Why I Posted a Thank You Graphic

The other day I posted a graphic to Facebook and to Instagram that I'll post at the bottom of this note that is a combination of two quotes that really sum up how I feel about the people in my life. The first quote deals with friends who become more than friends - they become family. The second quote deals with people showing their true colors and knowing who your true friends are when you're in a crisis and need them the most.

To clarify something, I was not looking for the incredible amount of accolades I received from that post when I posted it. I posted it because I have an incredible support system surrounding me that I don't thank nearly enough for all they do and now and then I like to acknowledge them. A lot of people feel they haven't really done much for me over the years because they live so far away or they can't fix me or they aren't in a financial position to send me get well gifts. I want to put a stop to people feeling that way because you DO help even when you might think that you're not. The well wishes and love and support and yes even all of the prayers I receive (as most know I'm not the most religious of people) do me a tremendous amount of good and I accept all of them with open arms and the knowledge that they are each genuine.

My situation is not an easy one. It's not easy for me. It's not easy for my family. It's not easy for the people in my life that I see and spend time with and it is not easy for those of you too far away to visit. I realize that because when a person is sick or injured it is not simply that person who is dealing with the side effects of all of it. The people around us go through the pain and the worry and the hurt as well watching someone they love and/or care about struggle with nothing much they can do to take away the hellishness. Everyone in my circle is effected by what I've been living through.

I was always somewhat aware of that but became incredibly aware when my oldest sister was diagnosed with glioblastoma (the same brain cancer Ted Kennedy fought and John McCain is currently fighting) and then when she died from it. Until that time, I'd always been the patient. I'd always been the one in the bed hooked up to tubes and stuff and then suddenly out of nowhere the tables turned and I became what Michaeleh had always been to me...the sister of the patient. I learned the hard way and very quickly in her last two months that it's not just about the sick person and that care taking, whether it's being a physical caretaker like my parents doing dressing changes or friends sending gifts and cards and keeping tabs waiting anxiously for the next update, is incredibly taxing and scary.

So with al of my heart I once again say thank you for EVERYTHING each and every one of you have done to help me through the years. Again, I'm not looking for pity or recognition or to put myself on any kind of pedestal. I'm simply saying something I often think but don't say nearly often enough.

THANK YOU

Grief: It Doesn't Get Easier But It Does Get Better

A few days ago one of my best friends, in fact the incredible woman I refer to as "My Sister From Another Mister" because we are so alike, suffered a horrible loss. Her amazing, sweet, funny, always there with a smile, always happy to see you, kinder than kind father Calvin passed away after a battle with cancer. She posted to Facebook sentences that have echoed in my own thoughts since the death of my beloved oldest sister in 2014 - also to cancer. She wrote "I told him then, as long as I have a "job" to do, I can handle things better." She also wrote, "People say it gets easier... but I just don't see that ever happening."

People who know me, who know my battle with PTSD for which one of the triggers is hospitals and the noises and smells there, have often said of my spending an entire week in my sister's hospital room before we brought her home for hospice that they are amazed I held it together so well through that week. Those same people have said that they are so amazed that I held it together so well for the month that she was home before she died. I was the midnight shift because I am the family night owl. She needed medication at midnight until the final week and I'd go out, get her to eat some apple sauce in which was hidden a tiny pill, and then spend at least an hour if not far more sitting next to her hospital bed both of us barely bathed in the light of a small bedside lamp. Those people were amazed that I was so strong and eventually openly wondered how I managed. The answer is simple and the same answer that my dear friend gave... as long as I had a "job" to do, I could handle it. I could handle the hospital because my "job" was to be there to help feed her. My "job" was to be the easiest family representative to interact with when co-workers and friends came to visit as opposed to one or both of our parents.  Everyone who had yet to meet me in person knew of me and somehow that made me the easiest family member to interact with. My "job" was to stay most of the day and often into the late evening to make sure she never felt left alone. When she told me as I prepared to go one night that she was scared, it was my "job" to stay and hold her hand until I was certain she was asleep. Those were my "jobs" for that week at the hospital just as it was my "job" when we brought her home to take charge of the midnight shift. It was my "job" to make sure she got that midnight pill and it was my "job" to stay with her until she fell back to sleep. It was my "job" when friends and coworkers came to visit at the house to again be the family member at the foot of the bed sitting with them so they felt a little more comfortable.

