Once a home, always a home

Two days after my accident, I was being knocked out to have metal put in my leg.

 

From the hospital, I was put on a flight back home to Michigan. My stubborn ego was kicking and screaming all the way. But for at least the three months I would have to keep weight off my leg, it was the most stable place to be.

 

“How long are you visiting?”

“It’s not a visit. I’m just here to heal my leg.”

I say this in a relatively positive tone of voice, but it’s a discrepancy that I will not let be misunderstood. Michigan is a temporary place.

It’s not that I didnt’t love my home, or my family and friends. It’s not that I find Michigan absolutely abhorring (although I could do without the colder winters). But ever since I began to travel, I simply knew that I didn’t want to stay and live in the same state I grew up in. And when I cried at seeing the Pacific ocean for the first time in 2011, I knew I’d actually like to be in one of the furthest states from it.

On more than one occasion this year, my parents cautiously extended the option of moving back home for a time. Not once did I even entertain the thought in a discussion. Sure, my life looked messy right now. But this was where I wanted to be. And why would I go figure out what I want to be doing in a place I don’t want to be doing it in? It felt like I huge step backwards.

But a few weeks ago, my parents moved my homebody brother out to Portland, OR and a week afterwards, my mother was back in Portland, OR to fly her mangled daughter home.

After an exhausting red-eye (if you thought there was no leg room on a plane before, try flying when you need to keep one leg extended AND elevated), I arrived at my house early the morning and collapsed on the living room couch. Deflation set in immediately. It felt like I’d died in a video game without saving at the checkpoint. I reached for the pain pills to kill two birds with one stone, and dozed off.

The first few days home were like that. Regret, despair, sensations of surreal disbelief. However at the end of the week, my mom asked if I’d like her friend to come do some energy work.

Cassie stretched me out on my bed as she talked a bit about what to expect. Polarity she explained, was different than massage or other forms of healing art. She would gently tap and touch dual points on my body with the purpose of activating polarities that may be too heightened or too depleted, and bring them into balance. As she worked, we spoke a little bit about the recent crises in my life. After she left, the angst about my surroundings seemed to have shed just enough to jump start a positivity streak.

Michigan still wasn’t home, but it wasn’t a prison either. As I began to scrounge up information on the best diets and habits to develop for bone healing, I also began to sit into my painful experiences with more curiosity. I realized if I’d been anywhere else to heal, I wouldn’t be able to be doing this.

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve seen old friends, gone out to eat, been taken to events and connected with other healers. And in that way, I’ve had to accept that part of this is home. Maybe not the place, but in the undying web of community that I will always have from growing up here.

I guess I can visit for a while.

Blame the Bone

Sticks and stones may break my bones…but words, they can be healing.

Blame is such a pervasive concept. We can hardly avoid doing it, even if we don’t mean to. In my last post, I explained a little bit about the insanity of my 2017 and the accident that led to this blog. I spent many soul-wrenching moments both during and “post-mortem” pointing angry, disappointed fingers at me like a mother that won’t have rest until she learns the name of her son’s killer.

The injury that brought me home, was an innocent, freak accident. Completely unrelated to anything going on in my life. And yet sitting here staring at it every day, I couldn’t help but see it as a product of every wrong turn, every time I should have hit pause and didn’t, every time I saw myself slipping away and let me loosen my grip on her just a little more. In my mind, I was literally connecting my faults and my leg as though I’d wronged someone and they instantly turned around and snapped my bone in half.

I looked on my leg as this karmic heavy armor of regret that reflected and bounced all this blame back onto me.

Karmic, maybe. My fault, no.

 

I did make a lot of mistakes this year, and have a lot of myself to rebuild. But the leg has only provided an opportunity to look and learn from those choices. I don’t have a broken leg because of these mistakes. I’m not sitting clear across the country from my belongings because I made these mistakes. I’m at home healing a bone, because a bone broke.

While it is still sometimes a challenge not to wonder where I would be if different actions had been taken, this blog was aptly named to make blame what it is: just the fact of a thing that happened. In my quiet moments I know that most unfortunate situations are simply a tragic collision of poor timing, misunderstanding and hurt, mismanaged egos. The only thing to blame my bone for being broken is my bone.

Initially, I thought about starting a new blog. But upon revisiting my little gem here, I realized this is a perfect place to pick up. Flight of the Honey Bee was started in the rich caves of human vulnerability, brokenness, healing, and unknown directions. Eventually, it will pick back up and follow this honey bee back into flight. And while I can blame the bone for a little detour in this blog, and my binge watching of Mr. Robot and my even less infrequent showers, it has been the catalyst for writing again, for my re-centering, re-learning and a healing that leaves me stronger than before. What has its woes always has its opportunities. The karmic part is that it just so happens that this provides the opportunity to heal other broken things also.

An annotated tale of a Year That Never Should

“I’m still young enough to have one of those years where you completely lose your way!” I recently quipped to a group of older women.

“Oh, you’re never too old to have those!”

It was one more small token of solidarity to file away in my new “everybody gets lost” affirmation.

2017 was the year I got lost.

 

This is not to say that I am typically, by any stretch of the imagination a solved puzzle. At 27, my “career path” still consists of coffee shops, farms, groceries and occasional odd-end tasks I come up with. But I’d like to think I was well on track to being in tune with the more important piece. The frame, if you will. No matter the external chaos of my topsy-turvy world, it was contained and made beautiful by the reliable frame of my inner landscape.

I have to be careful about being a restless “keep on moving” person. While I’ve learned to exercise restraint in circumstances and areas of my life, the character trait still exudes from my day to day actions. I’m the one who will go through the inconvenience of clambering up a counter instead of waiting for the person that offered a step stool. I’m the one that gets in the car with a rough plan, or will try to improvise if at all possible if the alternative stops the “forward” momentum.

Like I said, I became increasingly aware of this over the years and two years ago, a challenging and pivotal relationship was the catalyst for what seemed like leaps and bounds of growth.

Yet for all of the ways in which I’d grown, I didn’t realize that the energy I was putting into the relationship was also causing me to lose my sense of self in other ways.

 

And then in 2017, that same relationship became a catalyst for many back tracks down that same road. And in so doing, I found out just how shaky the foundation was underneath.

 

It was a year of selfishness of the worst kind: the kind that doesn’t even serve the self. For almost nine months, my life and the lives of loved ones became a nightmarish hell created by reactive behavior bouncing off one another like shock waves. All of the significant ways in which I’d felt I’d become an example of patience, discernment and integrity began to unravel. With every failure, subsequent failure became as routine as morning coffee. And like my morning coffee, there were times I just needed to see it was too much. I needed to take a break, but instead excited the same chemicals, trying to tackle moods and angsts that came from deprived rest. My restlessness had always been balanced by a willfulness to pause myself at a certain threshold, but I wasn’t. I was deprived of pause. Reacting to symptoms instead of healing the cause.

 

It was a year of cognitive dissonance. I’ve always had an acute awareness of how relatively fortunate I have been. The supportive people, generosity, resources, and mobility I have that has allowed me to explore and dabble. And yet, while the thought of “when will my bottom be” whispers a cautionary tale, I don’t believe I have ever made the best use of that gift, or let the acknowledgement keep me from the habits that bring me closer to those falls.

 

Enter August 26th.

