Last weekend I celebrated my birthday, and with this milestone I realised that I have now reached 7 years living with chronic fatigue. Not only did chronic fatigue steal my life from me overnight, it did it on my birthday.
For the first few years I didn’t want to celebrate my birthday because it was too painful to think about everything I’d lost.
Over time I’ve come to be grateful for all the change and transformation chronic fatigue has brought into my life.
Without it, I probably would never have changed, and today I would probably be a stressed out and deeply unhappy Project Manager who constantly felt like she was never enough and never had enough time.
I’m still living with chronic fatigue and, chances are, I probably will be for the rest of my life but I’m grateful for what I’ve learnt from it, and the changes it’s forcing me to make.
Chronic Fatigue has taught me:
- to peel back the layers of my emotional wounds, everything I’d buried to just get through life.
- to put myself first.
- to stop pleasing everyone else.
- that I don’t need to please anyone else.
- to surround myself with what I love.
- to embrace the meditative power of crochet and natural fibres
With love, Lynda.
