Been Caught Stealing

Am I being selfish? Am I being greedy? Am I being overly dramatic? Should I be more grateful? Should I be more positive? Should I accept my lot in life and plod ahead without fighting for the life I really want?

I got an email from my cousin where she expressed her profound dissaproval in a blog where I stated that my needs are not always being met by those close to me. She reminded me that I have a loving family who'd do anything for me and incredible friends. I don't deny any of that. She gave examples of two situations where my family has adjusted previously made plans for me to support her argument. It saddened her to know that my loved ones are reading this blog and sometimes it appears to her that I am blasting them.

For anyone else that is as outraged or offended as she is; I am not blasting them. I am one of the lucky ones. My entire family puts their lives on hold when I am sick. How many times have they been mobilised on my behalf. How many times have they had to put their plans on hold while they continuously check in with me to ascertain whether I need anything and how much of their day must be forgone for my benefit. I am all too aware of that. And unfortunately, there is nothing I could do for them to ever fully express my gratitude for all that they have given up on my behalf, for the many mixed emotions they must have about my illness, for the inconveniences I cause, for the constant attention I require, for the frustration they must have about this. I have sent heartfelt thank you cards. I have bought thank you gifts. But again, these material things do not compensate for what they have done for me. They can't. My father keeps telling me to stop spending my money on them, that it's not necessary, that what they're doing is what family is supposed to do and I needn't say thank you in so many ways, so many times. But I can't help it. I need to express my gratitude. I don't know what I would have done without them. That's the truth and I think they know it.

As for my friends. Again, where do I start. V has saved me countless times. She famously brought the emergency room to my house on more than one occasion. She came to the emergency room with me another time and sat with me through every test and talked to every doctor that came to see me. BE sends me cards to lift my spirits and show me she's thinking about me. She buys me little presents like the Maya Angelou book and astronaut ice cream and bee propolis. A has baby-sat me twice, saving me from myself, making sure that I follow the doctor's and V's and my parent's orders and sit home and sit still and rest. She has gone grocery shopping for me. She has done my nails and sat with me on my futon or in my bed just keeping me company. AC spent so much time with me at the hospital. She brought me her super warm super comfy downy slippers. She brought me peppermint tea, my favorite, and extra tea bags. She brought me a paint-by-numbers kit. Her brother, RC, visited me in the hospital as well and spent a couple of hours with me. When I told him I was bottomless because my mother believes that you don't wear underwear in the hospital, that there's a reason they give you a gown and only a gown, he took the fleece pants he was going to use to work out and handed them to me insisting that I take them. That's friendship. I have amazing friends.

The thing is, and what my cousin objects to is that there are certain needs that aren't being met and I make that fact public. Maybe those needs are more frivolous because they are my emotional needs and maybe she thinks that with all I am putting everyone through, bemoaning having no one's arms to cry in is asking too much and being straight-up greedy. Maybe she's right. I don't know. The closest I get is with S. She, like me has one health issue after another and we often joke around about starting a nursing home for young singles. She hysterically found a website called prescription4love.com which is where people with health issues can make online love connections, Tragically, everyone on that website is decades older than us. She understands the fears I have about my future because she has them too. I can be brutally honest and 'woe is me' with her because she gets that sometimes it is difficult to put on a happy face and not be overwhelmed and it can be difficult not to see the trees and only be able to see the forest. And the forest is scary. We joke that every time we make plans to hang out one of us is either on drugs or has to cancel due to some ailment. But most people can't get their head around the dramatic turn my life has taken. That unlike them, I may or may not be in a race against time. That unlike them, I will be on chemotherapy for the rest of my life leaving me prone to infection and making it more likely that my children have birth defects. Unlike them, I have to be constantly vigilant. Unlike them, I have to lean on my family and friends and ask more of my family and friends than I ever thought I would have to. Unlike them, I always feel guilty for putting those I love through this, that they are victims of this disease too and I wish I could shoulder all of it and they didn't have to be affected by it as well.

So, for my cousin to call me dramatic may or may not be true but I am giving the situation I am in justice in describing it the way it actually is. And I am in it; she is not. Somehow I doubt most people would handle it as well as I am. Again, my doctor describes me as one of his 'saner' patients. Additionally, unless people are lying to me, they agree with my doctor. I have received countless emails about how strong and positive I have been in the face of this. I don't know what that says but it definitely says something. Maybe she doesn't realize how sick I really am. Maybe in witnessing the devotion of my friends and family she thinks that those relationships should somehow make up for the fact that I am sick. Like in a, "you can't have it all," kind of way?

Either way my mother has written, "I'm really proud of how you were able to get yourself through the past several months. It is just wonderful." Alpha Taurus acknowledged that, "I can only imagine what it must be like to have your future taken away and replaced with mostly crap and you seem especially ambitious, so it must be twice as tough." Katri observed, "I had no idea what you were really going through until I read your blog - and you made a decision to throw off that anger and fear and you did it and were radiant and so full of love ..." JE wrote, "I never understood the toll your illness took on you. I never really understood how much anguish you were in. I never really understood that you needed your friends as much as you do. I got that from reading the blog. When I started reading it I saw you in a light I had never seen before. I began to understand you for the first time in my life." From D, " Love your blogs. Love them. Even if I didn't know you I would love them. So universal. I am so amazed about the truthfullness about your disease. Briana, I had no idea what you've endured and continue to endure all these years. It's really humbling and I really am so inspired by your outpouring of emotion and information because in many ways I am just like you; hiding stuff. On the outside I am loquacious but I feel like I always say what people want me to say. I am good at cocktail talk. You are showing me that how being honest with oneself is very liberating and its the only way to be an artist or a writer, at least a writer that is respeected. People respond to truthful art."

I don't understand exactly where my cousin is coming from. She has known me her entire life but maybe never really knew me and the real me is disturbing her perception of who she thought I was, from the awkward, surly teenager to the carefree, fun, well-adjusted adult. That teenager is inside this smiling adult. That teenager had a lot of feelings she couldn't express and couldn't explain and she learned how to mask her feelings under a smile. Now that teenager exists in my blogs. She cries, she complains, she is overwhelmed, she is scared, she is greedy, she is misunderstood, she feels guilty, she doesn't feel pretty enough, she wonders if she's smart enough, she second guesses herself too much and she spends a lot of her time being angry at herself. Sadly, my cousin's email and her disapproval validates everything that teenager inside me feels. I am asking too much. I should be more grateful. I am alone. I am misunderstood. I guess the truth is out. I'm a bad person.