 

I had been bouncing around with most of my belongings in my car. I hadn’t had a real job since I let the drama of my life rip mine away in May. Belongings, both practical and sentimental had been destroyed. And the last shreds of a relationship seemed to have crumbled for good. But in the midst of it all crashing down, I’d found a change of direction that seemed like it would do everything I needed for myself. I had a solid week and a half of work lined up before I would be moving to the Olympic Peninsula to work on a farm, re-gather myself, build an income and take one GIANT exhale from the year.

There were a few gnawing influences trying to keep me in the city and the life that was spinning circles around me. Still, I had those two weeks to decide.

August 26^th was the first day of those two weeks, and the universe wasted no time in setting me straight. As I was hopping off my friends’ bicycle to sell patches for his compressed air-powered design, my foot snagged the bar. I heard a loud SNAP as my body went one way while my right leg did not follow in any direction it was anatomically supposed to.

 

A Tibial Plateau Fracture…

 

Follow more here

 

Snap!

Snap!

It blasted like bold punctuation

at the end of a story

I carried myself gracefully

to the ground, bound

by that same exhausted acceptance

From dancing with loss

For too long

 

Perhaps I belonged here

Where camouflaged fear

Finally flaunted as something real

I could look down and see

A knee three times it’s size

in five seconds

 

Like life letting me know

I still needed the punch line to the joke

 

It’s easy to mistake

movement for freedom

But circles and lines

don’t produce the same results

And I felt like a lab rat in a ball

 

But this is the fall that froze me

mid-spin, course-correction came

with a collision, hands shaken

I rattle off information to medics

And its oddly calming

To be firing off answers

 

Still, my world is dizzy

From the circles I’d been dancing

Like when you’re moving

Everything is moving

But you really are standing

Still

You

 

You’re still you, under there

but in that freeze frame

waiting for the ambulance

you’re wailing for the movement

Weren’t you going somewhere?

 

Perhaps I belonged here

But it felt like a fluke

 

But disbelief doesn’t make it different

Sunny days and crowds and

I was just on that bike

I was just looking forward

I was just going to go

In a line

I swear

 

Or was I?

 

Now I’ve been gifted time

As my leg rebuilds bone

I swim in dark matter of memory

And the even darker matter

Of distant light

Regret is reversible only if you own it

 

For a while

I-told-you so’s slowly

Dismantle whatever story

I thought I was telling

And I yell back at my anger

For a while

 

But more smiles are

Stitched back together

Through visits of friends

And visits from

Some whisper of another self

 

Lessons are sometimes

the best medicine

And you know you belonged here

You needed to relearn so much

or you were just going to go

 

In circles

 

 

-Melissa Meiller, 2017

 

 

Facing the Fault Lines: Billy

After a long hiatus with the project, I have finally picked up ‘Facing the Fault Lines’ once again. To learn more about the focus of this project, read this entry here. 

Billy is someone that I’d been wanting to spend more time getting to know and who I felt would have some wonderful insights to share in regards to the topic of lessons learned through hard experiences. I was incredibly grateful to Billy for taking some time to share how this past year has affected his life and what he has been learning from a tumultuous experience. Just over a year ago, Billy got into a serious accident that came very close to taking his life. He has spent his time since then learning how to live with Traumatic Brain Injury and the plethora of challenges that it presents. In addition to navigating such a difficult recovery, he has also used this experience as an opportunity to focus his life in a new direction and has spent the past year growing a passion and knowledge of planting with his strong start-up business  2nd Chance Nursery. We got together to talk in a small cabin that he had built on his family’s property.

M: So, [I’d imagine] the physical experience of getting in an accident of that severity and suffering the result of that to the degree that you did brought up a lot of changes. But I guess I am curious in your own words what the whole experience was like for you…from the reaction of dealing with it and then over time as that unfolded, and realizing how you kind of had to shift – essentially – how you related to yourself and everything else.

B: Relating to myself, that’s kind of a new one. Cause I’m still figuring out who I am. Cause Im still kinda changing. All of last year from my accident on was like, basically gone. I know that I was in the hospital cause I’ve seen pictures and remember about 20 minutes out of three weeks, but other than that, I don’t remember last year at all. so I was just like…everything has been new to me. Memory is kind of a big one too. I go off on tangents now. I kind of…just correct me if I stray from where you’re directed towards…cause I do that quite often now.

M: Well, thats the nice thing about these conversations is you know, basically it covers so much about the essence of what we all want to learn about ourselves as humans. So it’s pretty broad territory. It’s hard to stray from it I guess, is what Ive experienced.

B: Yeah, like it just flows.

M: I want to keep it open. Because there isn’t any handbook for these experiences. Like, I try to imagine myself in that position of dealing with something that…cause you have the physical pain, I’m sure —-

B: Yeah, oh yea. Broken bones. Like, my back and my neck were broke. And I have titanium implants and screws all along [my head] and I fractured my skull. And I had a nice burn…but got that covered up with my tattoo (He shows me the tribal raven on his arm)

It’s NW Indian…and its the raven. If you look up the raven’s meaning, basically he’s a messenger or a carrier, basically from the afterlife to the present life.

M: So there’s that immediate physical pain, and then the memory and the confusion, and the philosophical, wrapping your head around what this means for you.

B: And sobriety. Not drinking. Cause I don’t drink anymore. I haven’t drank since the day of the accident. So, learning to live sober for one. Learning to live with TBI which also includes PTSD, stress, anxiety, depression…just this whole slew of other onslaughts…and then also the broken bones….so theres three or four things I’m learning to live with and I have no clue how to do it.

M: What has been the biggest tool for you in moving from…reacting to all those changes with anger and desperation, or any of the reactionary kind of human stuff that would come up in that…to being able to utilize it and turn it around to benefit and learn from it?

B: Long walks in the woods. Is just all that I could really think. Letting your mind go and letting it go somewhere else. I mean, before I got put on house arrest, there was times I’d go out here at night and walk between here and the bridge and I’d get lost. I’d just walk in circles. One time I was literally…I was lost. I knew where I was at, but I was lost. and I know I went in there…not really pissed off but not really sure…I don’t know, it’s been so long ago now but yea, it was a good time…good experience.

M: Do you feel like the walking kind of lets you remove yourself from the immediacy of your ego, like dealing with you and get to something bigger?

B: Yea, cause I go out there and I just walk around and take pictures out in the woods. I’ve got 2500 pictures on my pone that I’ve just taken since…not even 6 months. Im a big big picture-taker now. You’ve probably noticed, with all the pictures I put up [on Facebook].

M: And all of those pictures are of your plants. Was that a hobby that you’d ever had and inkling about before all of this?

b: Growing weed, that’s about it. And then about this time last year, my mom brought up the idea of a green house. I just went wild since then. in three weeks tomorrow, I get my ankle bracelet off and there’s a lady that has a greenhouse…I’m gonna go over and talk to her about re-vamping that and a whole bunch of stuff. And here, I’m gonna do one or two more green houses, some artificial lights, and I’m gonna go hog-wild with growing plants…for early starts and everything else. Sun is so low. Summer is fine but in Fall/winter, it’s so low in the sky there is no sun at all so just supplement with artificial light.

M: What is it like, the process of learning a skill and a hobby like that and dealing with an injury. Do they conflict?

B: yeah, they kind of coincide, I think that’s the proper word for that..I use words that I didn’t know that I knew. they kind of went hand in hand because it was a connection to nature and a way to escape from reality. So it’s actually kinda easy…I get asked so many times how I do it and I say I don’t know. I put it in what it says to put it in and I give it sun. and it grows. Everything that I’ve got. I’ve got some of the most difficult plants to grow and I’m excelling with them, even beyond what I’m told I can get away with I think.

