Hope There's Someone

Last night I was watching (again) YouTube videos about consciousness, near death experiences and dreams.  My body was in agony and my mind was racing at a million miles an hour, trying to make sense of what I was listening to, watching, and feeling physically.  After a couple hours I had to switch to some old television show, giving my brain a rest.

I get that my life is my life, my adventure here designed for me and me alone.  I know deep in my heart that I am very lucky in many ways; family, friends, access to my medical needs, food.  I know those things are beyond measure.  I just get tweaked when I hear, like I did in one of the videos, a doctor talking about people who are in the end stages of their lives and how the primary concern is keeping them “out of pain and comfortable’.  What a concept.  I’m not in the end stages of life (to my knowledge) so I don’t get to be kept “comfortable”.   I also don’t get to choose to die, at least not legally (though it is legal in Washington state).  It’s a huge hole in the right to die system.  The line has to be drawn somewhere, yes, but drawing it in front of someone in agonizing pain for over 15 years with no end in sight is….insane.

Tonight I am feeling like I want to end it, right now, right here.  But the thought of actually going through with it makes me so anxious I want to scream.  I don’t know what is worse.  It’s all the word salad about being “punished” for taking my life that stops me.  Everyone tells me “No, Sherri, that won’t happen” but who the hell knows?

One of the YouTube shows was on this experiment done years ago in the UK on the afterlife and communicating with the dead through a radio.  Okay,  then.  I tried to find the book to put it on hold at my library, but I couldn’t find it.  It was called the Scole experiments.  Watch it, it’s fascinating.  Really out there. 

I feel like I’m treading water that’s in an abyss….everything is scary, out of focus and feels hopeless.  Everything.  I’ve never wanted it to end so bad.  I want to see my loved ones who have passed.  I want them to show up for me.  All the gifts I had regarding being in touch with the other side, and there have been a LOT of them, vanished when I had to start taking medication for pain.  Since the opiates do little to abate the pain, I wonder if I can wean myself off of them and stop all together.  I wonder if it would be any different, really.  Scares the hell out of me because it’s already bad.  

 I saw my healer/acupuncturist today…she always helps me.  And I need to do a Shamanic journey.  Haven’t done that for ages.  AND, I need to STOP reading the news.  I’ll. Never. Learn.  Or maybe I will.  Some day.  She told me those gifts I thought I have lost are still there, and pointed out some things I’ve experienced on her table that I forgot about.  I guess I still have those gifts: they are just slightly different now.  Not as fun.

I started going through all my “stuff” the other day; found a bracelet my sister gave me after my first tumor surgery in 1995.  It is beautiful silver with tiny hoops and the word “Strength” on the circle that holds it together.  I need strength.  I may need it to end my life when I get brave enough and the pain is bad enough.  But again,  I don’t want to make that decision because I’m sad/mad/fearful.  I want to make it when I just know I’m done.  When the joy is no longer there at all.  Every time I get a small break in the pain, the desire to end my life vanishes.  But the breaks a few and far, far between.  So I just sleep with the picture of my grandparents and parents, asking for help. 

I’ve been getting horrific headaches.  I don’t normally get headaches but they come in short, painful bursts.  Maybe it’s a sign.  Maybe my sudden urge to cook and actually eat what I make (though small portions) is a sign.  Embracing life prior to moving on.  What a pip, eh?

I know I’m all over the map here….I know I should not be reading the news non- stop the way I do.  I know my anxiety levels are through the roof due to my behavior around this issue.  I just can’t help myself.  The news flies by at lightning speed and it’s all bad.  It scares the tar out of me.  Coupled with this agonizing pain that just doesn’t let up for more than an hour every other day or so (no exaggeration) I can hardly breathe.  Getting out of my head is harder and harder to do.

                                                                   

Rainbow Room

When I was a kid, there was this restaurant in Minneapolis called the Rainbow Room.  This was in the late fifties/early sixties.  My family would go there Sunday nights sometimes, and my grandparents from both sides often joined us.  My brother and I (sister was not yet born) would huddle down in the backseat “dodging” the lights that would often flash across the skies, announcing a new movie playing in a nearby theater.

I have occasionally written about my grandmother Ida, my dad’s mother.  She was and still is, long after her death, a driving force in my life.  I often reach out to her across the veil that separates us, asking for her help.  Such was the case last night.  I had a very bad day.  My sister had come by to visit bringing with her a delicious lunch.  I usually am able to gather myself together enough to chat, laugh and have the best time possible given my limitations.  I was unable to do that Monday.  She could see it, and only stayed a short time.  I felt bad, as it is a long drive.  Perhaps I should have called to cancel, but I wanted to see her.

Anyway, last night I was in one of my awful mental/spiritual/physical situations, crying for it to be over.  I begged for Ida to appear to me; to show me something that would help.  Like death.  It wasn’t my usual crying jags.  It was more of a giving up emotion.  I’m just worn out.

The surgery in February was a bust, the tumors are back and hurt like heck; my cataract surgery changed nothing, except that it’s a little worse.  The dry eye makes my eyes hurt.  I did get a new prescription which should be in soon and I’m hoping I can go back to reading….I know I can do audio books but it’s not the same thing.  Reading is cathartic; listening feels passive unless the speaker grabs hold and even then the experience isn’t the same.  So poor me, pity potty, etc.

Anyway, after waking up every hour I finally fell asleep.  Then came the dream.  I was in the Rainbow Room with my family (not all, but I remember some) and my Grandma Ida was to the left of me, eating quietly.  At some point, everyone but my grandmother moved to the other side of the table, down and away from her and me.  Then, suddenly, we were in a hotel room, only it was a room next to a noisy street full of drug addicts and hookers.  I tried to get us a different room.  And I did.  Then I woke up.

I haven’t a clue what any of it meant.   The “hooker/addict” thing could have been about me (well, the addict thing anyway) but I’m not an addict; dependent yes, but as I always say, I’d flush every last pill down the toilet if I could.  But I need them the same way someone else needs blood pressure medication, etc.  Somehow though, seeing her and being aware there was a “rainbow” involved, lifted my spirits a bit.  I went out with my help today to get some things to make a slow cooker soup. I’ve been experimenting with slow cooker recipes, just so I get food in me.  So far, I haven’t found anything I like,   But right now, I smell the aroma of the lentil/Portobello mushroom soup that Maria is making for me..  We shall see.

And maybe, just maybe, I’ll see Ida soon.