Illness

A note before this story: I was born unhealthy, and deformed. I was a sickly, but bright, child. In my early teens I started having joint problems. Hip and knee pain, eventually my shoulder. Right before my 22nd birthday I had some heart complications. I began experiencing more severe symptoms, noticing medicine didn't help, looking back I also see the anxiety and depression. This poem is about the process of trying to find out what causes this, and the constant arrogance and ignorance of many doctors, friends, and family treating me like I was lying to get medication (my early to mid-twenties).

Poem:

Rejection, rejection. It's not often I am the one seeking this kind of affection, mental war inside, constant push and pull of the tide, lies hiding behind "I'm fine.". Moments ruined. People died. So many tears cried. Trivial? Lost? Seen? Legacy left to hang free, sadness in the greens. Stronghold, peace of mind, he seems so lost, yet...he finds. She's ragged ruin, slick like putty, sliding smooth through callous fingers. Let it out, let it be said, words no longer crawling through her head.

P.S.: I'm now 33. Since the earlier years I finally found a doctor that took me seriously. I have learned that I have severe allergies to many things along with asthma since I was born, have been genetically tested and confirmed I have MTHFR Gene Mutation (so I wasn't lying when I said the medicines didn't work). I have an auto-immune disease related to my tendons and ligaments (joints), that also leaves me vulnerable to pretty much every illness I might come in contact with. My heart likes to try to kill me once in awhile, resulting in 3 medications every day to keep it at bay, and my mental health has digressed. I'm disabled by Anxiety, Panic, Depression, and PTSD, as well as the many ailments that plague immunocompromised individuals. BUT: I'm alive. My body is a fighter. And I WON'T STOP trying to go on.