M: You just said something interesting there, when you said that it coincides and that you use words that you didn’t know you knew. Sort of like with plants and finding success with them so naturally…I find those things interesting. We are so attached to something we feel we have control over. Like, most people would say they feel they have a certain degree of control on how they operate their mind and to an extent, that’s an illusion. And at the same time that kind of blocks you into such a narrow-minded sense of thinking. I guess for myself, I’m affected a lot by stress and anxiety and overwhelmedness, and when I am wrapped up in that, I feel that my capacity for learning and accessing that creativity shuts down.

B: Oh, totally shuts down. If I become overwhelmed by anything, just people asking too many questions. I just shut down. I totally block everyone out and I don’t know where I go…sometimes its not a good place that I go, and I don’t want to go there…but I can’t help it…

M: And so it’s interesting, now that you don’t have that same operative tools that people are using mentally, you’re actually accessing things differently.

B: I’m thinking for myself now. I’m not conforming to the way everyone else wants me to be. I was used a lot before my accident. Looking back on it and what I did…who I did things for…and who has actually come around now, I was straight up used. Cause not one of them wants to help me out now. And I would bend over backwards for them then. But I was also drinking. I was the one that had alcohol and weed…whatever they wanted.

M: So how did you go about reforming your connections and relationships with people, especially in a small town like Packwood? Obviously, you’re surrounded by the people that you drank with, the people that you feel you didn’t actually have a good connection with beyond that. But then it seems like with the plant-growing and just being in the space you are now, you’ve been able to develop a completely new community and new circle of friends that’s more supportive. How did you start to approach that or how has this changed how you learn to relate to people?

B: I don’t really know. I never really had to think about it at all. It was everyone else showing me that they didn’t want me around. Thats the way I looked at it. When I first got out of the hospital and stuff, I went to the Blue Spruce (the local bar) and everyone was so excited to see me and what I was doing…but I’d say, if you’re so excited come over and see what I’m doing. You’re so close. They couldn’t take the time for 5 minutes. Just come over, smoke a cigarette and leave. That’s all I’m asking. Nobody can even do that unless they need something from me. So basically I never had to push anyone away. They pushed me away, I feel. So it’s kind of easy. You’re one of the very few that I did talk to before that has come around. I didn’t not expect it from you…but its just kind of..i didn’t expect it cause I’m so used to people saying ‘oh yeah, I’ll come over’ and then two weeks later they still haven’t called to let you know they’re not gonna make it.

M: Yeah, hen you have defense mechanisms in place like drinking and all that crazy social atmosphere and the superficiality of it…it just stays superficial. But when you strip all of that way, people actually gravitate towards whats real and what’s vulnerable…and that’s kind of why I like talking to people about these things too…is because all of the people that I’ve talked to so far have surprised me in some way. Like, I knew they’ve struggled but it’s not until people start talking and they feel comfortable that you realize how relatable the depth of your struggle is. Here I am feeling like what I’m going through is the worst but then you start talking to people and they’re right on the same level as you on some other trip. I think thats why it builds such a larger supportive circle of friends…the ones that gravitate towards you now because it’s real and it relates on the level that people really want to relate on.

B: Yeah, that’s basically it. If you look around now, it’s my girlfriend and Greg from the bar. After I get off house arrest, him and I are gonna go cut firewood.

M: Yeah, I didn’t realize that you were on house arrest. So that recently happened. After you’d been doing all of the kind of growth for a while now then you went to court…did it feel like kind of a slap in the face to have been dealing with all of this and have been growing and then have the punishment come?

B:Yeah. Almost a year to a day before everything was over. It was six months before I got the court order in the mail. I mean I didn’t care…I didn’t go anywhere before…just kind of sucks cause now I have to stay here.

M: Like before, you said you could do your walks and stuff.

B: now it’s like if things in my home life are irritating me or something, I can’t just go off on a walk…But now I’ve got this (referring to the cabin that he built near the house). I can come here. Cause I was in a tent in the back yard all summer.

M: Yea, I was a little Jealous. Would you say that…do you feel a real sense of contentment with where you’re at right now?

B: I’m happy with where I’m at. not 100% but like 95%. Theres a few little different things that I’d like to see change here shortly.

M: With change, do you feel this has brought you to a more patient place with just how you accept changes in life in general? I don’t know what your experience was with patience or impatience was beforehand….do you feel like you’ve become more patient?

B: I think I was more patient before. The only reason I say that is because I was constantly drunk 24/7 365 and I just didn’t care. yea yea go for it. I’m very plan-based, like almost down to a time. It sucks that I have to be that way cause I don’t want to be that way…

M: Its hard to approach the ways that we want to be or don’t want to be when they are so ingrained.

B: My ways…I didn’t want to change them, they were kind of forcefully changed [by the accident] so…

M: Does it feel like it has integrated to actually be more like who you are?

B: It’s starting to feel more natural. I was always a quick thinker, back when I was in high school. Cause I never drank at all..until I was…23 when I started drinking. before then, I never did anything. I was a good boy. I was a square. the quickness of my thoughts and how fast i think even though I’ve been through so much, I’m still a quick thinker. like comebacks. I can come up with comebacks…a pin can’t drop fast enough. everything is so different even though its the same.

M: and you said even before all of this you had leanings more towards like buddhist philosophy even if you didn’t realize that was it…

B: Cause that was the closest…I wasn’t a Christian. The bible was a nice story book but it wasn’t something that truly made life….they’re just stories to make you feel better about yourself. Feel-good stories. I just didn’t see that. you just went up and lived to make yourself happy. I’m kind of going through that right now with my girlfriend. she’s having a hard time with that cause she’s so willing to just at a moment’s notice, go help anyone. Yes, I understand you can do that but there are some people you’re helping that aren’t going to be helping you or haven’t yet. And she’s slowly weeding them out.

She’s gonna be taking up nursing school, another person I’ve kind of helped influence.

M: To nursing?

B: well, its something that she wanted to do but after seeing what I’d been through and everything, it helped her re-realize and pursue it. Theres actually a lot of people that I’ve touched with how I’ve changed my life around. With a lot of people it’s not big things, just little things. That’s what I want to do. I feel I am like a messenger or something. I’m here for another reason cause if I was supposed to not be here ever again, why am I still here?

M: yeah its gotta be really rewarding to have gone through everything you’ve gone through and then get the feedback that it’s actually contributing to something beyond yourself and your day to day struggle with it. Its actually helping others in their own stuff and motivating them.

Have you thought ahead, with what you want to do with your plant stuff?

B: Well, I’ve got a business plan sort of set up…2nd Chance Nursery. in my mind I’ve got a business plan already for what I want to do down the road.

M: So how did you choose the exotic plant? A lot of them are exotic right?

b: cause everyone can grow a petunia! I do have a lot of exotic plants but a lot of carnivorous plants. They’re easy to grow.

M: Does it feel like kind of having pets with more personality?

b: I don’ t know what it is about them. They’re unusual i think….there’s other things Im gonna do too…Rhumiliads…jungle plants. water pools and frogs sit in them, and they live in trees. I’ve got almost..over a dozen and I started with 7….

M: do you get all these from international nurseries?

B: I’ve got some from international borders

M: How might you summarize how this whole experience has – despite all the hard aspects of it – brought a gift into your life…

B: I’ve been forced into being taught patience….always a new day….just when you get complacent in your life, somethings gonna throw it out of whack so try not to get complacent in anything. I kind of do need a schedule and routine.

Every day’s a new day.