I say that it was my "job" because in a large sense all of those things were jobs, however, more than jobs every single one of those things was my HONOR. She was my oldest sister who'd spent countless hours by my side over the years as I went through one medical hell after another. She stood up for me and protected me so fiercely over the years not just as an individual with disabilities but as HER LITTLE SISTER who happened to have disabilities. I've never seen someone more irate over a place claiming to be disability friendly and accessible only to turn out not to be that friendly or accessible to those with disabilities. I know that my friend also views what she did for her dad throughout his cancer battle was not just her "job" but her HONOR as well.

I also deeply feel and understand what my friend means when she says, "People say it gets easier...but I just don't see that ever happening." People tend to hand out A LOT of platitudes and cliches when they don't know what else to say and that it will get easier is one of the biggest when a death occurs. As I wrote my friend in response to her post, it DOESN'T get easier but it does get better. Time, contrary to popular believe DOES NOT heal all wounds especially not the deepest of them. Time will never heal the wound in my friends heart from losing the man who raised her, loved her, was with her through her darkest moments, and whom she was luckily enough to call her dad just as it will never heal the wound in my heart created by the death of my sister. What time does do, I have learned, is build scar tissue and trust me when I say that it takes a lot of time just as it takes a lot of time for scar tissue to form and hold up after a surgery. Scar tissue is a sign that things have been and are healing but it will never be as strong as what was originally there. I personally don't believe that it gets easier to live with such a huge loss but that it does get better as the scar tissue forms. I'm sure there are those who will say that's a matter of semantics and that for it to get better then it must also get easier but I don't see them as one and the same. 

EASIER, by definition means: achieved without great effort; presenting few difficulties. 
BETTER, by definition means: partially recovered from; less unwell. 

I will ALWAYS miss my sister and feel her loss in my life deeply with each new thing - be it a good thing or a bad thing - that happens in my family's lives just as my Sister From Another Mister will feel the loss of her dad deeply in those same moments. Moving forward and dealing with the good and bad of the future will never "be achieved without great effort" without my sister or in my friend's case, without her father. Moving forward and dealing with the good and bad of the future will, however, be done in a better or "less unwell" manner.

The streets of heaven are too crowded with angels tonight just as they are every night. I don't know if this post makes any sense to anyone besides myself or if it comes off as just a rambling blog post of a young woman who has seen too much pain in her life and can't quite find the right words. Regardless, remember this if you remember nothing else: Time allows for the creation of scar tissue which dampens the pain but it does not ever fully heal because no matter how much time passes, pain will still find a way to seep through the cracks. Accept it. Feel it. Embrace it. It is now a part of who you are.

My Family's Tail Wagging Godsend

I'm very open about the tragedies that have struck the lives of myself and my family. I share openly about my health issues and about the fact that my oldest sister died on November 2, 2014 after being diagnosed with a highly aggressive glioblastoma brain tumor less than two months earlier in September of that same year. I personally am one of the countless people living with Post Traumatic Stress, Disorder and no - I have never served in the military. I am one of the countless civilians with PTSD.

I don't remember exactly when the decision was made to start looking into getting a dog again but suddenly both of my parents were looking into goldendoodles. We've never bought a dog. We've always rescued them but due to my mom's worsening pet dander allergies, we needed a "doodle" and more specifically a F1b. What exactly does that mean? A F1b is created when a golden retriever mates with a poodle creating a normal goldendoodle. To create a F1b, a goldendoodle mates with a poodle making the dog one part golden retriever and two parts poodle. No dog is truly hypoallergenic but a F1b is the closest you'll come. They don't shed and by my mom's own testimony, she can and does cuddle with our dog with no allergy issues. Each goldendoodle is different and our girl is the greatest combination with the personality of a golden retriever and the body of a poodle.

