My life is kind of weird
For as long as I can remember I have never felt nor wanted to be normal. To the rebellious punk rock kid inside me, who lives in my head to this day, normal was just a synonym for ordinary aka boring. I truly never understood why this was a goal. When I got diagnosed with YOPD [being female and under 50 it made me quite the rare one] I found I had no cohort to retreat into who would metaphorically circle the wagons when I needed support.
To coddle the pieces of my fractured ego, my only option was to protect myself behind physical barriers of walls, curtains, and windows. It took more than a year of my self-imposed solitude working through my thoughts for me to pluck up the courage to try getting back into the world. Really that was the first time in my life I had desperately wanted to fit in so much to just slip by unnoticed, the people I met during this brief attempt at being normal didn't last.
The punk rock kid in my head was raging and the voice in my head would keep repeating ''this isn't me'', after this feeling had passed I would learn it is referred to as internalized ableism. I can't pinpoint the exact moment my road to self-acceptance began. My journey has been much more nuanced than that.
I can however pinpoint the exact date 6 months ago [thanks Facebook] when I stood up and stopped apologizing for myself. For anyone who hasn't lived the life of a military spouse think GOLDFISH BOWL. A friend [quite innocently] told me how people had been referring to me as the one with Parkinson's. I was livid. I had done so much work to get back to the real me but still, all people could see was my illness.
I sat down at my computer and crafted the most wonderfully passive-aggressive post I have ever written in what felt like the blink of an eye. In one final act of social defiance, I logged out!!!
A few hours later I turned my phone back on and ping ping ping the notifications kept on coming, the love was so great that it caused me to change how I see myself. I realized I had been viewing myself through a distorted lens coming from the assumption that I am broken. I also realized the benefit of choosing your friends carefully
Those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind!!!!