Facing the Fault Lines: Randi

The first time I saw Randi, I quietly observed the exchange between her and my co-worker. By the glisten in her eyes and the boisterous laughs that they exchanged, I could tell they had known one another a while. I could also tell that Randi was not someone that I would get to know through small talk. She exuded a presence that did not concern itself with conventions or trivial banter, and would protect herself against inauthentic exchanges with a vengeance. 

It was not until a year after moving to Packwood that I had the opportunity to meet her outside of work at a mutual friend’s house. By then, I’d of course settled into my place within the community and was able to embody my self with complete ease and comfort. It didn’t take long for us to get into a beautiful and intimate talk about our biggest challenges and I was immediately captivated by her story. 

Most literally and figuratively a force of nature, Randi’s journey on this earth is etched into the trails and roads of forests and mountains. Since she was a child, hiking had always been where she found home. At 73, when most her age have resigned themselves to quiet days at home, Randi has not stopped seeking ways out to nature. And she isn’t just combating the test of time. Just before reaching 60, Randi was was hit dead-on by a young driver and the course of her life was altered forever. Yet after being told she would likely never walk again, Randi now shuttles hikers from all over the world to trailheads across the state. 

Randi has since become not only a dear friend, but a personal icon of resilience for me. In all of her humanity, struggle and pain, I have seen a spirit that has never once lost sight of its voice or purpose. I have seen a spirit that continuously shows up, confronts change, and fights for what feeds her heart. Over the years since our first meeting, not one conversation has passed without her praising the natural world that we are surrounded by. And in each of these conversations, she reminds me again and again of how continuously and intentionally we have to strive to keep sight of appreciation for those things that are most important to us. The world may present us with challenges that appear to strip that away, but she is a reminder that human spirit has the strength to rediscover meaning in the darkest places. 

For our interview, I met Randi at her house, where she took some time to show me a few photographs of her favorite spaces near Packwood. Through her images, Randi conveys some of the messages that she receives by being out in nature. 

Note: While I was able to share a few of her images, I unfortunately do not have copies of all the ones that she describes but have left those parts of the conversation in, as they are potent examples of how she views her surroundings.

R: This one here is called the Portal to Another Dimension.

Portal to Another Dimension by Randi Nelsen

M: Did this style of photography start after you’d had the accident? 

R: No, I have been a photographer taking pictures since I was a kid. I asked for my first camera…it was a little brownie box and I got it when I was about 7 years old.

But these pictures, the most meaningful pictures of mine, have been taken since the wreck.

This here is called Through the eye of a Universal God. The head of a Dolphin sharing the face of a man. That day that I stood taking these pictures, I was watching people look at this beautiful rock and not seeing what I was seeing…or they would’ve said “AH! LOOK AT THAT FACE!”

This here is a place I called The Altar. The sun hit that rock just right…That picture hangs in my best friends office – she’s a therapist – and she finally had to put it up in her meditation room because people were meditating on that picture. Now, do you know how good that makes me feel to hear something like that?

M: Cause you know you’re finding something that speaks to more than just you

R: That’s the thing. Its not always just about us.

M: So, you find all of these spiritual messages in nature…when your accident happened, do you feel like at first, very immediately after the accident…do you feel like you clung to finding that more, or did you get deterred from that for a while

R: It did [deter me] because I was always up here photographing. I was on my way to a hike to Schriner’s peak that day. In the park, I was coming down to meet two women from MI. They gave me a lot of money to take them on Mt. Rainier

M: And I remember you told me earlier that you had been getting messages in your mind, not to go. 

R: I did. That morning, I woke up and this trip had been planned for weeks with these people, these two women that knew me from my railroad days. They had met me when I went to school to become an engineer. We’d stayed in touch through the years.

I woke up that morning and I’m not kidding you. I wont forget it. A voice said ‘Don’t go’. I thought: ‘What?! No one’s ever heard of you backing out of a hike. What’re you gonna say? I’ve got this feeling? There’s a voice telling me not to go?’

Randi smiled an accepting, matter-of-fact smile that said ‘yes, that’s exactly what I should have done.

R: Instead, I thought: ‘Oh, everybody has these feelings. You never know what it’s gonna be…’ I was rationalizing. Then, finally it was too late for me to call [it off]. I thought: ‘Everybody, this comes along you know, changes in our life, they could be smackers…what’re you gonna do?’ And that was kind of my attitude.

I was walkin’ out the door, and I thought: ‘check the runes’. So, I grabbed my bag of runes that always travels with me – its always around me – and I reached in, and I pulled the rune of Disruption. And what that rune says is that the disruption in your life could be something major or it could be something simple like a divorce that you’re goin’ through…or the change could be so much that it would change. Your life. Forever. And I felt a chill. I’m talking the hairs stood up on the top of my head. And I thought: ‘well it’s too late now, you’ve gotta go.’

I was coming down the Canyon…and still that fear…and I was standing out in the canyon with my dog Abby ready to start in, and I couldn’t get rid of that feeling…until that car came around the curb and all that went through my mind was ‘oh my god’.

Her face speaks in a knowing as a small smile forms. Not one of joy, but just a knowing.

R: Apparently I had to walk that road. Or I wouldn’t have had that feeling inside me.

M: Do you notice your intuition differently now? 

R: I always did. One time years ago when I was a young woman, I had a ’65 Mustang. It was in the late 60’s and I was headed for Arizona on a vacation. I had spent the night at a motel and I was driving at night cause it was so damn hot. Back then, we didn’t have air conditioning in cars. It was hot so i was drivin’ at night and staying in the motels during the day and sleeping. And that night I took off onto San Bernadino, I felt a Tremor outside of Palm Springs.

Okay…all I needed was a strong warning. I turned around and went back to the motel. Checked back in. He was confused…I just told him I felt I should spend the night here.

The next morning on the front page of the news and all over the radio, they are saying that the night before, a man came down highway 10 and was firing that gun into the driver’s side windows at oncoming traffic and he killed three people. And they caught him when he crossed the border.

M: Wow. 

R: Things like that, and then the earthquake. That was another Bizarre thing. Years ago. I’d been driving, and god I was tired. It was about 3 o’clock in the morning. I pull into this campground, and there’s not a soul around. Not a soul. So, I lay down in my van, me and my dog. The next thing I know, goddamn earth shakes. I’m looking and there’s not a soul around. Quiet. The dog gets in and I say ‘c’mon, we’re getting outta here, something’s weird.’ I get back on I-10 and I’m looking over at the palm trees bending over hitting the ground and coming back up, and I think I’ve gone crazy! I thought: ’What the hell?!’ not realizing my van was doing that, going down the road too.

I drove out to my friend’s house in Pheonix and they come runnin’ out their door saying ‘OH MY GOD, WE’RE GLAD TO SEE YOU! We thought you were in it!” 

I said ‘In what?’ and they replied: ‘That earthquake in Los Angeles.” My mouth dropped, I looked at them and said “THATS WHAT HAPPENED TO ME?! I WAS IN IT! OH SHIT!” I took on out there I went up to Jay – he was my therapist – he was doin’ this high energy therapy work with me – and I go down there and I mean, it was expensive work and I’d go to him for teachings cause I mean, I was a therapist too, doing that. Wanted to know more about holistic health. He says ‘I think you better come in and take a look at the TV’. I’m standing  there and I’m watching what I have gone through and I’m going ‘oh my god’.

Those kinds of experiences….