My father found a breeder in Lancaster, PA and he and I made the two hour or so drive from where we live to see, and hopefully bring home, one of the 10 week old puppies. The second that the woman placed our Rosie in my dad's arms, I knew we had found our dog. She was so sweet, so cute, and proved that what the woman had said - that particular little girl loved to give kisses and kept kissing my dad's face and hands. We drove home and that weekend my other sister came over to meet her and to help name her. We must have read through at least ten lists of "names for dogs" as well as lists of basic female names. We first settled on Cady in large part because we love the Netflix show Longmire and Cady is one of the main characters who has plenty of spunk which fit our puppy. My dad took her out and by the time they returned...we'd changed our minds. When they walked back in we announced that this adorable puppy who we'd just decided we would name Cady and who my dad had been calling Cady while outside, was going to be named Rosie which turned out to be perfect due to her disposition.

Amazingly enough, from the very start Rosie has seemed to just know that I'm different. I always used a wheelchair at home and crutches while out having lost my right leg above the knee years before but at the time, unable to use a prosthesis. She was patient when I'd crutch my way up and down the stairs. She simply followed me giving me space unlike our previous dog who thought  that the area where my lower leg had been was created specifically so she could run under me to get up or down faster. I often noticed Rosie watching me with a tilted head almost as if she was examining the situation very closely. She got in the way of the wheelchair once and immediately learned that unless we are playing, that she needed to stay to one side of it. Crutches, even for those of us who would be Olympic champions if crutching ability was a Paralympic sport, can at times be tricky and even the best of us take some rather nasty falls on our own. Add a puppy on a leash full of energy to that and things can get far far trickier. Rosie, however, from the start just knew what she needed to do and I could walk on my crutches, her leash in my hand wrapped around the crutch handle, and not have issues. There was even one time when a rabbit hopped across the driveway directly in front of us which, with her leash in the hands of any other person would have had her taking off at maximum speed dragging the person holding that leash with her, and though she registered it and watched it very closely Rosie knew she was with me and that I am different. She tensed and wanted that rabbit badly but didn't take off after it. She just looked back and up at me and we continued to the car without incident. Rosie is slightly over two years old now and I, thankfully, have been able to start using a prosthesis and still when I'm the one holding the leash she's aware and alters her behaviors.

Rosie has been an amazing source of amusement, distraction, and also a source of calmness during the medical problems I've dealt with since she entered our lives. I've endured a lot in the past 14 years. A "simple" knee surgery led to a severe infection and the first of many emergency life saving surgeries. I stopped counting the number of surgeries on my leg during these past 14 years when I hit the 60th. I've survived sepsis, a severe blood infection,  a number of times and months after getting Rosie I survived the worst case of sepsis I've ever lived through - one that many of the health professionals I know didn't believe I would live through. My fever reached a maximum temperature of 106.2 which in layman's terms boiled my brain causing a few seizures and damage to my brain. It is thought that due to that bout of sepsis the bacteria from my leg traveled throughout my body through my blood and marrow and found a home in my right ulna laying dormant until last year. I have since lost most of my ulna to osteomyelitis bone infection, have had massive surgery to insert hardware to strengthen my radius, and am all too well aware that should the infection return I will likely become a double right sided amputee losing my right arm. It has quite honestly been a living hell but Rosie has been there knowing when I need her most to help with anxiety, depression, and fear.

Eight years ago, I had an arterial hemorrhage from my stump nearly bleeding to death on my own couch at home that required surgery, many blood transfusions, and opened my eyes even more to the fact that my health situation was precarious. I also learned that I'd gotten lucky because had I been asleep when the artery blew, there's no doubt that I would indeed have bled to death. The realization several days ago that this past week has been the eighth anniversary of that event triggered my PTSD and caused me to have to deal with flashbacks, panic attacks, and reliving certain moments of it as though it was happening in the here and now. Rosie has responded by sticking very close to my side and more than once I've awoken from a nightmare with Rosie snuggled closely to my side nearly smothering me with her concern, protection, and love.

