It's been a while since I've been this knocked down by allergies. I'd sort of forgotten what the full impact is like.
It's a strange feeling to lose days and weeks and months of your life to just drifting along.
I sleep. Most of the time I'm in bed a good 12 hours a day, sometimes more. There's no way for me to recall, unaided, how much time has passed; time has lost its sense, its meaning. Trying to remember time by looking back on significant dates like holidays is often the best I can do.
Sometimes I feel like I'm far adrift, tethered to earth by the most tenuous strand, delicate and fragile as a spider's web. Then I hear your comments like voices whispering to me in the ether, and that strand anchors me, it's strong as steel...
I have trouble communicating. Not just because I'm abed so much; it even happens when I'm out and about and moving around in my quiet world. There's something about the onslaught of all this histamine that leaves me, well, speechless.
My voice is often just a squeak, high-pitched and childish, a voice I dislike hearing from my own self, and can't control. Oh, I want my deep crunchy voice back!
But it's not just the voice, either. If someone asks me a question my mind goes blank. Very simple decisions are hard to make on the spot. It's difficult putting words and sentences together, even while writing. Can I do it? Yes. And I do. Then it saps my energy, sometimes for days afterwards. It takes everything I've got.
And here and there, people who don't understand have trouble being patient with me as my mind searches for the words and phrases, as I struggle to put it together and communicate. I give them all I've got. Everything. They try to mask their impatience and their sense that I'm Just Not Trying Very Hard. They've no idea how much they've just taken out of me, leaving me drained for hours or days afterward, nothing left inside me for anyone else or for myself.
I'm starting to come up for air now, here and there. Usually by mid-July the waves of pollen spikes diminish. So far this year? It hasn't changed much.
Many of you also have allergies; I know that for some of you they're severe. Are you doing worse than usual this year? Does it seem like this hay fever season is making you sicker, so far, or is going on longer than usual?
Patience, I tell myself, patience...
I try not to have things that need taking care of, personal business to attend to. But I do, as do we all; and that's all there is to it.
so...gently, carefully, I get myself up and about, slowly...
.
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9 comments:
Maybe that's why they called me 'Stoney' in high school.
My allergies have been almost negligible this year, thank goodness. I'm one of those lucky people whose worst allergies happened when I was three; they've been slightly better every year since.
Glad to hear from you!
wOOt! Glad to hear you are still among us!
Very glad to see a new post K!
My allergies are mixed...I've not had a sinus infection for what seems an incredible length of time (for me)...could it be that I'm healthier now that I'm not teaching full time?
On the other hand, the eat, sneeze and erp routine keeps on hitting and unexpected and unforeseeable times.
Good to hear from you...blogbaby is still chugging along, growth has slowed greatly since the great feline uprooting, but leaves are still intact and it's upright...keep us posted!
You poor thing. Wishing you more strength and relief soon.
k..I have some allergies which are aggravating when they flare up, but nothing which compares to what you and Walter go through on a regular basis.. so it is hard to even imagine what you have to endure.
I hope that you will be feeling better, soon.
It's been almost a week since you last wrote. Do hang in there, k, please.
PL, HAH!!! People mistake me for being drunk or stoned way too often. Ah, a nation of cynics we are...
Growing out of allergies is a very nice thing. Lucky! But some that were doing better as adults? Now they're going back, getting sensitized again. So I hope and pray you keep going in the good direction.
Joyce, you'll never be rid of me! nyuk nyuk nyuk!
Nancy, that food thing you're getting worries me. Food allergies can kill. And they do. I would feel more than a little relieved if you got tested.
Just knowing what to avoid increases your health and survival. You know that. And when you can't figure it out by analyzing what you've eaten before an allergic reaction? The tests are handy, then.
From what I hear, hanging around groups of kids means catching everything under the sun. Little germ factories, they are. heh! Now you're sort of safe.
SeaPhoenix, it's probably sitting there thinking. They do that at times. Probably contemplating *Life Among Threats by Cats, and Rescues by Humans.*
You just watch. It's book will be out soon.
Jean, you are sweet. Thank you. But it's not so bad. More tedious than sufferish, you know?
Jan, NO allergies are easy. And I know yours aren't what I'd call mild. I hope they aren't harassing you too much right now. You have enough on your plate. I'm praying for you and yours.
Shea, hi! When it rains the plants don't pollinate. I love that.
I used to have the same problem with contacts. Then I got so sick vanity went way out the door.
Then I got LASIK. Yay! Walter drove me home from it, and I kept just looking and looking at everything out the car window. Oh, it was wonderful. Still is, today, even though I need reading glasses now. It was way worth it.
Granny J, I done posted. *whew.* Still no abatement from the pollen. It's just, just extraordinary, this year. Ick.
But soon we'll get a little escape.
Hi! Jan recommended you a while ago and glad I was reviewing old comments so I knew to stop by. Wow, I think we have so much in common. I, too, am "abed" (love your word) much of the day, and grapple with a string of chronic health issues...from birth, so I am relatively used to it. But, I am getting more and more impatient...some days losing hope of having the life I had planned for myself. So, I am still grappling and probably always will - just my nature. On top of everything, might be facing foreclosure so that is new, terrifying territory -- it's like who are you to take my house? Sure, you're the bank, but..heck, what else can I lose?
Anyhow not here to be a depressant, but wanted to say hello and let you know I will be stopping by on my rounds. Come to The Oxygen Chronicles when/if you feel well enough or have some time!
Hinsley
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