“I’m going to talk to you tonight about coming out of the closet. And not just in the traditional sense. Not just the “gay” closet. I think we all have closets.”
On November 11, 2011 some awful news was delivered to me. I am diseased. I’m getting better about discussing this fact, but I still live in my closet. People will worry unnecessarily, and for that I apologize. In the same vein, however, people deserve to know in order to parse it as they will. This (well and Facebook to a degree) is why we are here.
Facebook has long passed its day of being an actual useful tool in life. While some are looking for their next greatest chance to call some random stranger an idiot, most are like me. Your daily Facebook activity consists of checking on your family, close friends, and scrolling through for that next eye-catching funny cat picture that is going to make your current 5 minutes. On a day that I don’t remember and for a reason I don’t remember, a Ted talk from Boulder, Colorado given by a wonderful soul named Ash Beckham came across my timeline. For whatever reason, I watched. And then I watched again. And I thought that my takeaway from the talk was the line “Hard is not relative. Hard is hard.” It is a tremendous line, to be fair. If you hear it, internalize it, believe it, apply it… it is tremendously powerful and influential in the way you live life and treat people. Go ahead and do that, and this will have had some benefit already. Again, though, this is not why we are here.
“All the closet is, is a hard conversation”
There is literally nothing that can be done about my situation. You should not worry. You should not lose sleep. It is what it is, which is why it is still a closet. No one can change it. The worry will take time away from time that you can be using on important things in your own daily life. Making coffee. Petting your animals. You cannot help me, and I don’t want you to try. Not because I’m obstinate. Ok, maybe I am a little… but I am already doing what anyone can in order to try to “make things better”. In this situation “better” is “maintaining the status quo”. Which is why I don’t want you to worry.
I am I. I say this to level my words at that old “I’m ill but brave” axiom that is “My illness does not define me.” It doesn’t, but it does. When you live in my situation, every activity every day is examined through the lens of what is possible in spite of my illness. It has to be. At the same time, I am I. Mentally, I am everything that you have ever known me to be. Literally nothing has changed there. The amount of physical effort that I can give is significantly less. And it varies. Yesterday, I went to an Easter egg hunt, went to the store, took the dog to a dog park (with the walk to and from), made and carved Easter dinner (potato and green bean sides as well!). The day before, in the exact same weather conditions, I managed the bare minimum. This is all that has changed.
“But inside — in the dark — you can’t tell what color the walls are. You just know what it feels like to live in a closet.”
I have no idea what color the walls are in here. I know that there are walls. I know when the dark gets darker and the cold gets colder. Cold? If you have a closet, it’s cold in there. Don’t let anyone ever tell you differently. There are times when things legitimately not of your construction define your existence. Of course the illness. Your energy and coping levels. How daily stress impacts you. Dealing with problems in the matrix of trying to make things as OK as they can be (insurance, I’m looking at you) – but that is a discussion for a different day – compounded by responsibilities around the house compounded by what you need to do to do those thing. All of these levels pile a tremendous amount of pressure onto a base already wobbly to begin with.
“It’s a lot harder to meet them where they are and acknowledge that they were trying. What else can you ask someone to do but try? If you’re going to be real with someone, you have to be ready for real in return.”
This piece is going to be met with an amount of entreaties to help. That is not the point, but while I may struggle dealing with you if you reach out, know that I have reached a point that I am first and foremost glad to have been in your thoughts at all. I am still old enough that the prevailing ethos was tied to being a good employee… a good foot soldier for the company. That is no longer where I live –again, something we will likely talk about in the future – but there is still that part of me that defines self-worth on how much I can do. This writing is a first step towards not abandoning what I have known but redirecting it towards a much healthier outlook. On today’s internet there will be no shortage of people queued up to take shots at me which creates a sadness that compounds like loan interest on top of everything else. There will also be twice as many people even within my current social structure who want to take a spot under my arms to help me stagger forward as best as I can. I love you and appreciate you for this. I will struggle to accept it – this is the part where you might define my attitude as strong – as I rage against my body wasting away against me through no fault of my own. In the meantime I intend to keep this line of communication open. For myself. For you. For anyone I do not know who needs to hear it. I am Jim. I am ill. I am doing what I can to carry on as best as is humanly possible. Multiple Sclerosis built me my own personal closet. And I am no longer in my closet. Thank you for listening.
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