To top it all off, and I'm sure it's because I'm already on edge from the PTSD caused by the events of eight years ago, I had a breakdown over the death of my sister. I was asked by my family at the time if I'd be OK with Michaeleh coming home for hospice care knowing she would live her final months and die about 20 feet from my room. I, of course, said yes knowing this is where she would want to be if she were able to voice that to us. I was the family member in charge of the midnight pills because I'm a night owl and I'm often a roamer at night when I can't sleep. I spent every night for almost two months spending the midnight hours with my sister. Due to where her bed was, the minute you opened my bedroom door you could see my frail dying sister which is what I faced every single morning when I opened the door. At night around 10PM or so I would retreat to my room. I'd shut my door until midnight, open it, give her the pills she needed while she could still take them, and spend at least one to two hours with her in the middle of the night. That was my routine every night. It wasn't easy but if I had to choose and do it all over again, I'd choose and do the same things.

It isn't often, but now and then when my anxiety is already high, I'll open my bedroom door with the intent to get a drink from the kitchen or to look out at the darkness thinking about things and stare at that space where my sister spent her final months and where she died and not even realize I'm frozen in the past. That is what happened last night and before I knew it the tears were falling. Rosie had been upstairs fast asleep at the top of the stairs (I know because she was snoring). I hadn't made a sound as I sat there reliving touching but very hard moments when out of nowhere and out of a dead sleep Rosie flew down the stairs to my side covering my hands with kisses. She followed me to the kitchen for a drink and followed me back to my room hopping up onto the bed. She watched my every move closely and once I settled in bed she laid herself on me. Her chin was on my chin, her body was laying down the length of mind, and she stared at me. We stayed that way, my dog and I, until she was sure that I was OK and only then did she climb off of me. She found a comfortable spot at the end of the bed and kept her eyes on me for the next half hour with one paw on my only leg until satisfied that I was doing better. It's not the first time she's done nearly exactly this and I know it won't be the last.

Rosie is not a trained therapy, PTSD, or Emotional Support dog though we are working on training her as a therapy animal. She may not be fully trained or certified, but she is every single one of those things without the training and certification and not just with me. It can be another family member having a hard time or a family friend staying with us struggling with something in their life, she senses it and she reacts to it with love and support. She's been that way from almost the moment we brought her home and she realized that I'm different that most people. I go to therapy for my PTSD which has been hugely helpful but I also greatly credit Rosie for the fact that I'doing better with better control over it. A fact that most people, even those living with PTSD, don't know is that a single PTSD episode can last for up to 72hrs before you're back to your true self again.

I credit my therapist but also greatly credit Rosie for the episodes I do have lasting for less time than they ever did before. I tell people all of the time that she has played a big role in saving my family after Michaeleh's death. My other sister isn't a dog person and yet she loves Rosie and you can see her face light up when Rosie is around and is happy to have her come with us to she and my brother-in-law's house when we all. Rosie has certainly saved me from some seriously dark and scary points during my difficult journey through life. I'm not a very religious person but I am spiritual and I do believe in guardian angels and I wholeheartedly believe that Michaeleh knew that for us to be OK, we needed Rosie and made sure she was the dog who became a member of this family.

As I type this, much calmer than I had been a few hours ago but still coming down from the anxiety attack, Rosie is sleeping peacefully at the end of the bed with a paw on my leg slightly snoring as if to say, "I'm here, Meg. I've got you and I'm not letting go."

Rosie taking care of me. Under the blanket with me when I got home from
the hospital. Resting with me. Laying with her head up near mine. Sleeping
on my stump. Happy to let me fall asleep with my arms wrapped around her
which, on an ordinary day, she's not a huge fan of. Her paw holding my hand.

Chilling in bed completely comfortable with my prosthetic leg knowing it's an important part of me.

My adorable (and spoiled) Rosie girl, being a lazy bum comfortably
sleeping on one of my pillows, playing in the snow, and showing
off why everyone who sees her immediately comments on how cute and how
beautiful she is.

An Open Letter To Those Claiming To Have "Cured" Themselves

We've all found ourselves in disagreements or flat out fights on social media platforms, even those of us who detest such things. We all also know that in arguing the odds of changing the other person's mind are slim to none. However, sometimes a topic arises that you just have to wade into with the tiniest amount of hope that you'll help someone understand why what they're claiming isn't quite true. I have recently found myself in just such a situation.

