Careful What You Wish For

There was this girl who had fibro.  We'll refer to her from here on out, as FG ...short for Fibro Girl.  She also had COPD and some other ailments.  FG had caught a bad cold last week and as we all know, when a person has fibro, everything is worse.  She drug her butt around sniffling and sneezing, and blowing her sore red nose.  Gasping for breath through a completely plugged nose she'd think "Boy, if only I could get over this cold".  Monday, she stopped sneezing and her head felt normal again but now her lungs were clogged.  She'd cough and wheeze and curse her crappy health.  

FG started to feel depressed.  Depression is a common co-condition of fibro, and FG deals with it from time to time. FG would sit around with tears welling up in her eyes.  She felt sad, and lonely, and depressed.  She wondered why she has to live day to day in pain.  She wondered why she only has a few friends that she can ever get together with.  She thought about how crappy of a person her ex-husband is, for leaving her just because of her health conditions.  FG even wondered if she'd now be alone for the rest of her life.  FG's latest idiotic saying lately has been "I couldn't even buy a date to McDonald's.  Some dude would take my money then through me out of the car before he turned into the parking lot".

Being nice, the boyfriend of FG's daughter told her last night not to make plans for supper tonight because he was going to take her out to eat at a buffet, with him and FG's daughter.  Today came and FG was so tired and fatigued, that she wasn't sure she could go out to eat.  Thinking it may do her more good than harm though, FG forced herself to go.  

FG was still in a funk.  It was so bitter cold.  Her muscles and joints started aching as soon as she walked out the door.  She was determined though, to enjoy herself for once.  

Shortly after arriving at the restaurant, FG was sitting there eating.  Her daughter and the boyfriend started whispering and giggling.  FG asked them "what's going on?".  FG's daughter said "just a minute" then pulled out her cell phone and sent FG a text.  It said "That creepy old man sitting diagonal from us won't quit staring at you mom, and he keeps smiling".  FG tried to be extremely casual about it, but looked over her shoulder to see a gentleman dining alone, openly staring at her.  FG just kind of shrugged it off.  

A bit later, FG got up to go get some more food.  She could feel eyes burning into her back all the way to the buffet tables.  Walking back to the table, Creepy Older Man was staring at her, looking her up & down, and smiling at her.  FG kept looking straight ahead, and found her seat.  

Now, FG has always had a kind heart for the elderly.  Always smiles and nods, or stops and talks, when she comes upon the elderly.  This gentleman though, was not that elderly.  He probably had a good 15 years on FG, but FG is over the hill only 43 years old.  So in the eyes of FG's 18.5 yr old daughter, he was an old man.  In FG's eyes, he was just an older man.  

FG was trying to eat, but she could feel eyes buring into her with every bite she took.  She couldn't help obviously non-chalantly glancing to see if her ever over-active imagination was taking over, or if her every move was being watched.  For once, she wasn't completely delusional.  Creepy Older Guy really was staring at her constantly.  By constantly, I mean only looking away to get food on his fork, then staring as he forked it into his mouth.  He'd smile the creepiest smile as he stared at her. It became unnerving.

By this point, FG was feeling self-conscious with every bite she took, herself!  FG saw Creepy Older Guy finally stand up and grab his coat, out of the corner of her eye.  She froze, half-scared that on his way old Creepy Older Guy would stop at the table and say something.  An audible sigh of relief was heard coming from FG's lips, as the gentleman passed the table without stopping.

The entire ride home, FG's daughter made little jokes about Creepy Older Man liking FG.  Once home, FG thought about the whole situation, and cracked up laughing!  Although some would think the non-stop, hyena-sounding laugh meant that FG had finally cracked and lost her sanity, FG knew it was a good sign.  Her bought of depression had finally some-what disapated.  She also had learned a valuable lesson when it came to complaining about being single and not being able to "buy a date to McDonald's".  She learned to be careful what you wish for ...because there will always be a Creepy Older Man Prince Charming out there somewhere, that you'll run across sometime in your life.

FG is in physical pain tonight.  The bitter cold makes her old bones ache and her muscles have sharp, shooting pains in them.  Still, she's thankful that she forced herself out of the house.  This has been good for her mind and soul.

Finding Mr. Right

For those of you who are single, do you ever wonder if you'll find Mr. Right, now that you're affected by a chronic pain illness?  Do you ever wonder if there will ever be anyone out there, that will truly be able to understand and stick this thing called life, out with you?  Is there anyone out there that is NOT affected by a chronic pain illness, that will truly be able to "get it" and be able to understand what we're going through on our bad days?

Those of you who've been around my blog since the beginning, know that my husband left me a couple months after my official diagnosis.  That was lacking 6 days of being 15 months ago.  I'm ready to move on.  I'm ready to have someone in my life again.  Someone who I can talk to. Someone to hold my hand, and to give me hugs.  A man who I can take care of on my good days, and know that he'll take care of me on my bad days.  Someone to spend the rest of my life with.  

Having low self-esteem due to several factors, and not working for years due to my illnesses, I don't have a clue how to meet this Mr. Right.  My teens kept telling me to join a dating site.  My teen daughter would joke that she was just going to make me a profile behind my back and "hook me up".  Finally, I caved in.  I was upfront about my health problems from the beginning.  I didn't want to play around, so if it's a problem to someone, I wanted them to know up front.

Responses have provided me with great amusement, I can say that much at least LOL.  I've lost count of how many messages I've received from random men that say "So, do you smoke pot?" ...or "So, are you in pain every day?"  ....or "How do you manage living with a condition that causes pain".  I respond, and then if I'm lucky, I get back a generic response that says "Well, I hope your pain isn't too bad".  That's pretty much the end of it.  

Those questions are all pretty good for starting conversations about awareness.  Not so good for starting relationships.  It seems like whenever a guy reads that I have chronic pain conditions, they're curious about the condition ...but not about a relationship with me.

Then, we have my best friend of almost 20 years.  We've dated in the past, as a matter of fact, we were even engaged once.  No matter what though, we've always ended up remaining best friends.  If ANYONE could understand, it'd be him.  Well, he didn't.  All I ever hear is "Amy, I'm so sorry that you have problems with your health".  Well, me too Nate, me too.  I finally couldn't take it any more and told him if I heard "I'm sorry" one more time, I was going to seriously come unglued.  I live with a chronic pain condition.  I'm not on my death bed.  Then, he wanted to try a relationship.  I finally start thinking that maybe I won't have to live my life alone, when out of the blue that is done before it even got started.  He just treats me like I'm a complete invalid.  I'm NOT.  Then, he wants to party all the time.  I'm not into all of that.  I never have been. I couldn't even if I wanted to, because I take medicine every day.  Back to just being BFF's.  Another Mr. Wrong, for my situation.

I know that there are good guys (and girls) out there.  I know that there are those who are willing to learn about someone's condition, and are actually eager to learn about it and stick it out with someone who has a chronic pain condition.  I'm just not sure that there's someone out there like that for me.  Fibro, arthritis, and COPD give me feelings of sadness and depression as it is, and my hopeless feeling about finding Mr. Right is really getting to me tonight.  I think I'm just giving up for the time being.  I'll do as I've done for the past 15 months.  I'll sit here and hide behind my computer.  I'll pour my heart and soul into doing what I can to create awareness about chronic pain conditions.  I'll advocate for our patient rights, for further research, and for a cure.  Please God, please let them find a cure.  Then, maybe I can actually live for the rest of my life, instead of sitting around waiting to die.