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Live Like You’re Dying

posted 24th September 2010    Written by: Alisha    CATEGORY: Alisha, All Posts, Family, Job/Career/Work, Life Lesson, Quarterlife Crisis, Season 3, What I've Learned

One of the unfortunate side-effects of aging is watching your loved ones die.  Five years ago I lost my maternal grandmother; two years after that, my paternal grandmother died.  Last year my father-in-law lost his battle with cancer.  Then two weeks ago my grandfather passed away from the same evil disease.  It’s just the circle of life, I know, but it still scares me.  I am scared of a lot of things (snakes, the paranormal, having a wardrobe malfunction in Target while baby-wearing) but what scares me the most: dying before feeling like I ever really lived.

I have already had a little piece of myself die.  I think of the years around the onset of my bipolar as a slow, painful death.  Whatever was “Alisha” then, withered away and was buried.  Now I am on this seemingly endless journey of re-birth.  I am rediscovering my passions, redefining my values, renewing my confidence and strength.  Foolish me thought these tasks would be easy, but it is hard work.  It is so hard that I worry I will not finish all of it in time to live my dream life.

I honestly and truly believe that I have the potential to be and do anything.  While this is an amazing belief (in which my confidence always wavers), it is also overwhelming.  I have so many passions and interests, notebooks full of ideas and theories, a running lists of careers I want to pursue.  (And I want to pursue them perfectly.  I’m also working on that perfectionism stuff.)  Yet, I feel bound by many constraints.    At 2.5 and 1 year old, my children require constant attention.  From tickles and kisses (my favorite) to poopy diapers and crumbled crackers, my energy is always focused on them.  I love my family (really, I do) but let’s face it: kids are a huge time suck.  Until I can start generating a substantial amount of money–to justify a babysitter and housekeeper–the last little bits of sand in my hour glass are devoted to sleep.

I do realize that I use my talents and potential to raise my children.  They wouldn’t be such happy, awesome kids if I were not consistently trying to give them my best. It just does not feel the same as creating and developing community, healing the sick or enriching the poor.  I want to be an awesome mother, an awesome wife, and an awesome “everything.”

Yet, as I realized when I went up into the mountains, I cannot be “everything.”  There is not enough time in the day–at least not right now.  Does it mean that I will not be able to live my dream life?  No.  Not at all.  I can live my dream life every day.  What I need to get better at is acceptance.  I can no longer spend so much of my time and mental energy focusing on the future.  Planning is great, but as we all know, even “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”  The concept of letting go is a difficult one for a controlling and perfectionistic person such as myself.  But if I want to enjoy the rest of this life–if I want to live a life of no regrets that is full of abundance, authenticity, connection, family and freedom–it means letting go.

I will never live the life I dream of if I can not learn to accept the moments as they come.  When I learn to bring my best to each experience that comes my way.  When I learn to savor each bite of food, each sip of coffee.  When I learn to bask in the golden rays of the sun and dig my toes in the sand.  When I learn to look for the silver lining of all those clouds.  When I learn to cherish each day as though it will be my last–that is when I will live.

(Photo: me with one of my favorite people in the whole world living and having one of the best times I can remember.)

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Normal People Food Kills Me

posted 30th July 2009    Written by: Marisa    CATEGORY: All Posts, Marisa, Quarterlife Crisis, Season 1

In three days I will no longer have health insurance.

…WHAT?!!!…

It’s true; in three days I will be joining the other uninsured 47 million United States citizens.  The available COBRA option given to people in my situation is still too expensive for this funemployment gal and I have no choice but to be uninsured.   And I know I’m freaking out more so than most people in this situation.

Yes, I am young and for the most part healthy, but I am sadly unique when compared to the health needs for the average person.

I have severe food allergies.  And by severe I mean I’ve been to the ER twice due to anaphylactic shock.  I am unique all right.

In fact, I’m actually part of a very small percentage of adults who have severe food allergies past the age of 25.  I’m part of a percentage of only 250,000 in this country who have a severe food allergy to one or all of the seven major food allergies: milk, eggs, soy, peanuts, shellfish, tree nuts/nuts and wheat.  Yay for me, I have four out of the seven.

I didn’t grow up with these food allergies though.  It started at 16 with a reaction to clams while attending a formal, and then when I was 20 to a granola peanut butter bar during one of my English Lit. classes.  Both times I was saved at the ER.  Both times I had health insurance.  Then most recently after some extensive testing, soy and tree nuts came up as positives.

With these results and finding out exactly what was in processed food, I had to basically teach myself how to eat again.

My last visit to the ER was in February of this year.  My eye started to swell while I was at a Jazz club with some of my friends and I knew exactly then what I had to do.  My ER visits record had been swept clean since I moved to Portland, almost three years without a visit.  Luckily this visit wasn’t as life threatening as the past two but nonetheless, just as stressful and scary at times.

I don’t know what to do now.  I can panic I suppose.  Well, I know I will here and there but I don’t want this worry to consume my every day life.  I have my Benadryl, I have my epi-pen and I have some sanity about me whenever I get a reaction.  However, rationality and logic are not always present.  I’m scared shitless when I really think about it. I live alone, I AM alone.  And I don’t think my cat Sophie will be able to dial 911 from my cell phone.

I guess the point of this post was to expunge some of my worries and stress that involve such a huge part of my life.  My current journey to live a happy life has bumps and this large bump will never go away.  It’s the permanent speed bump that slows me down here.

I do have hope though. On the news a few weeks ago I witnessed President Obama hug a woman who had cancer of the kidneys and who was also unemployed and uninsured.  This gesture and his speech had such an impact, I actually have hope that somehow or someway I will be able to afford healthcare soon.

But for now it’s like any other day, pursuing and living a happy life, one free of ER visits and one that will always miss peanut butter like crazy.


photo credit: Bob.Fornal

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