The idea that one can cure a disease by eating healthy and living a healthy lifestyle has been around forever. I've seen it more times than I can count and while I generally keep my opinion on that to myself I simply can't stand aside anymore and allow people to make these claims. Do I believe that eating healthy and living a healthy lifestyle helps someone with a disease be it Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson's, ALS, AIDS, cancers, or any of the other numerous diseases attacking people daily? Yes. Notice, however, that I said that it HELPS not that it CURES. To simply throw aside all of our medical advancements and say that they actually do nothing and that it's simply Big Pharma looking to get as much money as possible is, in my opinion, asinine. Is Big Pharma a problem? Yes. Is it the reason people have diseases? No.

I've heard it said that diseases are nothing but a group of symptoms Big Pharma has decided to call a certain name in order to gain vast amounts of money by creating new diseases and then new drugs by which to cure said diseases. I'm not saying that I'm a fan of Big Pharma and that they don't play a role in certain issues but again, it's not the culprit. Yes, diseases are comprised of symptoms. That's how you know which disease you have. It's very simple logic.

When I was about 8 years old, the doctors tried to figure out what was going on with me and although I never tested positive and do not have the antibodies for it now, the decision was that I was suffering from mono at a young age. I wasn't. It was, in fact, the beginning of my journey with Multiple Sclerosis. The problem was that MS was not, at that time, considered a pediatric disease so it was never in the running as a potential possibility. 11 years later I sat in a neurologist's office being told that due to the symptoms I experienced I either had a brain tumor, ALS, or MS. After several studies it was shown that I have MS. I was relieved and grateful to finally have a reason and name for the symptoms I was experiencing all of those years.

In 2014, my oldest sister was diagnosed with the most aggressive almost always fatal form of brain cancer. She had surgery to remove what they could of the tumor. She did not do chemotherapy. She did not do radiation. Neither would have saved her life serving only to make her far more miserable. She was gone in less than 2 months. According to the person I've recently argued with, eating nothing but fruits and vegetables, cures because there's no such thing as disease. I can tell you with absolute certainty that no amount of fruits and veggies would have saved my sister's life. She had a cancer that is almost always deadly. Do the "no such thing as disease" people have an answer when I bring this up? No. They do not. They skip over it or don't respond at all.

I have an immune system defect that keeps my immune system from fighting certain strains of streptococcal bacteria. I've lost my right leg above the knee to it and to date have lost my right ulna to it and may in the long run lose my right arm to it. Again, no amount of fruits and veggies could have saved my leg nor can they save my arm should it come to that. They also cannot save me from sepsis which I've already fought off several times. I am literally missing pieces of my body and pieces of my immune system. Also, the "no such thing of disease" people say if you just relax the body will heal itself without any medical intervention. Not for nothing but my leg isn't going to grow back because I eat nothing but fruits and veggies and exercise daily.

I know far too many people who've battled cancer. Some of them have been taken by it and others are alive and living incredible lives today and each of them treated their cancers with modern medicines. Those who are alive today are alive because of the hellish chemotherapy and radiation treatments they had to endure. Do you think any of them enjoyed it? Hell no but it was the only way they had a chance to save their lives. Children die of cancer. Adults die of cancer. But hey, all they had to do to live and cure themselves was to eat fruits and vegetables. How foolish of them to have not done that and only that.

It really upsets me that people dare claim to have the cure for all diseases. I'm in no way trying to belittle anyone who has improved their health by eating healthy and living healthy lifestyles. I do have a problem with someone who has what is a well documented disease that relapses and remits claiming that they're cured by doing such things. Diseases go into remission and if you're one of the lucky people who has gone into remission no matter what disease you have, I'm incredibly happy for you but to then tell everyone else that they're doing it wrong and they are making themselves sick because they aren't just eating fruits and vegetables and are taking advantage of modern healthcare is just plain wrong. Believe what you choose to believe but don't you dare tell the rest of us that we're sick basically because we want to be sick and are choosing to be sick. Not only is it disgusting and disturbing but it's potentially harmful and could actually potentially be deadly if someone decides they'll take that route to treat a disease believing it will cure them because it "cured" someone else.

