I Don't Stop Where I'm At

When my life stopped because I was paralyzed, I thought my entire world had ended.  I couldn't take care of myself.  I could not feed myself, not that I wanted food anyway.  Talking was almost impossible unless you count getting a word out every few minutes as normal.

I wanted to give up.  In fact, my body tried hard to give up.  I had seizures from the Conversion Disorder.  I struggled to keep myself awake.  The rest of the time I was either a zombie or asleep.  It was a terrifying ordeal considering the day before it started, I was up and running around just like everyone else.

In those days, there were no support groups to ask how to come out of this because the internet was barely a thing at the time.  It was in the early days of CompuServe and Prodigy and AOL.  It would be many years later before I would meet someone else with Conversion Disorder.

Of course, by this point in my life, I have healed so much and have been able to do much more than anyone ever thought I could.  In the early days, they didn't expect that I would make it, much less function normally and go back to work.  I proved them wrong.

I don't quit trying...

How did I prove them wrong?  I adopted the philosophy that I have always lived by in my life.  I don't stop where I'm at and I don't quit trying. 

I will turn my world upside down if I have to and I'll challenge anything that someone thinks is what I should believe.  I'm not one to just accept the situation I am in.  After all, when I was paralyzed, I didn't know if I would ever walk again at the time.

It took me saying I'm going to find my way through this while leaving no stone unturned.  I knew I had to keep looking for how to heal myself, because the doctors at the time didn't have a clue.  There was a way, but I had to let go of what I thought worked in my life to find out what did.

I had to let go...

I had to let go of everything that was my life up to that point.  I had to let go of what my family thought I should do and what friends thought I should do.  I had to walk over the edge of the cliff and take the leap so I could find the path before me.

By not stopping where I was and pushing into the unknown, I found my way through it, step by step.  I didn't hold on to labels.  I didn't hold on to the diagnosis.  I started to search for all that physically helped me and resonated with me.  I started to search for all that felt right, even if I could not see a difference in the early days.

I had to turn every stone over...

It was through letting go of all I was holding on to that I discovered the things that got me to walk again, talk again, and begin functioning in life once again.  None of it was easy.  None of it was immediate.  None of it was anything anyone could tell me to do.  I had to find the path forward and I had to turn over every stone until I saw where I could take a step.

Healing and experiences in life can be pretty daunting and challenging.  Sometimes they work hard to take us under.  As hard as it is to do, we do make the choices in how we proceed.  Many times, the choices seem limited and nonexistent, but they are there.  The process of finding them is where the healing begins.

I thought the odds of me recovering from what I went through were zero.  Yet, in the depths of despair and taking my last breaths, I decided in my mind that I was going to fight and come through this.  It was a difficult time and the choice to fight and find my way through was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.

Don't stop where you're at.  Don't think this is the way things will always be.  There is far more than we are aware of in this one single moment of time.  I do not accept any condition I face now as if it is the way things are.  I've learned that I have to give that up in order to find myself.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

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