M: So, I know that after your accident there was quite a long road to healing and regaining your memory back…

R:Well I never did regain it. I have no short-term memory. The other thing that I deal with every day and people don’t realize [is] I’ve got horrible post-traumatic stress syndrome.Because of the brain injury. The seriousness of it. I have ADHD because of it.

Her face hardens, as the daily grapple with the reality sets in. 

R: Because it did a number on me, and to deal with that on a daily basis drives me up the wall sometimes. People don’t realize that. I walk around with a smile….because it keeps my mind off it.

M: What I’m impressed with…I mean, lots of things…but…the fact that, through the healing and the recovery, I mean, there was a period of time you very much were not yourself

R: Oh no. Uh-uh

M: And what you’ve come to though, is not only having the memory of your intuitive experiences like the earthquake…but also coming back to how that created your identity and your spiritual strength of  knowing that …you’ve been able to come back to that, even after your accident. 

Randi nods in agreement

M: What was that like to find that again?

R: It still is tough. Sometimes, I think. Because of the problems I deal with daily, of trying to keep me together and stop this mind from reacting to things that it doesn’t have to. It’s taken a lot to try to get in touch with how that has affected my life. except now. But the first year…I was taken from my home. I couldn’t cook. Cause I was an airhead. I couldn’t remember anything. and i said I couldn’t. It was the realization in the beginning when these people took me to their home in this cabin on the river, it was like somebody…and I had said, I kept mumbling “you have got to get me out of town. I am NOT gonna heal from this if you keep me here. I can’t. You’ve gotta take me into the woods, I gotta get out of here. I’ve gotta get out of the city.” I knew that, because I knew that I was not gonna be healed. I couldn’t stand the noise, I still can’t. There’s too much going on, I’m done. But there’s really nothing going on. It’s just that I’m not dealing with it [in my head]. But there, it would scare the hell out of me. they didn’t realize at first, that when I couldn’t make that basket…I pick up this basketball and hold it in my hands and I’d sit there crying.

I sat there on that riverbank at that cabin for over a year. And the first several months…I love to chop wood…. and I couldn’t even lift the hachet to chop wood. There was absolutely no strength.

The doctors told them to take me out in public, so they take me to a shopping center. And me, my eyes get about THAT big (gesture) and I says “You can’t get me into a goddamn shopping mall before the wreck, what make you think you’re gonna get me into one now?! It’s not going to happen.” And they didn’t, I would not go…I couldn’t stand it and I’m still the same way. That has not left me at all. Going to concerts, anything. Loud noises…cause this whole [left] side of my face, clear down, I’ve lost 70% …over 30% that came out on the test…what’s going on with me…its not from my heart, my lungs is clear, if you can believe a cigarette smoker from the time she could sneak ‘em outta daddy’s lunchbox has got healthy lungs, healthy heart, and then they did the nerve conduction study and…my whole right side…was atrophied. And you can see it (shows me her leg) This leg, it’s smaller than this one. I never gained my strength back. I can go out here and chop a couple pieces of wood, and that’s it. And it’s only gotten worse. It seems like I was able to come back but…even though my motercycle riding had nothing to do with it…because of my brain, I at least know better than to go buy one and get one. Ya’ know. That was it, what it took away from me…those two things. I’d pray to god “don’t take those things. Take all you want, as long as I can walk and ride my motorcycle.

In the beginning, the doctors would say: “where do you wanna be in a year from now?”

I’d say “schriner’s peak” . When I was comin’ out of it, starting to make sense, then the doctor would say “where do you wanna be in a year?”

“Schriner’s peak”

He says to me, he says: “Randi, when they brought you in, you kept moaning ‘Schriner’s Peak’

‘That’s where I was on my way to”

He said ‘well what is it?’ I said “it’s a peak” of course I couldn’t even talk, my vocal chords were so damaged.

“why do you love that peak so much? “ and I says “cause she’s a bitch!” and he says okay.

You gain 1,040 feet for every mile in elevation you hike. She’s a bitch. And she’s my bitch.

That sense of humor. that was another thing that never left. I always had a comment to make. And I still do that today. Well you know, I got this brain thing. Be Patient. But then you know, they told me back then to tell people what happened and that I had a brain injury. So, you know, you gotta be aware of that. But people who’ve never been through it have no idea what that does to anybody. And all the years of medicine and blood services and things that I’d seen, I never thought that it would happen to me. Or, I didn’t think that it wouldn’t happen to me, cause people things do happen to people. I  didn’t understand, and I was a very understanding and compassionate person dealing with injured people at the senior center. And yet, did I really? I didn’t really understand because I didn’t understand what that put them through because it happened to me. And here, I got it. That changes people’s lives forever. and nothing’s ever the same again.

M: well, that’s a big lesson if you ever have one. 

R: I used to take a trip six weeks out of the year just to go play in the 11 western states on my motorcycle. I can’t do it anymore. I’ve flown once to Hawaii since the wreck.

I used to jump, hike…now I have to pick the ones that I can get to on the road.

Stuff like that. but I’m not unhappy with what I’ve been through. Not unhappy at all. And I used to say…one of the things I wish to say, is how luck I am. I wasn’t. They said “I’m lucky I lived through it.” No, I’m not lucky I lived through it. I wanted to die. I didn’t think I would live through it. And I one time, stood on that river bank where I was being cared for and I’d sit out there around the campfire all the time and just watch the ducks go up and down the river. I knew when the ducks were coming up, I knew when they were coming back down. I’d watch a Bald-headed eagle go to the next and there was this Blue Heron and you know Blue Heron they look at you it’s kind of like you’re looking into the eyes of the world. theres something about them and this blue heron would come in every morning and they would tell me to stay off the river bank. Don’t go down to the creek. It was canyon creek. But to me it was a river – a lot like the Cowlitz – it was big. And Id sit there and I’d look down there on the bank and think about how much fun I could have down there on those rocks and I’d try to see that blue heron. I knew it was landing. I couldn’t see it but I knew she was landing. So down the river bank I go. Make it down there, get over in the water, crawl up on this rock that would fit my dog and I, and there’s that blue heron. And that blue heron puffed herself up to full and she turned around and she looked me square in the eye and I could not move. I could only just sit there and let her pin me with that look. Just like I was staring into eternity. and all of a sudden she spread those wings and flew (elaborate emulation of the heron, her face releases 31:39) Here comes this rainstorm. And I’m in one of my spaces. And I’m standing out there on this river bank, rain is pouring down just in sheets like it was here and I’m standing in it and Im screaming at god and I’m telling him how stupid I think he is and that you want me to entertain thAe god mind. You tell me why I should do that?! Why didn’t you just let me die (32:18) I don’t. I cant do this. And Ive never forgotten that day cause in that storm, these ducks was coming down that river and they looked right at me and I feel them laughing and I started busting up at how ridiculous I sounded. And if I told anybody this story about those ducks looking at me in a rainstorm and laughing and how they brought me out of that space I was in of just wanting to die because I look at them laughing and how ridiculous I must sound at 60 years old to be screaming and calling god a jerk…I’ve got more brains than you do! I never did that one again. But the thing of it is, is when I would say “I’m lucky about thinkg that would happen…before that wreck….I’m not lucky. I’m grateful to have done the things I have done because if it hadn’t been for what I was into, the therapies the natural healing and told doctors nothing is broken, get your hands off me, I know how to take care of my body. it was a therapy that they’d never heard of. Cranial-sacral brain. Cause my whole energy had gotten all messed up. Clear through my body. Its a mess. And I knew that and I got this top neurologist…he says “I’m top doc. What do you want?” I says “I want you to write me prescriptions for this therapist, I says “for cranial sacral therapy” . When I left his care over a year later, his ears, nose and throat specialists all looked at me and said “ms Nelsen. You taught us a lot.”  I said “ I would hope so and I thank you for standing up and having the degrees behind your name to write that and make this insurance company pay for every damn bit of it!” cause that’s what it took was having that doctor of mine, top doc: “What do you want me to do?” “write me prescriptions.” cause there was nothing anybody could do about what was happening to my brain. And soon as they done the mir on my brain to make sure it wasn’t bleeding. 48 hours, my brain was in the hands of that therapist. Three times a week. Professional doctors still don’t know, with head injury, you get into cranial sacral work if there’s no bleeding. you don’t mess with it. you don’t just leave it there and do nothing and try to figure shit out. I am so fortunate I had that background.

