It's cheesy, I know, but I'm really starting to get the feeling that these next six months are going to be a new beginning for me. I think it starts now, with my acceptance of everything in my life as it currently is, good and bad. I'm still working on it, but I need to accept that I have done everything in my power to get better, and I will continue doing this. I need to learn how to put my own ambitions aside and follow God's plan for me, even if I can't see it all yet. I need to understand that I will never fully understand the reasons why my life is as it is, because I am not God. I am human, an imperfection. I need to stop striving for perfection because I will never reach it. All of these selfish ambitions and prideful actions will only lead me further from God, no matter how good my intentions are. I have every intention of actively following God and His plan, but oftentimes I find myself far from God's direction, and I realize that yet again, I have ignored His help and proceeded forward on my own. The times when I come to this realization are times like right now, when I am lying completely defenseless and broken in spirit and body. I am afraid. I am scared that in these next few weeks when I'm recovering I will forget about God and internalize all of my feelings, and end up in depression. Usually when I am recovering, I have some sort of goal or thing I am striving for, like going back to school or getting ready for college. I don't know how to handle the open-ended question that lies ahead of me. I don't have school again until September, and I don't have a job. I can't even think of a hobby that I want to get back to.
Here I am again, talking about my goals and my aspirations when I should be focusing on the here and now, resting and healing, listening to God's voice to see where He guides me. This is something each and every one of us does way too often, worry about the future. Worrying gets you nowhere. It leaves you anxious, fearful, quick to judge, and vulnerable to worldly forces. Of course, it is impossible to just stop worrying altogether, because again, we are human, imperfections. We are going to worry now and then, and that's okay. God doesn't expect us to be perfect. He just expects us to try our best, which includes learning when it is appropriate to worry and when it is time to give it up to God. Now unfortunately, there is no "magic moment" where you hear God's voice booming from the heavens reminding you that your suffering is not in vain. (I kinda wish there was though, it would make our jobs much easier.) I know a little bit about suffering, but Jesus knows everything about suffering. Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice, one that we just celebrated yesterday. This year, Easter reminded me that God and Jesus understand and empathize with suffering, so He would not let us suffer if it wasn't absolutely necessary for our souls. Again, this is difficult to understand, but it falls under the category of faith. Faith is believing in something without proof, knowledge, or full understanding of it. That's the beauty of faith.
I was admitted into the hospital today. So far I have gotten one dose of DHE through an IV, and I will get a second one hopefully within the hour. I haven't started to feel the side effects yet, so I'm mostly just tired. I want to take a moment to thank each and every one of you that reads my blog, sends me positive notes of encouragement, and/or prays for me. My heart has swelled in the past few days with the realization that I have an army praying for me and supporting me. I am truly not alone in this fight. I have my friends, family, strangers, and most of all, God. If you do or don't have an army or even one person praying for you and caring about you as you are suffering, I would like to pray for you and support you as you do for me.
"Many are saying of me, 'God will not deliver him.' But you, Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high. I call out to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain. I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the Lord sustains me. I will not fear though tens of thousands assail me on every side."
Psalm 3:2-6
Love always,
Sierra
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Monday, March 28, 2016
Saturday, March 26, 2016
Disappointment
Of all the emotions you can feel, I think I hate disappointment the most. I don't know if this is a universal thing or just a me thing, but I really can't stand disappointment. It doesn't matter if it's me feeling the disappointment or someone I love feeling it. It just all around sucks. I've been feeling a lot of disappointment for the past couple months. No matter what I do, it never seems to make a difference. I try my best and work as hard as I can, and yet still I end up feeling disappointed. I'm not disappointed in myself, because I have done every single thing to the best of my abilities, but I am disappointed in the situation surrounding me.
