Ozzy Osbourne sang, "Times have changed and times are strange. Here I come, but I ain't the same." The Ozzman is right, times change and so do people. We change every moment of every day. We have to, otherwise we'd still be the spitting image of our chimp ancestors...
We have to change and grow, to move on to new life experiences because without it we'd never do anything like fall in love or have kids. We'd never get to meet people who inspire us and experience people who annoy us. Life is all about moments and those moments ensure we move forward.
I admit I'm guilty of staying the past because I don't like certain changes, like losing someone I love or fighting with my family, but it's inevitable that I have to grow up and move on. Move to a place where I know things will only get better, because I know exactly what I need my life to be. I need to fall in love, get married, have my child and establish a career that I can be proud of. I need to push away things that will get in the way. I'm getting to a point in my life, where I have to move on and cut out people who will never change and continue the past drama. It's not healthy emotionally or mentally.
But what do you do when life throws a curve-ball at you? When things are finally falling into place and then suddenly, boom!... A monkey wrench in the plans? For me it was just like someone had hit me with a car. I wasn't prepared and couldn't even believe that I went from this semi-healthy 24-year-old, to this person facing her own mortality. I realize now that my disorder is not something 100 percent life threatening, but I could contract an illness and become deathly ill.
Elizabeth Kubler Ross defines the five stages of grieving as "Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance..."
I definitely had depression and anger. Denial never entered into it because there wasn't enough time. I literally went from doctor to doctor, appointment to appointment, to procedure after procedure. I was constantly having worse case scenarios thrown in my face, so I never knew what to expect or what to prepare for.
Bargaining may also have never happened because what's to bargain with? I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow let alone next year. You can't bargain with time, so all I can do is continue to live on in the only way I know how.
At the end of the summer of 2009 when I was in the midst of my summer from hell I developed such anger that I nearly lost my mind. I couldn't concentrate on anything because I was out of my mind with constantly being told this was a waiting game.
You have to wait until the tests are done to determine what's going on, you have to wait until the pain ends to make sure it's completely over, you have to wait to do anything. And so, I completely lost it. I threatened to stop all tests and everything until I got some sort of a break because I was at the hospital nearly every day all day -- sometimes from 6am to four in the afternoon. And so I ran all the way to Wisconsin. I ran to my uncle whom I had never had a relationship with but figured why not start now?
I spent nearly a week there and gained perspective. I had to come to terms with but I also gained something else I gained knowledge that I was being given a chance to experience a new phase of life...
I came home early with a new attitude that I was going in the right direction and that I could possibly change the path -- that i don't have to be that smartass from before. I found that I could learn to appreciate what I have and not take anything for granted.
And as for my depression, it comes back in bits but not back in its full blown sense -- not like I could cry my guts out, but then just as soon as I stopped, I would move on. It helped to go to the beach. The ocean and salt air act like a soothing hand making sure everything in its path is calm...
So okay, I understood that it was time for a change but not quite the one I imagined. Along with my own personal changes, the world changed. The economy rose and dipped. We've entered a new part of the world. We're in a place where we are the force behind the change and nothing can even begin to interfere with that. We're at a place where we can make changes and for the better...
Times are they are a changing. We just gotta learn how to roll with them...
What personal changes have you experienced to gain a different perspective of the world?