Lockjaw

Last year - and years before - when I got this sick, I just went out of touch for a while. Weeks, months. Time loses all meaning for me and I just drift along, waiting it out. There's really not much else to be done, after all, besides the usual preparations for this annual siege. Just wait. Let time go by. The pollen levels will go back down again, and I can go back to the less limited life I get to have the rest of the year.

It's hard to explain, and hard to understand, how something as ordinary as allergies can do this to a person. Even the very extreme allergies I'm experiencing now.

But I want to try.

This year I want very much to not go out of communication again. And if there's anything positive to be gained from talking about it, then the time to talk is now.

I'm not the only one who gets desperately ill from extreme allergies. Of course not. The thing is, though, there are more and more people like me every year. That means there are lots of newbies. It took years for me to come to terms with it, even as imperfectly as I have. I think about those people freshly struck down and I hope I can help them a little bit, talking about what it's like.

If bad health news bothers you, I understand perfectly well. I understand if it's depressing or even irritating. That's human nature. If you do dislike it, the answer is NOT to tell me to stop talking. YOU, instead, should stop reading.

See, giving any comfort I can to others like me far outweighs any discomfort I may give to reasonably healthy people. Think about this: Choice. If you don't want to read it, then don't. You don't need to, after all.

OTOH: Whether you choose to accept this truth or not, people who are sick didn't get that way by choice.