Happy Anniversary!!

I'm not really sure that this anniversary is something that I will celebrate forever. I hope that one day, it will all be a distant memory instead of something that prevents me from closing my eyes and going to sleep at night. This is the anniversary of the day that I almost died. I was actually supposed to die, I think. The doctors said that I only had a 10% chance to survive. And initially the prognosis was NEVER in my favor. I wasn't supposed to return home until sometime in March of 2007. But, instead, I was not only home, I was back to work by then.

Everything they said I would struggle through and the set backs they assumed I would face, I overcame with no problem. Physically I talked sooner, walked sooner, and even ate months ahead of what they initially told my family. I guess it is true that no matter how good the doctor, there is one factor they fail to recognize. And that would be the will to live.

I won't pretend that I actually knew what was going on with me during my month long coma. I drifted in and out of consciousness mainly in the first few days. I would hear people talking, recognize voices, but not be able to respond. I was easily agitated and very, very scared. I don't who 'they' are when hospital personnel say 'being in a coma is peaceful'. My time in mine was anything BUT peaceful.

And I think it is so weird that I can recall those memories so vividly. Things that NEVER actually happened. I guess that is how powerful the drugs they had me on were. I guess feeling terrified was better than feeling all the pain.

My first memory is of my sister and my husband. They were on either side of me, and begging me to open my eyes. They were explaining what had happened to me. Only, I didn't think they were really 'them'. I thought I was being lied to and tricked. I remember thinking I had been kidnapped. And that they wanted me to trust them because they wanted to hurt me. I KNEW I was in the hospital, but I thought I was being held prisoner in the hospital. I thought I was actually being held in the light boxes in the ceiling. And whenever I think about that, my whole body reacts. My hands get clammy. My heart races. I remember seeing my kidnappers, who were giggling and laughing at me. I wanted to answer Sloan and Chris. But, I wasn't able to.

Helpless is something that I just don't do. I never have. And I never will. But, in the coma and in the hospital for all those months, that is just what I felt. Absolute helplessness. And no matter how much time passes, that hasn't changed. It makes me nauseated. At times it consumes me - all day long.

My heart knows that I should feel nothing except grateful and very, very lucky. I am not suffering from brain damage, and I wasn't paralyzed. But, just because to the outside world there is very little reminder of what happened to me, it is always right behind my smile or tears. It just is a huge part of who I am.

I want to let it go, but I'm not sure how to do that. I still can't figure out how to 'get over it'. I'm living with it - but I'm not sure I've dealt with it. I don't know how you really actually do that. I guess in time it will get easier. Two years isn't really that long, I guess.