This past quarter, Winter Quarter, at UC Davis has been one of the hardest time periods of my life. In case you didn't know, college is hard. Like, really hard. No matter how much work you put in, what grades you get, what classes you take, it's just all around difficult in the first place. When you factor in forming new friendships, learning to live independently, and personal issues, college seems downright impossible, yet people graduate all the time. How do they do it? Well, I'm not totally sure, but I'll make sure to tell you when I figure it out. So far, my college career has included the need for persistence, dedication, compassion, patience, tons of energy, hard work, and an encompassingly (that's probably not a real word but oh well) healthy lifestyle. I have to think about literally every step of every process and how it could possibly affect me in the long run, because when I act without thinking, I end up in searing pain. Until now, I have not accepted that this is my life. I told myself that this won't last forever, and I just need to wait it out, but I've been coming to realize that my pain is not going to magically go away. I don't just have headaches. I don't just have migraines. I don't even just have chronic migraines. I have a disease. I have a disease where my body attacks itself every chance it gets, and there is no cure for it. Right now, I barely even have treatments for the symptoms. I like to have the mindset that I am "just a normal college student", but that's not the case. I'm not normal in the slightest. I am extremely abnormal. Luckily, I've never had the goal of being "normal" in the sense of style, personality, and lifestyle, so I'm halfway there to accepting my abnormality, but I still have to learn how to accept that I am not able to have a normal, carefree, experimental, crazy college experience. I'm going to have to take the long road to graduation, from having a lighter course load to graduating after over four years of schooling. I'm going to have to pay more, do less, and be realistic about my life goals.
As to my current lifestyle, it's going to change quite a bit in the next six months. I have had a constant pain level of an 8/10 or higher every day for the past month and a half. I failed my finals in two of my classes, and got my first ever C, in my two favorite classes, no less. I have never had a final grade lower than a B- ever. Seriously, never. Once when I was in fifth grade, I had a D on a progress report, but by the time the final grades came out, I had an A. I considered a C or lower to be failing. Now, I have to change that thought because I know that I did not fail. In fact, I succeeded in my Winter Quarter. I passed the two hardest classes I have ever taken while I was having the consistently worst pain I have ever experienced. Because this pain is still here, I am going to "fail" yet again. I'm going to do something that I have previously considered a failure. I have to take a quarter off of school. Clearly, this is not something I want to do, but something I have to do. On Monday 3/28, instead of going back to Davis for my Spring Quarter, I will get an emergency admission into the UCSF hospital. I'm going to get the same treatment that I've gotten twice before, the DHE infusion. This is the big change in my life. Going to the hospital for DHE is mentally, emotionally, physically, completely exhausting. It takes a full month for me to recover and be back to normal and up to six weeks for the medicine to make my pain less intense. Because college is so hard, missing even two weeks of school would be too much to come back from, so I have to take this Spring Quarter off. There is a program that allows any student to take any one quarter off while they attend UC Davis, so logistically it is a relatively stress-free solution. So here's where my disappointment comes in: I'm leaving my new life. I LOVE my life in Davis. I love my community and my school. It has become my home, and my friends have become my family. I know that my friends feel the same way, but a small part of me worries that by me not being there for a large chunk of time, they will forget about me or lose interest in being my friend. I also worry about being behind in my classes and my "plan" for my life. All in all, the situation is very disappointing. I was looking forward to my classes, fun outings with my friends, and engaging in my social life again (since last quarter, I was kind of a hermit).
Even with my disappointment, I have to be okay with the situation because if I'm not, then it will be even harder for me to stay happy through this difficult time. Staying happy will keep my stress, anxiety, and therefore pain and nausea levels down, which will allow the DHE to do its job correctly. This is something that I have learned from my doctors and therapists, and I have been practicing it for years, but it is still one of the hardest parts of my migraines. I'm sharing this with you because I am still struggling with this process, and God told me that it will be better if I share my experiences. I would also appreciate your prayers in this difficult time.
"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose."