M: Absolutely.

R: so very fortunate. And thats where I can even be thankful to this family that has nothing to do with me. my daddy had everything to do with me being a therapist. He would bribe me.  I knew a way to get around daddy when I was a little kid and stay out of trouble. Cause all I had to do was sit there and massage my daddy’s feet. (36:28) and you know what. Today, if I’m gonna give you a massage, give me your feet: Cause I’m touching everything and you’ll feel so good when you leave. I do that. Somebody gets hurt? Let me at it. You hurt a joint? Let me at that immediately. I’m not gonna touch it. I’m gonna work around it.

M: You do that extra mile of work with your injury, then you learn your body more intimately.

R: Uh-huh. I was into therapies…stayed in them..and then to retire and have to deal with doctors….that is the hardest thing of me going to doctors, and them not listening to me. because they have a whole different mindset.

I told em, and I’m gonna tell em because they finally found out: Its not my heart. its sending pain up through my arms and into my chest because of what’s going on in here (mind). The impact of that injury…I’ve already had surgery. They had to operate on this leg and immediately cause of the impact. I took 110 mph impact.

you couldn’t even…anybody that walked into that surgery room. I knew that they were there cause the tears were streaming down their face…I could sense the tears when they walked in and saw me. I wish I had pictures.

Boy some of the things they did when I was coming out of it and starting to realize what had happened….you tell me how old I was when I show you what I did…I’m on the living room floor of my home and I’m starting to realize that things are weird. Cause it’s not registering with me that my brain is compromised at that point. Futons. Up the walls. on the floor.  And I was crawling, I was not walking. You had me holding onto chairs, You had to button my shirt. you had to tie my shoes. I was not aware of any of that. We were one day in the kitchen: (39:30) Whats happening to me?! I cant tie my shoelaces?!!” she comes running in the there, she looks at me and here I am, tell me how old I was? She heard the cry of probably a three-year-old. And here I am: (muddled cry) I can’t tie my shoelaces! whats happening to me?!” How old do you think I was? maybe three or four. and I can remember. That was the only thing I can remember is her coming in and getting down on those futons with me and holding my face. and saying “look at me. You’ve got a very serious brain injury.”

“what do I do?” She says “There’s only one thing to do, Randi” “Just tell me what to do!” She says “You’ve got to get better. Give it time.” I said “I don’t know how…” and I did it. And that’s when they put me with these people. They’d put a belt around me, take me to the store. If you walked down the aisle, if you left me standing alone, I’d start crying. I’d just go into a panic cause I didn’t know where I was at and you’re taking me out in public to a store! And you had a belt around me but we walked into the store there in Granite Falls, around a corner to another aisle and left me standing there and I went into a goddamn panic. Stuff like that that just led me into a panic: Where am I? What am I gonna do? First time I came home to Packwood. Of course, those spaces had gotten further apart, and I didn’t panic so much. and I came home for the first time – it was christmas –  it was a year later a week before christmas. And this is when I found out I’d learnt to laugh at me. I’d just bust up at the things I’d put me through and I still do. I’d just start laughing cause I’d do something stupid. (42:23 laughing) I came down here and I got a room up at the mountain view lodge. And Debbie, my best friend who knew that I was coming and I was all excited…it took me six hours to get here from seattle cause I kept getting distracted. Keep it together, you’ll make it. So i got here, and I’m driving right up to high valley 7 to go visit my best friend and of course, I’m driving along you know…its dark…its christmas. And I’m thinking around the next corner I’ll see all those lights on that lead up to debbie’s house. Came around the corner and there wasn’t a light in the road.  I said “ wow. Geez, abby. I guess it’s around the next curb. But the next curb went the wrong way. finally, I just got out of the car and I’m standing there and every star in the sky is showing and it’s just gorgeous. And Abby’s outside the car with me and I’m saying “where in the hell am I?” and I felt this little voice say “packwood!” I start laughing! I busted up and I say “PACKwood?! now this is too funny. Lost in packwood?!” and I get into the car and I says “now abby, around the next bend if I’m where I think I’m at right now…there should be a place where I can turn this car around.” and the voice says “but what if there isn’t a place?” Tough shit, there better be!” Went around the corner and there’s that pull out. I knew where I was. I hadn’t turned onto cannon. I was going down Skate Creek!

M: Minor details!

R: Yea, minor details! I get over there, Debbie says “what took you so long. “ and I said, you are not going to believe this I got lost in Packwood.

(We take some time to look at more photographs) Okay, so see when I showed that “through the universal eye of a god” ? This is the picture I saw first that day.  That Indian. watching over eveything. This here was through the eye of a universal god. I turned around after I saw that light in there and thought: whats in that light? And we got that face. Down here I got a big picture of this. look at this face. The eye. The mouth. This big pool. The pool of redemption. The names that I pick for these photographs, I find very interesting.

Theres the pool of redemption.

M: When you hike around…well, when you take people out these days and see spaces like his and images in the rocks, does it kind of guide your actions and behavior of the moment (yes) or are they more like bigger picture messages?

R: No, whenever I address this issues like talking with you, I get into the spirituality. We all get different messages and mine comes from the earth and nature. It also tells me that there’s real life there. Something happened in that area. heres the prayer of deliverance there’s this guy. There’s his mouth, nose…who is he? But he looks like he’s praying. And here? What’s this here? This little critter with a hat on? And then down here I get this image of being very female, that there’s a woman there. I went back time and time again. And I got him the other day when I was there. He’s still there. There’s a lot more. But here. This one. I just love this one. I pick up that something happened in this place to leave these images behind. and yet that big flood that we had in 2006, that tore up that campground? I think that may have revealed that that was always there because these pictures were taken before that storm

Somebody’s watchin’ over them both. Some animal. Somethin. But this whole area – I can take you over there , you can stand there in that waterfall and see….

Heaven sent a rose [these images] jump out at me. I have to go back and see “ are you still here? Or was that my imagination? Oh! It’s still here!” And that’s what I find amusing, is people don’t notice it.

Abby…she was with me through that wreck. makin’ me walk. She wouldn’t go out with people to pee. She wouldn’t go without me. So they had to help me down 27 stairs to the backyard so that my dog could pee! because she wasn’t gonna go anywhere without her mom!

