The Weeding Tool

Good Morning Bleeps.

What another beautiful day it is in the South East of England, it is such a mood changer for me. I am in pain yet again (boooooooooring) and feel nauseous as usual but I actually don't care. The sun is shining and I have lots of work to be getting on with today - no time for feeling down.

I was thinking about changing the name of my blog to "My Journey through Limbo Land and into the unknown world of maybe MS or possibly Lupus or maybe something entirely different that Doctors are yet to suggest" but I couldn't fit it on the banner. Hmmm, whatever is a girl to do?

Through my blog I have made many new friends and it makes me feel really blessed. I have such a support system around me and I am humbled by it. I have people that I can turn to when I am feeling down that pick me up and offer me support, ironically most of them I have never met in person.

One thing that seems to come up a lot when I talk to my friends is that the people that you THINK will be there for you when you get sick quite often are not. Getting ill is an amazing weeding tool. I have learned a lot about human nature since this all started.

In particular, I have learned that sometimes your best friends can be people you have never even met. Today I would like to talk about a couple of these people. I have met many but for today I want to focus on these two lovely women.

I got chatting to one lady (Lisa) after she made a comment on my blog link on Facebook. She was so lovely and was trying to get more of an understanding of her friend's MS. I think her MSer friend had shared a link to my blog and before long we got talking. One day another lady (Kirstie) commented on my blog and Lisa said something along the lines of "Kirstie, you read Karen's blog?" It turned out that these two ladies know each other and are good friends in real life, what a small world.

I have become very close to both of them and they have been such great sources of support. Kirstie is a total inspiration to me because this woman has been through hell. She was fobbed off by Doctors for years, dealt with the same "it's all in your head" attitude until she started to think (like me) that maybe she was going mad. It turned out that they FINALLY discovered that she had a brain tumour. A freakin' BRAIN TUMOUR on her brain stem but, oh yeah, it was all in her head. I want to hunt down those Doctors that implied she was imagining her symptoms for YEARS and put this beautiful woman's life in danger. Jerks!

She endured a nine hour life saving operation just a few months ago and is still trying to recover. She was then accidentally exposed to chicken pox and had to go on a high strength chemo medication because it is SO dangerous for her to get sick. She has been left with other effects from the surgery that she continues to fight and deal with but let me just say that this woman, this friend of mine who has been through and continues to go through so much has been such a massive tower of strength to me, selflessly putting aside her own pain to cheer me up.

I talk to Phil about "my friend Kirstie" or "my friend Lisa" as if I have known these women for years and yet even though I have never met them in person (yet!) this is exactly how I feel.

I was chatting to Kirstie the other day and she said "I have friendships and support that  I NEVER thought possible. Friends that I THOUGHT were close to me were not at all - in the past few weeks I have learnt what friendship truly is."

I couldn't have put it better myself. Isn't it amazing though that someone who is recovering from a brain tumour operation is there for me every single day and yet there are people in my life that I thought were friends (and in some cases family) that don't even bother to pick up the phone or send an email. It has made me toughen up a LOT and made me realise who really matters.

Kirstie is my inspiration, I don't think that even she realises how strong she is, how beautiful she is both inside and out.

Lisa is one of life's good people. She has a heart of gold and is constantly opening her heart (and in some cases her home) to help out people in need. I can't go into details without possibly betraying a confidence but let me just say that she has gone above and beyond what most people would do to help out people she either hasn't seen for years or in some cases hasn't even met. If we could bottle up her kind heart then the world would be a much better place to live in for sure.

Is it a bit weird that when I think of all the lovely people I have met (and there are too many to mention) that I am actually almost grateful to getting ill. Without this illness (whatever it is) I wouldn't have started to blog and then my path might not have crossed with all of these wonderful people.

I get messages from people saying that my blog helps them but really it is everyone that reads and comments that help ME. To my friends who have been disappointed by people who you thought would be there and are not, don't give them your energy. You can't make someone be there for you (even if it hurts) but just take a moment to look around and think about the people that are constant and true in your life, they are the ones that really matter.

So enough about me, how are YOU?