Again, I am not trying to belittle people. I'm simply asking that should you be one of those people who claims that they've cured themselves and that diseases aren't real that you stop and think before you spout off about it and that you be wise enough to add the disclaimer to your assertions that your way of doing things may not be effective for everyone.  False hope is a horrible thing especially for those who've just entered the world of disease. Be respectful of those around you and if you do choose to spout this crap make it perfectly clear to those you preach to that you are NOT a medical doctor or nurse or in the medical profession in any way. You're just an every day person who has absolutely no training who is currently lucky. It's hard enough to live with any disease but to have people preaching that you're doing this to yourself only makes it harder and, in my opinion, is cruel.

Thank You Nurses

May 6-12 is apparently Nurse Appreciation Week for 20071, and for someone who loves the written word, it has taken me quite some time to come up with the right words for the nurses in my life and to explain why nurses in general are so important. I have been incredibly unlucky when it has come to my health but I won’t the mega jackpot when it comes to my medical team especially the nurses.

No one WANTS to be recognized by nearly every nurse in a hospital. It’s definitive and loud proof that you’ve been sick far too long and at the hospital far too many times. I used to be terrified of ever having to spend a night in the hospital. Little did I know that I’d spend oh so many nights in the hospital as a young adult. At this point, I’m recognized and fought over as far as who is going to be my nurse in pre-op and while I’m never with it enough to notice, apparently a similar thing happens in the recovery room in regards to me and regardless of who wins the “Meg’s My Patient” lottery, every nurse who knows me and knows I’m there tries to stop and see me. There’s an upside to this. Several years ago I was under the care of Stephanie, a recovery room nurse who I’d known for years, when she knew immediately something was wrong because I wasn’t my normal self at all. She’s the reason my first case of sepsis landed me in the ICU and treated before it could do permanent damage.

Another post-op recovery room nurse, Blaze, was the nurse on duty a day in September after an infection chest port was removed and in pre-op I took a rapid downhill turn. My BP plummeted, my pulse skyrocketed, I was freezing cold with a fever of 106.2, and seizing. He was with me the whole way, rarely ever leaving my side. When talk of the ICU came, I completely lost my mind. I struggle with PTSD resulting from my health especially the ICU both for my own experiences there but because less than a full year prior, I’d been forced to see my oldest sister in ICU after her fatal diagnosis of brain cancer. I started sobbing while my mom filled in the rest of post-op and my doctors and Blaze knelt beside me patiently listening to my fear filled sobs about how I COULD NOT go to the ICU. I just couldn’t do it. In the end I was kept in post-op.

The nurses on the orthopedic floor at my hospital are true heroes. They not only attend to the physical issues but the emotional and mental effects as well. Due to my recurrent infections I’ve been in and out of the hospital since 2004 and have cultivated so many friendships amongst the nursing staff. How many nurses come to your 30^th birthday because they’re so glad that you’ve survived another year – another year they weren’t sure I’d get. How many nurses look into your eyes and see the terror you’re hiding with stupid humor and order pizza to have a party in your hospital room? How many spend money of their own to buy you a bagel on their day off purely out of the goodness in their hearts or buy magazines and goodies just for you? (And by the way…they DO NOT get paid nearly enough.) How many nurses send you birthday and holiday cards? How many nurses recognize how important the memorial bracelet you wear to honor a fallen hero that you don’t want to leave it in the room, and volunteer to wear it for you until you’re back from surgery?

