When you have had a lot of surgeries, the process may become a dreaded necessity. I do not go a single calendar year without having at least one surgery; one year I was lucky enough to have three, and now I'm nearing a two per year average.
Unfortunately, my chronic illnesses are not good friends with surgery. No matter what we've tried, my post-surgery progression to better health requires a month of terror before the mental and physical relief begins. I am usually sick and bedridden for about month. Let me be clear, the tiniest of surgeries negatively affect Dysautonomics (my illness) more than it does a typical patient. Those operations that take 24 hours of recover...takes me one month. There are specific reasons why, but that's a tall order and I've run out of paper.
At two-weeks of my slow recovery, people start to make health suggestions. They treat me like I've done something criminal and should be given the electric chair for not trying all of the 1,274 natural remedies they've suggested. Mind you, this illness takes lives every year; and many lives are for the better because of surgeries like mine. I have talented people on my team who never try to sugarcoat the process my body is going through. These same doctors have prescribed me lots of natural treatments that work--and I use them daily. My doctors go the route of: "If you were my daughter, I'd suggest you..."
When someone asks how I feel or how good I'm doing, I muddle: "I feel like shit." For their own good, nobody wants to hear that I'm not feeling." Since I've never been known to go around complaining and looking to be babied, my statement seems to be a hit with lots of elderly people but does not bolster morale for the physically healthy middle-aged optimistic people.
It doesn't matter, my body doesn't care about what people think. Yes, I've tried alternative ways to healing; it's sad that I have had to defend myself for utilizing the myriad of choices as if like I've committed a crime.
Maybe one day I'll take a little time to write about the craziest alternative treatments I've tried. Whether I do so or not, my body won't give a shit about what anyone thinks, and I decided long ago to accept that.
~MissNikkiAnn (@missnikkiann on most platforms)
*Photo of and by MissNikkiAnn (@missnikkiann)