On Recovery

Time never stops moving forward but sometimes we do and it feels like the whole world is leaving without us. We breathe easy and stay in place because our feet won’t lift from the ground. Stuck like gum. But we wish we could run, so fast, just to catch up.

We’re so caught up in this idea that we have to move at the same pace as everyone else. We can’t seem to sit down when everyone around us is standing up.

The thing with pain is, you forget how much it hurts once it’s over. I find myself telling everyone it really wasn’t all that bad. Because physical pain is momentary. And emotional pain is not something we want to remind ourselves of. Because you don’t remember the physical pain like you remember the emotional pain. Waking up becomes hard not because your body aches but because your heart does.

They said six weeks was all it would take. But I’m hitting nine and I still don’t fully feel myself. The doctors never take into account the healing of the mind.

Healing takes time. So much time. A lot of waiting. So much so, it feels unnecessary at a certain point. The end goal becomes blurred because you don’t really know what you’re waiting for. To feel better, I guess. But you feel so weak and you tell yourself, I never want to feel this way again. I don’t think you ever fully accept it. But at a certain point, you find a way to come to terms with it.

Out of pain comes strength, and if there’s one thing that healing has taught me, it’s bravery. Overcoming humiliation and fear and treating the sadness as a building block. Because the universe is not against you, but sometimes it makes mistakes. And sometimes we get hurt. If we can’t make art and love out of pain and sadness, take the good out of the bad, how can we overcome the hardships that are thrown at us?