Getting better

(PLEASE NOTE THIS WAS NOT EDITING. IT'S LITERALLY JUST THE RAMBLINGS OF A SICK WOMAN AT 3:30 IN THE MORNING)

It's 3:30 in the morning here and instead of sleeping, I'm awake, contemplating life and health. I'm not a very healthy person. Every time the doctor asks, "How do you see your overall health?" and I say "Fine" I can hear my inner voice say, "Bitch, please." The hard truth is that I haven't been healthy since middle school.

I was homeschooled from preschool to middle school and only didn't graduate a year early from high school because I was held back in home school one year when my mom was sick with my brother. I wasn't the sharpest pencil in the kitchen drawer, but I did okay. And I rarely got sick. I don't remember being sick much as a kid, but being homeschooled by my social circle was small. My friends were our next-door neighbors and the kids I attended church with. There are literally only two times I remember being sick as a kid and that was the time I got West Nile and the time I was so ill I literally fell asleep on my math textbook. 

When I reached high school, however, the homeschool game had shifted. All my classes went from books to the computer. Math became exceedingly difficult and my parents decided that maybe we should look into my going to a high school. 

That first year of high school was a train wreck. All my teachers would tell you and the office staff literally rolled their eyes whenever I walked into the office. See, my body crashed. My entire immune system decided to shut down, and since I was having an awful time adjusting to the school, I didn't really try to stop it...something I now regret. Now...to understand what caused this, here are some things you need to know.

1) I went from homeschooling (Where I would get all my classes done in five hours and about 2 hours of that was spent on math alone) to an environment where I had a set amount of time for each class (too much in most classes, not enough in math). So I was stressing over grades.

2) I knew 1 person at the school before joining it. She turned out to not be the friend I thought she was and was instead a two-faced bitch. 

3) I was Nazarene, the school was Lutheran...I had to learn quickly all the random chants and such we did during chaples. 

4) I felt sick ALL THE TIME. 

So, my immune system crashed and I gave up on school. I started hating school, but I still went on to college after I graduated. I did pretty good at college because of how the classes were set up. I loved night classes. I was more awake at that time of day and preferred 1 class for 3 hours a week to 3 classes for 1 hour a week. But I entered the workforce. 

I kept my job at college for 5 years. By some miracle, I worked my way up to student manager and catering manager. I learned quickly during this time in my life that mornings were my downfall. I had a harder time talking myself into going to work and class in the mornings. I didn't even party! Like, I could have been out with friends getting drunk, but NO! I was calling in every morning because of 'the flu'...which I later came to realize was just morning nerves.

After college, I got a gig at the school I'd worked at in the summer. This was decent. It was like 3 hours a day in the evening...but I ended up needing more income and I wanted to go full-time. So I switched positions. I loved my new position but I got sick for about 1 week every month.

Then COVID hit. Fucking, COVID. My life instantly separated itself into BC and AC (Before COVID and After COVID). Before COVID, I'd get sick a lot but not so much that I was at a risk of losing my job. After COVID....well, a year of lockdown was not nice to me. I ended up on an anti-depressant, and anti-anxiety pill, and was scared to leave my apartment. Just as the lockdown ended and work started up again, I was given these meds and an ESA (emotional support animal). 

My ESA is my baby. Spook has been a godsend. Yet, at first, he would eat himself while I was at work. Turns out he has anxiety and IBS. So the vet told me to either get him a friend or jam a pill down his throat. Naturally, I got him a friend. I've only given that cat medicine once in our lives and he bit me...and I couldn't even blame him because if someone jammed a tube of gross-tasting liquid down my throat I'd bite them too. 

Spook was sick, I was sick...And when I was sick I was worried about being stuck, which made me even sicker...and I lost my job. 

I took a few months off, then decided to pursue a job in my actual field of study. I was good at it too. Journalism was my thing, but it was so stressful. I quickly realized why it was on the list of jobs that people with anxiety should not have. I literally never stopped working and I was constantly triple-checking everything because I was terrified of getting a fact, or a name, or a quote wrong. 

Recently, I went back to the job I had before I lost it. Not the librarian position, but back as a para. I missed working with the kids and it's been nice. The problem is, I'm still sick all the time. 

I beat myself up a lot for being sick, but I'm trying to learn to give myself grace. I've gone from being sick for a week at a time to being sick for 3 days. I've started therapy, I'm working on getting my health better, and I do nightly meditations. I still get worried about what my coworkers think of me not being at work. I tell my boss what's going on, but I don't tell all of them. 

I am getting better though, and that's what I'm trying to focus on lately.