Yesterday, I had five new autism families come to me for help. FIVE. It's usually one or two a week. When the family comes to you, you hear their story. You relive your own. You remember the frantic helplessness. You remember the longest lasting anguish imaginable. Five times yesterday.
My purpose on this planet now is to show others the way around chronic illness, and through it if they are already there.
But it's also to stay strong enough here to keep pulling myself and my son through it, and yesterday made my well run dry. Going to have to learn to balance this if this volume of numbers continues.
Andrew is walking for a day or two after a pulsatilla dose, then stopping again. Going to talk to the doc about it Monday when I bring Ava in.
I have had high-anxiety dreams this week, they are making my heart and head race and keep me on edge all day long.
Tuesday I was in the grocery store with Benjamin, picking up things to make a meal for a new-mom friend, and in the gluten free aisles ran into a mom of autism. They dabble in gluten and dairy free, but haven't gone full force . She asked if it helped and I told her diet has been our most important intervention. She looked like she wanted to ask more. I didn't offer anything. Nothing. Since when do I stay silent? How long will it haunt me that I could have sent her to Dr Gruber or TACA and I did NOTHING? Said nothing.
Am I trying so hard to be non confrontational that I am denying my truth?
It's a balancing act. Every day I post stories about sick babies and I think: how many more oft real life friends will block me on Facebook today? So in real life with this woman, I didn't want a rejection? Why does my pride even get to be a factor in the quest to save babies? So unlike me.
But it's cost me. I feel uncomfortable around most humans now: they know what I think, the articles I post, my thoughts on this blog. And it's all out there because it's such an important story to tell: autism is treatable and preventable. We are proving it. But at a cost. I can say I don't care what you think of me, but in truth, when you turn around and get your child the flu shot after the year of work I have done, it feels like a blatant rejection of me and my truth.
My feelings shouldn't matter in this. It's okay when friends agree to disagree. But this, children's health, is my purpose, and feels like my entire life, so it is difficult to not take it personally when the humans around me , sweet friends of mine, make different choices. I am isolating myself a lot, on purpose.
And I know there are people making different choices because of my truth, and that's really all I can ask for.
Some days it just gets to me.
I have given you 81 peer reviewed, published in medical journal studies that prove the vaccination/autism connection. It's not just the heavy metals/neurotoxins. It's everything about them. They change our very DNA. I have showed you the role GMOs play in our poor health. Showed you that Tylenol causes autism and asthma. I have linked you to articles that prove beyond a shadow of doubt that herd immunity is fiction, that outbreaks are cyclical. That we create new diseases with vaccinations. That the effects of even one round of antibiotics change the body forever. I really don't know what is left to question.
Part of the problem this week is that I am tired! I am taking care of ME! And exercising six days a week, for going on 3 weeks, and have already lost 6 lbs. my body is changing and I am a little more sensitive because I am hungry, and out here exposed without my ice cream crutch to make it better at the end of the day.
My heart is, as always, thankful. We are in such a good place. It's just a strange transition time.
Through various trials in my life, one thing I have finally learned is that I can share my experience and I can share what I have learned from it but I can't force anyone to see things my way. I've also learned that there truly are people out there who have a vastly different experience from my own and their experience is just as valid. It doesn't mean that theirs knocks out mine or that mine knocks out theirs.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first started to confront my past, I remember going to hear a speaker who was an expert on working through traumatic abuse. One thing she spoke about was stages. Just as their are stages of grief, there are stages in most everything else. The thing she said that stuck with me was "the frog stage." I forgot why it was called that but I knew I was in it. It's the stage where you are taking control and coming to terms and taking action and you can't believe that people can walk around all normal when you are dealing with all of this reality. And that you want to tell everyone you meet about your experience and what you are going through. I wish I could remember her name or more about what she said. I left that stage but it took a while.
Just a couple of random thoughts for you!
You're my inspiration.
ReplyDelete