M: So I think a lot of people think about like the word pride as being like a negative thing. Like people are too prideful. (it’s not) I agree. I feel like pride is a sense of self. and when you found you couldn’t chop wood. (I wouldn’t leave it alone! I would not leave things alone!) Is that because you knew how important it was to re-establish that? (uh-huh) 

R: I had to and thats it. it’s the same thing with billy owens. The best thing you could’ve done for him was bring him right back home where he’s familiar with things. Best way of dealing with brain-injured people, you got to keep ‘em around whats familiar to em or they will forget. and what was familiar to me…like those people. I mean, how blessed could I get to find a family. These friends of mine that knew a family that would take me up in the woods and watch out for me and bring me back and forth to doctors and everything. They did. they were paid very well by me. they made quite a bit of money. but i didn’t care. It wasn’t about money. It was about being in a safe place on the river bank. Of getting out of that town. My friends know me well enough to know that “youve gotta get her out of town.” They did. people banded together. Those people didn’t know me. They just knew the woman working with me. And mark…I couldn’t eat. and the first time that I knew I was gonna eat…didn’t know if i could eat it all but I was gonna eat…was when the husband – mark was his name…a nd I met him…his wife was there ,and he walked in that door…they had three children. it was just the place for me to be because I was more of a kid and that son of theirs was 9… and I’d watch him on his bicycle and he’d watch me try to shoot baskets. I was always a good basketball player….by the time I left there I was shooting baskets, I was chopping wood…cause I wouldn’t leave it alone. Once I discovered I couldn’t do it, I was like “bull shit! I know how to do that!”

M: And then, where you still haven’t been able to re-establish like full physical pride, you’ve gone to…your creative outlet for that has been to do the hiker’s shuttle. So you exercise that…

R: I stay in it. That’s it. it’s been a life-saving thing. me being home, I love the mountains…so I can’t go on 22-mile hikes…but I can still go enjoy. and thats important. I can still enjoy it. I gained something. And Bill ___. I don’t care for Bill but a couple weeks ago he was at cruiser’s when I went in to watch the ball game. and he said “ you know, I’ve watched you since you came home…cause he met me when I came home. And he says…I’ve watched you and you’ve grown so much. And I says “and this year was the best. Last few years it was growing and this year, I wasn’t just running short little trips up and down the pass. I was running all over the state. 

I do get tired. Like yesterday, I get home and I’ll lay down on my bed after sleeping all night…fell asleep yesterday afternoon about 2 o’clock and i didn’t wake up until last night and then I was back to bed by 9.

M: But then you have such active periods. 

R: But the active periods every day, that I do…I go into town to return a movie. This is how I’m dressed. colder than hell, but I’m just going straight home. But I come out in a storm and now here I gotta look and see what everybody else is doing. and away I go and here I’m standing out there so cold, trying to get these pictures of Leach Lake and that cause it’s so gorgeous and there’s ice all over and when I send em out to my friends…they say “what in the hell were you doing standing out there with no hat and no coat on!” I said “yeah, thats the thing about my brain. It does real crappy things sometimes to me! and I just go for it, cause I just got that mood!” and I says “then I run for the car!” oh geez I gotta get warm. Oh I better go back…oh no! you gotta go to Leech Lake and see what that looks like! Maybe the swans are still there! What are you thinking, going on 73 and being stupid?!….no, I had fun!

M: If you can do it, you can do it!

R: So it goes on and on, you know. Its just crazy.

M: Now I know you and I have gotten into it a little bit about kind of anger being one thing you really really grapple with through all of this. 

R: I do. I do, and that why i just…cause a  lot of it comes from the post traumatic stress. and thats when I am just you know its not uncommon for me to go off and be crazy because of the post traumatic stress syndrome. Because it’s too much stress. now all of a sudden all of this shit comes together convoluted…

M: Do you ever find that you can feel it coming on and warn people…

R: I’m starting to recognize it…over some of the things the last couple months is: You. Pay attention. you know you don’t have attention. You have an attention disorder, but pay attention! Cause you do. Like you said you start to feel it, you get up and walk away and go home. and thats the way I’ve been deling with it. You don’t sit here and let it blow you away. You blow it away. and that little thing just came in. And that’s why I’ve been isolating myself, because I do feel it and I don’t like it. Its uncomfortable, because my brain is scrambled and I can’t stop that. Its …unless somebody has something like that, you can’t understand. And billy is gonna go through it. The best I can do is talk to him.

He said “am I gonna have short term memory. And I said no, you’re not. its gone. and you have to learn to deal with it. You don’t take it inside. It can make you feel crazy. And so I thought “you stop that crazy because of what it does to me and my body. Everything. It’s no fun.

But you’ve got to walk away and let people be their people and say “it has nothing to do with you. And I find that it has not got to do with me. I’ve learned to ignore it and not take it on and let it become this….but I also had a therapist tell me “you’ve got to tell people that you have a brain injury.” They assume they won’t get it…no more than I’ve got it…until it happened to me.

M: So what would you say for yourself then, is the most important thing you tell people? 

Be aware of your own self-growth. (1:02:21) Let people, especially young people know “I now it’s hard you’re going through this…but its not the hardest thing you’ll go through. all these little things we go through, they’re not important because what’s important…its like this one thing my spirit…where I can get into my picture file and show …and it comes out of this humor but its true…about when we’re young and “oh you…and this older person: “hey! You ain’t seen nothing yet that’s laying ahead of you! this is nothin! Its just relationships and all this shit…and its nothing! absolutely. There’s more important things. A lot more important things. You’ve gotta have a good relationship with yourself in order to have one with someone else. And friends. You know, I read a statement many years ago as a kid. You know, you only get out of this life having one friend. we call a lot of people friends, but they’re not your friends. I have people “randi, let us help you. give us a call if you need help. But I make the phone call and “oh, we’re too busy.” So I step back and I realize I’m making the wrong choices, to call them friends.

M: And thats part of the self growth. The self-responsibility. 

R: You know. All this life is about…is changing. And you should be glad for change. Because nothing ever stays the same. and you’ve got to be able to adjust to that, that nothing is ever the same. And one minute you can be happy…in a happy marriage. But I see those falling apart all the time. You know, we always think we have to have somebody of our own to be worthwhile. No we don’t.

waves

The condition of my surroundings is incredibly indicative of my life at the moment; neglectfully spiraling out of control.

That sounds really dramatic, and I don’t mean to raise alarm. The negligent choices I’ve made over the past week and a half have been more or less conscious sacrifices to my well-being, with every intention to have a restoration goal. The problem is that I keep justifying an extension for that period and before I know it, I will have visitors again and with that, be throwing cares to the wind again. 

This weekend is one of lots of work, little sleep and novel social opportunities, all factors that I use to justify not giving a damn. However, on top of an indulgent decision last weekend, my body is suffering. I have had a swollen pelvic pain, unrelated to any feelings of fullness or cramping, which I’m sure will not go away with my current patterns. Yet, I’ve chosen to waive responsibility for this weekend, which suffices when I am power-tripping on social interactions. But when I hit the eventual moments of solitude, the unsustainable reality of this routine sets in. Over the past month, I’ve been thriving off of a routine that builds no fortitude for self-tolerance. soul-connective practices are diluted as I showcase a conformed, attention-yearning, reckless child coated in intense, false invincibility.

I never hit small tides. I hit big, sweeping waves. The kind that I imagine surfers wait ages for because when they catch that ride, it feels like it lasts forever. When I get in a good groove, its so good. But I let the bad waves build just as much.

Like I said, you can see it in my environment; a sink piled with dishes, leftover bottles and glasses in every room, unfinished projects strategically placed where I can be reminded of them yet still left un-touched.

I don’t really have a good place to end this entry. I’m not pleased about where I am and I know that I can do better. But I also trust my waves: waves are not stagnant and I’m catching that next big one out of here.

self-check

Even as I feel my skin crawl and my voice bite into the speaker, I know that this is all on me, squirming inside something I don’t understand. And as the tension dissipates into an apathetic silence, I know that I am hiding.