Romans 8:28
Love always,
Sierra
This past quarter, Winter Quarter, at UC Davis has been one of the hardest time periods of my life. In case you didn't know, college is hard. Like, really hard. No matter how much work you put in, what grades you get, what classes you take, it's just all around difficult in the first place. When you factor in forming new friendships, learning to live independently, and personal issues, college seems downright impossible, yet people graduate all the time. How do they do it? Well, I'm not totally sure, but I'll make sure to tell you when I figure it out. So far, my college career has included the need for persistence, dedication, compassion, patience, tons of energy, hard work, and an encompassingly (that's probably not a real word but oh well) healthy lifestyle. I have to think about literally every step of every process and how it could possibly affect me in the long run, because when I act without thinking, I end up in searing pain. Until now, I have not accepted that this is my life. I told myself that this won't last forever, and I just need to wait it out, but I've been coming to realize that my pain is not going to magically go away. I don't just have headaches. I don't just have migraines. I don't even just have chronic migraines. I have a disease. I have a disease where my body attacks itself every chance it gets, and there is no cure for it. Right now, I barely even have treatments for the symptoms. I like to have the mindset that I am "just a normal college student", but that's not the case. I'm not normal in the slightest. I am extremely abnormal. Luckily, I've never had the goal of being "normal" in the sense of style, personality, and lifestyle, so I'm halfway there to accepting my abnormality, but I still have to learn how to accept that I am not able to have a normal, carefree, experimental, crazy college experience. I'm going to have to take the long road to graduation, from having a lighter course load to graduating after over four years of schooling. I'm going to have to pay more, do less, and be realistic about my life goals.
As to my current lifestyle, it's going to change quite a bit in the next six months. I have had a constant pain level of an 8/10 or higher every day for the past month and a half. I failed my finals in two of my classes, and got my first ever C, in my two favorite classes, no less. I have never had a final grade lower than a B- ever. Seriously, never. Once when I was in fifth grade, I had a D on a progress report, but by the time the final grades came out, I had an A. I considered a C or lower to be failing. Now, I have to change that thought because I know that I did not fail. In fact, I succeeded in my Winter Quarter. I passed the two hardest classes I have ever taken while I was having the consistently worst pain I have ever experienced. Because this pain is still here, I am going to "fail" yet again. I'm going to do something that I have previously considered a failure. I have to take a quarter off of school. Clearly, this is not something I want to do, but something I have to do. On Monday 3/28, instead of going back to Davis for my Spring Quarter, I will get an emergency admission into the UCSF hospital. I'm going to get the same treatment that I've gotten twice before, the DHE infusion. This is the big change in my life. Going to the hospital for DHE is mentally, emotionally, physically, completely exhausting. It takes a full month for me to recover and be back to normal and up to six weeks for the medicine to make my pain less intense. Because college is so hard, missing even two weeks of school would be too much to come back from, so I have to take this Spring Quarter off. There is a program that allows any student to take any one quarter off while they attend UC Davis, so logistically it is a relatively stress-free solution. So here's where my disappointment comes in: I'm leaving my new life. I LOVE my life in Davis. I love my community and my school. It has become my home, and my friends have become my family. I know that my friends feel the same way, but a small part of me worries that by me not being there for a large chunk of time, they will forget about me or lose interest in being my friend. I also worry about being behind in my classes and my "plan" for my life. All in all, the situation is very disappointing. I was looking forward to my classes, fun outings with my friends, and engaging in my social life again (since last quarter, I was kind of a hermit).
Even with my disappointment, I have to be okay with the situation because if I'm not, then it will be even harder for me to stay happy through this difficult time. Staying happy will keep my stress, anxiety, and therefore pain and nausea levels down, which will allow the DHE to do its job correctly. This is something that I have learned from my doctors and therapists, and I have been practicing it for years, but it is still one of the hardest parts of my migraines. I'm sharing this with you because I am still struggling with this process, and God told me that it will be better if I share my experiences. I would also appreciate your prayers in this difficult time.
"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose."
Romans 8:28
Love always,
Sierra
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