The Power of Control

I woke up, got dressed and was ready to seize the day. Today would be the day that a doctor, after 17 years of waiting and searching, would tell me what was wrong. I drove into the parking deck, walked through the busy hospital building, filled with patients, family worrying about their ill loved ones, and staff tired of being surrounded by individuals that could never be polite.

She stood there, the door cracked slightly open, and read my name is an awful accent off my chart. I stood up, grabbed my bag and notebook and off I went to sit on yet another exam table. I sat there, staring at the white walls and medical posters, reading all about the new research programs the hospital needed volunteers for and just waited.

He walked in and went through the same routine I have done thousands of times before. I explained my medical history, my symptoms, my attempts to cure myself. He couldn’t explain the cause of the pain, but rather just acknowledged that I have pain and told me to be positive because at least I lead a normal active lifestyle. I felt defeated just as I had been for 17 years. As if there was not way for me to hold the power of control against nature and my body, but rather was just a victim the genes I was given.

He walked to me another room. Perhaps this room will read my symptoms differently and find that cause, find that little bit of information that would allow me to hold the power card against anture. I sat down, cracked a few jokes with the young gentleman holding the needle that would pull another 15 tubes of blood. He was probably the same age as me, working hard and living a normal life. As I watched the blood fill each tube I hoped that maybe he had some type of magical power that would pull information out of me and place it into one of these tubes so I could finally have the answer, the cause, so that I could work on the solution.

I returned to the exam table a week later. The doctor walked in, closed the door, sat down and just stared at my chart in search of the right words. His face filled with concern, a look I have never seen on a doctor’s face before. A week prior he seemed so confident, and now it was as if I was looking at a defeated 3rd grader losing the championship game of the baseball season.

I just stared at him, waiting for him to say something, wanting to just pull the chart out of his hands and read it myself though I was sure it would make no sense. I hoped for a cause for so many years and now it might here and I was terrified.

“Your blood work threw me for a loop. I was expecting nothing to be wrong, and it turns out you have signs of Lupus.”

I guess those were as right of words as he could find.

I sat there in shellshock, not sure what "signs of Lupus" meant, what it meant to me now or my future. He understood my confusion, probably because he was just as confused as I was in that moment. I did not look anything like the posterchild for such a diagnosis, as I was white, 26, active with clear skin. Our confusion together brought us to both understanding what those 15 tubes of blood translated into a 3 page document filled with acronyms and numbers that spelled out some code revealing answers that would allow me to finally hold the power card against nature.

He walked out, and for a moment I was alone with the diagnosis. I held my blood work results in my hand and while I knew what it all meant in the medical explanation, I had no idea how this information would change my life from this moment forward. This fear of the unknown took over my entire body. I walked to my car in a daze, unsure of what words to use to explain this to family and friends.

I sat in my car parked on the roof and just listened to the rain hitting my car. With each drop of rain, a drop of hope that now I could treat myself properly, a drop of fear that I couldn’t ignore my pain and assume it was just paranoia, a drop of courage that I would take control of the pain that has debilitated me and my relationships with those I love for 17 years. I began to cry as each emotion took over.

It is now a year later. I have spent this year learning how to take each drop of fear, hope and courage and use it to focus on me, my health and most importantly, my future. I have learned what creates my pain, what prevents it, and accepted that sometimes the pain will just be there no matter what.

Us as humans have have the ability to hold the wild card, to know and act on changing the situation we are in by taking action. I entered a world where I no longer wondered what was wrong, would worry about what might be. I finally held my wild card of life and would move forward with my personal Power of Control for my own destiny.

Lucky #13

When I was 17 I fell in love, like many 17 year olds do. When I was 24 I moved in with him, thinking my life would end up like the fairytales my mother read me before bedtime as a child. When I was 25, I moved out.

I stood in the doorway of my kitchen gazing into the living room, all my belongings in boxes, piled high to the ceiling against the wall of my new apartment. I wondered how I accumulated all this stuff, all this baggage that I considered important enough to move with me from place to place as I traveled through life. This home is lucky #13 – and it was going to be where I would connect back to me, forget the baggage that was following me for years, and move forward. I was ready to go anywhere, as long it was forward.

But of course, somehow, some way, that baggage found me. It only took a few months after I moved into my new home for him to arrive on my front porch, knocking on the door, asking to come up. I let him in and back into my life. With him I felt whole, as if I could carry the weight of the world on my shoulders as long as he was holding my hand down the path of life. But it didn’t take long until once again I felt myself being weighed down by the sorrows of a life I cannot change, cannot help, and cannot continue to carry with me.

It is now time to move once again. A year has passed and my signature on that legal document that made #13 my home for 13 months has expired. I find myself with boxes and heavy baggage yet again, and there are important decisions to be made. If I want a change that will last, I must leave the heavy baggage behind and make decisions that are different than those I’ve made before.