Every time I come down from superficial social highs, I hit an awkward phase, like an adolescent trying to decipher their authentic identity; the social butterfly has worn out its welcome but I don’t know how to find the graceful swan of deeper, quieter connections. What I am left with is a restless body and brain, knowing where I don’t want to be but stuck with layers of debris to dig through.

My mom is always the one that gets the brunt of these outbursts reminiscent of teenage angst (as if she didn’t get enough of that backlash already). When I catch myself, it’s a good indication that I’m not being honest and present enough. So this morning, I thought about what new or returned peeves are getting to me.

When I discovered I would now have to deal with hemorrhoids, I realize I kind of took a “fuck all” approach to everything else. I’ve subconsciously let it take the reigns, using it as an excuse to not make responsible choices. When I entered back into the realm of endless food and drink choices, there were a few things I intended for: I would only be enjoying these things on social occasions and visits, leaving time to myself for responsible, conscious healing choices. I would also not allow myself things that are bad for most even in peak conditions (i.e a piece of commercialized candy, corn syrup and all). Well, I’ve failed to comply with either of these precautionary measures. I say life got too complicated, too busy…but really, I just stopped considering things.

It can be stupidly easy to fool yourself. In a mind littered with the debris of disordered eating, there are streams of illogical processes. For instance, I can catch a glimpse of physical form and decide in that particular instance, what I see on the surface justifies eating or drinking something, regardless of tuning into how I feel. Or I can feel an obligation to eat something when I’m in discomfort as a way of defying that history of food avoidance. With a history so invested in the surface level of physical and visual acceptance, on days that the mirror feels good, I hear my brain want to say that there is nothing wrong at all and I can throw my cares to the wind a little more. This mental pattern also makes it difficult to keep a regular meal pattern. When the littlest bit of food has the potential to make me feel full or uncomfortable, it is easy to become apprehensive of meal time. My mind’s history is used to preferring the feeling of emptiness. I would be fine with a normal sensation of fullness but the symptoms I deal with are a big leap from what I found comfort in for so long.

If I am honest with myself, I know that I would be setting myself up for failure to expect to go back to a GAPs diet right now. But I have also not been creating expectations that respect my ability to meet challenge and that respect the knowledge I’ve gained about my body and my process. I am hence committing to redirect my focus towards what I need for myself in between social situations. I’ve also decided that I will be returning to a more invested effort come July. I have to stop trying to conveniently situate my healing around opportunities for summer frolic and bonfire and stereotypical moments. Healing doesn’t work that way. And I think I will get plenty of that in over the next few weeks with my beloved friend Mary coming to town…

Where I’ve been

The other day, I decided to take stock of the virtual footprints I’ve left throughout the inter webs and I realized that for the past two years, I’ve had three different blogs created for my health journey.

The first was back in Ann Arbor, when I took a lighthearted approach to a month-long cleansing experiment and abruptly ended my writing on the 1st of February. The second was last year, during a 6 week period of dietary restrictions. Again, when I broke my commitment ceremoniously at the summer’s Portland Cider Summit, I abandoned the blog.

I do not want this blog to be fated to the same inconclusive end that other’s have seen. With something as tumultuous as health and digestive struggles, it is so easy to get deterred from documenting when a routine or progress hits a lull. But I know that for myself, being aware of the stories of “failure” that others have had to overcome over years of work is a big part of what keeps me hopeful and helps me not to take things to heart with too much severity.

As I should have suspected, finding a balance after allowing myself a break from such a diligent routine has been difficult. I am on a bit of a social high and decent sleep patterns, curbed sugar cravings and conscious food preparations have certainly fallen by the wayside a bit.

Part of my laxidasical discipline was due to a new concern that came up for me over the spring break. I had been experiencing certain symptoms that indicated a more strictly physical complication as opposed to the ellusive physiological/emotional/energetic framework that I’d applied to my health. My stance sort of became: well, if it’s not something that can be solved by all of these careful preparations and precautions I’m pouring my energy into anyway, then I’m just as well to take a break from trying so hard; Basically, a spiteful ‘fuck this’.

I’ve enjoyed my spite thoroughly – visits to the cider house, lazy coffee shop mornings, continued social excursions that call for new food concoctions – but I know that I still need to curb my indulgences a bit.

I did finally have a doctor’s appointment with a specialist who confirmed the lesser of two physical evils: I’ve got inflamed hemorrhoids. Hurray for embarrassing topics. Fortunately, it’s nothing fatal or extremely harmful. Its just another inconvenient factor in my health mystery. The specialist referred me to a colleague who focuses on the upper digestive tract, as she suspects that this is only one piece to a body-wide puzzle. She also recommended my course of treatment be…physical therapy. Basically, I’ve got to re-train parts down yonder.

Life is taking me by storm again. Busy, exciting things are happening to distract me from wanting to make my health a priority. But like I said, I don’t want to stop talking about it.

I am going to make an appointment with the other specialist. And a physical therapist. But I’m at a ‘where do we go from here’ phase with my personal choices. My homemade broth has been making me feel worse lately. I am being told to trade in the low/no fiber practice and go back to trying to a good load of dietary fiber in. The Kombucha that had bothered me now feels soothing. The stuff that I had no problem with now riles up my system. I do need to back away from my insane chocolate collection.

The most important thing from all of this continues to be the lesson of patience with inconsistency and the openness to struggle and relating to other’s struggle as a way to bring meaning and connection into life.

I hope to get some more “faultlines” interviews up soon and will give an update on the next wind of appointments.

I hold these moments like a gem; unfathomably crystalline in such a way that one can’t conceive how nature constructs such a multiplicity of textures, sensations and features. These are the moments where my body shapes itself to my spirit. These are the moments where the energetic debris makes a break like light in a storm, and I can rest.

But gemstones are ultimately nothing but material. As soon as I drop it from my palms, we are disjointed. The contentment of precious things are illusion and ultimately, separated. These moments are fleeting and are a foolish illusion that maybe, I’m “free”.

I’m considered self-pitying or melodramatic by some, I’m sure. By others, a food snob. The lines blur at this point, why I make the food choices I do. Sometimes I even find myself longing that I could eat gas station Ice Cream bars and Skittles without suffering. Its a paradigm shift to remember that not being able to have those things is not confining. But what is confining is waking up every day wondering not if but when discomfort will strike. It is taking on stress when I’m getting ready to see a long-lost friend after months…because I want it to be a happy occasion and I can’t guarentee how I will feel. It is the gamble I play with each thing I ingest – is it safe this time or did I hit the tipping point? It is the seeming double standard in my love life, embodying a spirit that seeks the vibrancy of romance and sensuality yet simultaneously baring a body that literally cannot withstand the physical aspects of passion.

When people hear “digestive issues”, they isolate the situation. But it envelopes a person’s whole being in this reality. In being present. There is a subtle shift that happens when my body begins to indicate that it will be a rough day. My energy recoils. My concentration is truncated. I am made separate from the world before I can even register it.

I wholeheartedly admire those that push through daily pain in ways that people cannot detect it. I’ve done so myself. But others don’t realize how draining that is to do on a daily basis for years. Sometimes, you hit a point where you just have to say: Listen. This sucks and I’m not 100%. I want some respect and accommodation of that.

So I equally admire those that will stand up and admit they need support. They need to be allowed to function at half mast. It is not for others to judge how much effort you’re putting into your own healing. Sometimes the strongest step we take is admitting that we are not strong.