, but it's a triumph to keep working as much as I can.
Glad to know I'm not alone in this battle! We will get better and we will get stronger. Just have to keep battling the beast! ~Mo
map1131
Frequent Contributor (5K+ posts)
Member # 2022
posted
Once upon a time I thought that my job/career was who I was. Like many of you, I just kept on going for 2 1/2 yrs. Nothing was going to stop me and my career and climbing the corp ladder.
Wrong on both counts. There is so much more to me than who I was in my previous career. Secondly, when we continually ignore a sick body and put others/things before our health there is something or someone (my God) that can stop you. If you're lucky like me, it will be before it kills you at a young age.
Cantgiveupyet, the old you is still there. It's just buried under alot of garbage(lyme). You'll slowly get rid of it, layer by layer.
Take care, Pam
-------------------- "Never, never, never, never, never give up" Winston Churchill Posts: 6478 | From Louisville, Ky | Registered: Jan 2002
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Linda LD
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I just want to be a little better. Last night my four year old asked me before 7:00pm if we could go to bed. I said, "SURE!" So we went to bed. I want to be the Mom out in the driveway playing HORSE (basketball) at 7:00pm at night...
I want to be the mom doing fun things--not graciously allowing a four year old to cuddle up in my bed to go to sleep before 7:00pm--does that make sense?
I just want a little of my life back...
Posts: 1171 | From Knoxville, TN US | Registered: Dec 2004
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Michelle M
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GOOD FOR YOU, Can't! I'm so glad you're back at work. I hope that things will get better, albeit perhaps very slowly.
I worked through times which I look back on now and marvel that I made it through. I'm lucky to have an extremely supportive workplace where I've been for nearly 14 years.
In addition to giving everyone all the education they could stand about Lyme disease and in particular, neuroborreliosis, I tried to keep a bit of a sense of humour about it when possible. Otherwise, I would come kind of close to losing it at times.
I work for a criminal defense law firm. I would interview new clients and within five minutes have absolutely no recollection of what they said.
We would have staff meetings and assignments were given out..it got to be a (gentle) joke, "Don't tell Michelle, she'll forget!!"
I would fall asleep sitting up. I could not follow conversations. I could work on discrete tasks only one at a time and only if uninterrupted (i.e., next to impossible). I became the Queen of Blank Looks. I would try to pretend I was OK, which would cause my friends at work to cry, because they were trying to do my work secretly, without mentioning it to me. Co-workers covered me, wrote post-its and taped them all over me, my workstation, took responsibility for important dates, etc.
The good news is that the summer was the worst of it. Each week, each month, was better. If progress is slow, don't lose hope, because it might take months before you actually look back and say, "WHOA! I am TONS better than a few months ago!" Seize each positive thing, try to keep a sense of humor, share with your friends at work, and keep on keepin' on!! You can do it!
Michelle
Posts: 3193 | From Northern California | Registered: Apr 2005
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cantgiveupyet
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Hey Michelle, this is another Michelle.
I'm telling more and more coworkers about it...most are supportive. And a cowoker that was nasty to me before all of this stopped by my desk this AM...we talked and she filled me in on the mess my mgr created for her group while i was out. He is clueless. Anyway, she knews all about probiotics....which made me smile, she mentioned them to me...wanted to make sure i was on them. Her mom has been sick for months...one illness after another and she suspects lyme. I came out of this conversation with so much. The one person I least expected to ever talk to me, yet alone support me. WOW.
I will try to make jokes about it....
Im having a smidgen better of a day today....just bladder pain..which is painful...but yesterdays fog is released......its amazing how much better you feel...yet still a normal persons crappy, crappy day.
tonite is the xmas party at work, the coworkers i went with last year asked if i was going....i said no. It saddens me a tad....but im looking forward to curling up in bed with my cat tonite :-) Next year i will celebrate!
-------------------- "Say it straight simple and with a smile."
"Thus the task is, not so much to see what no one has seen yet, But to think what nobody has thought yet, About what everybody sees."
-Schopenhauer
pos babs, bart, igenex WB igm/igg Posts: 3156 | From Lyme limbo | Registered: Oct 2005
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Nothin in life stays the same. I have lived in many different places, left lots of friends, houses & careers I loved but I alwayse looked foreword to what NEW adventure awaited me rather than mourn for what was left behind.
This life prepared me to accept the major change lyme disease brought to me.
Some changes were wonderful and some difficult but in the end they all made me see the world as a much larger place and to recognize that my needs are not that important.
Each of us can take what we have and make a meaningful life with it if we are not too involved in looking at what we have lost.
I did go thru a 4 day mourning when I had to accept the fact that I could no longer work and had to live on social security disability but then I got up and got busy on learning how to make what little cognitive time I had be as meaningful as possible.
Posts: 561 | From connecticut | Registered: May 2004
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Loribelle
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Member # 6293
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cantgiveupyet,
Your post touched a soft spot in me. I remember how sick I was a year ago. Frankly, my husband and I both thought I would die.
BUT I didn't. I'm soooo much better. I started working again, not my old job which I LOVED, but a new one. It is flexible, part-time and much easier physically, it is working out well for me. I got a Christmas card from my boss today saying that she was so glad she hired me and that I am such an asset to the project... What a nice gift that card was!
I remember (last year) grieving for my 'old life', and being angry. I remember thinking every minute "I miss the me I used to be". I was always very active and strong. Got my 'big old Iowa farm butt' kicked by a tick. I remember refusing to "redefine myself" as someone "less" than what I was.
Thing is, I did redefine myself, little by little. Not really consciously, my life has just kind of evolved. Now I realize that I am in no way "less" than what I was, just "different". In many ways, I am "more" than what I was.
It still certainly frustrates me that I have no stamina. And that I just can't do many of the things I used to do or wanted to try. But, there are different avenues in my life now that I am so glad are there. I have met many interesting and wonderful people that I'd never have met in other circumstances; and I am glad for that.
Not really sure where to go with this Other than to say "Hang in there" and "Bloom where you're planted". Sounds like you have a good support team. Don't give up on you...
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I remember refusing to "redefine myself" as someone "less" than what I was.
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