The decision now is different – I leave the heavy stuff behind, gaze ahead into the distance and try walking the path less traveled. There is no plan, no itinerary, no goal, no expiration date, no baggage - just life, time, and heart.

The Decisions We Make

“A glass of white, please,” I said to the bartender at the hotel. I looked over my left shoulder at my best friend expecting “a rum and diet” but instead, “Just water for me.” We walk over to our table, glass in hand and all the stories we wanted to spill to each other about life, love, and everyday stories. We sat down and looked at each other, my mouth half open with the first story I was ready to spill about my life back home in New Jersey and before I knew it…

“I’m pregnant.”

That’s all I heard, as everything and anything I wanted to say about myself just escaped my brain.

“Ok.” I said. “What do you want to do?”

“I’m keeping it.”

“Ok.” I said.

“I’m going to go grab some more crackers and let you take that in for a minute.”

I sat there alone in my chair looking at my glass of wine, knowing that I’ve been in here not all that long ago and her decision is no where in the vicinity of what mine was at the time. I knew he loved me then, I knew he would always love me, and that I felt the same way about him. But there is more to raising a child than being in love with the other, he could never provide the “more” that I needed.

But…how do you tell someone you made the right decision when you don’t know what truly would have been the outcome if you had made theirs?

Seven months later I’ve returned to Washington, DC. This time there is another hotel, a baby due in July, and plenty of white wine for me to drink at the baby shower.

We walked into the room together, her friends and soon to be family surrounding her, her eyes lit up with joy. Pink balloons, lots of boxes wrapped with perfect bows, and everyone excited to celebrate baby girl Talya coming into the world.

As I continued to enjoy my white wine in an attempt to not worry about how she would manage being in DC with a newborn and boyfriend that can’t afford half the rent, no family of her own around to babysit in a moment’s notice, I realized what she’s been trying to tell me ever since I took that first sip of white wine seven months prior.

Each one of us makes decisions that are right for us. No matter what her life looks like at any point in time, when she looks at that baby girl, her eyes will light up and she will know she made the right decision.

No matter what the decision is that we make, inevitably, life will make it the right one.

It's all about that moment

The story always starts the same. Coffee in hand, driving to the office like a programed robot, log onto Facebook to see what's been going on in the world of your friends, and then...email, phone call, email, phone call, meeting, email, phone call, and of course, another meeting.

This meeting was just like every other weekly meeting with my boss. Walked in to explain what I've been working on, what I plan to accomplish this week, complain about how the office has no structure, blah blah blah blah blah.

And then she closed the door, shuffled through her desk and pulled out a folder.

"We are eliminating your position. This is the letter that explains it all. Please let me know if you have any questions."

All my eyes focused on in the letter as I pretended to read it was "June 30, 2010," my final day of employment at an organization where I have worked for 2 years after being laid off from my previous position. But this time was different. This time I asked to be laid off months prior to this moment. This time I didn't admire or learn anything from the leadership. This time was different, this time I wanted to leave, and this time I would make sure what I got out of it would be different.

I folded my letter, my get out of jail free card, and walked to the door.

"Thank you for this, I greatly appreciate it."

She looked at me and said, "you really did mean it when you said, 'I'll take one for the team.' I am happy to provide you a letter of recommendation before you leave."

I walked over to my desk and as I passed by my coworkers, all knowing that I have been asking to be laid off for the last 2 months, I was the only one that knew how important that 1 piece of paper I was holding was.

That paper means I don't have a place to go Monday to Friday from 9am-5pm. It means my days are mine, my life is mine, my dreams are mine, my world is mine, and only mine. I dreamt of what I would do a thousand times. Travel here, and travel there, make sure to move out of my apartment and put all my belongings in storage, sell most of the things I own to pay for the traveling. I had a plan, but for some reason in that moment, I went back to being the terrified person I was 2 years ago, not knowing if I would make it, feeling like my entire world just fell apart, thinking I spent all this working towards nothing because I could be replaced in a split second.

I wiggled my mouse and saw my GChat conversation with a friend. Just moments before going into that office I was talking about my dream job, how much I want to travel again and could only do it if I was laid off, and how I needed to force a change in my life and asking to be laid off was the only way to do it.

This is what i wanted, this is what I've been dreaming about for months now, the moment is here and I'm fearful of my future. That's when I remembered the problem. I have been planning my life since I was 17, always thinking about my next step, planning for the next moment, and moving faster than a tiger hunting its prey. This is the moment I get to decide to enjoy it, embrace it, and live it.

Life is a series of unknowns. You can either fear or embrace it. I choose embrace. Embrace the unknown - embrace the moment.