When osteomyelitis (a severe infection of the bone) struck my arm there was one late afternoon turned evening when it was just my older sister and I. It’s incredible how fast a 32 (at the time) year old and 36 year old turn into 12 year olds who just “want their mom” when you want something done and it’s taken forever and you KNOW that if mom was there she’d take charge and get things done because nobody messes with your mom. When she speaks they listen. I was still in shock that I now had osteomyelitis in my arm after a 13-year battle with it and other soft tissues infections in my leg leading to the loss of said leg and I. Was. Pissed about it. At one point my sister noticed a nurse we’ve known since nearly the very beginning and whom I have a genuinely amazing relationship with was in the hall and called her into the room,  A few minutes later she told me she needed food and left the room. She KNEW that I needed to talk to someone I trust outside of the family and someone who has been on this wild ride for years with us, again outside of family, to talk to in that moment and I, the girl who can’t stand letting people see her tears, broke down in tears.

Doctors get all of the recognition but it’s the nurses who make medicine what it is and keeps things rolling as fluidly as possible and take on so much of the grunt work. The emotions they circle through during one shift might take the stuffing out of others. What they go through on a daily basis from unruly patients would often cause so many to walk away.

Without the amazing nurses in my life I have no doubt that one way or another I wouldn’t be here anymore both in their care for my physical issues but their care in my emotional and mental health as well. To all of the nurses who’ve been a part of my life, part of my journey, either at the hospital or through home care I simply cannot tell you enough how much you mean to me and that I do not simply rely on my amazing OR teams when things go south for my health – I rely greatly on you.

How SUPERNATURAL Has Helped Me

I know how cliche it sounds to say that a TV show has helped me through some difficult times and anyone who really knows me knows that I don't like cliches. The truth is, though, that a TV show has helped me through some difficult times. It may not sound like much to the average person and many may be thinking that TV is supposed to help much as a great book does by transporting you to a different place and taking your mind off of whatever is bothering you. It's a release at the end of the day and a way to unwind. You plant yourself on the couch or in your favorite comfy chair perhaps with a snack and you let yourself get lost in a fictional world for an hour or two. That is the whole point to shows that aren't news or true crime related.

I've been in and out of the hospital since 2004 unfortunately achieving a surgical count that is above 60 at this point. This count includes the amputation of my right leg and will continue to rise due to the fact that the osteomyelitis bone infections have spread from my leg to my right arm which has so far cost me my right ulna and may end up costing me far more. I'm lucky enough to have an amazing medical team but though it seems incredibly clear to everyone now that the infection randomly moved from one limb to another that I have some form of immune system defect, we can't treat it. The immune system is so vast and while we know a lot about it, we simply do not know nearly enough. That coupled with the fact that I am allergic to so many antibiotics makes treating me a very difficult thing. However, I digress...

Hospitals are never fun places to be and aside from drug induced sleep, you spend a great deal of your time watching TV. There's this two hour period of time mid-morning where there's nothing on any of the limited channels you have there. It's one talk show or another or one news show or another. This is what I'd come to believe until I took a chance on a show a number of people I know had been talking about or even raving about. That show is Supernatural currently on it's 12th season. During that mid-morning lull when not even reruns of any of the Law & Order spinoffs are airing, Supernatural is. I'd thought it sounded a bit hokey but I eventually took a chance and I got hooked. The only problem was that I'd catch an episode here and there of different seasons. Then something glorious happened, Netflix. I could suddenly start at the very beginning and binge watch my way through 11 seasons which is exactly what I did.

I can't fully explain what it is about this show that appeals to me so much and why I consider it another form of treatment that thankfully, I can not be allergic to. I suppose in part it's due to the fact that at an early age I've had to ponder the subject of my own mortality and I've had to face it many times over the years standing on death's doorstep more times than I care to think about. It tackles the subjects of life and death and heaven and hell and even purgatory in an often comedic way though at times it goes much deeper. It tackles good versus evil and how there's some of each in all of us. There's levity with an Angel of the Lord who doesn't understand simple references and the King of Hell having traded his soul when he was alive for an extra few inches below the belt. There's the ever present notion of family and what it means to be family and backs up something I've always said, that family doesn't have to be blood. Who your family is is based on love, loyalty, trust, being there when the chips are down and everything is on the line. As the character Bobby Singer says, "Family don't end in blood." It tackles the issue of sibling relationships and how one minute you love them and the next you hate them but that you always come back together in the long run and having two older sisters of my own I know how true that is.

The truth, for me, is that unless some random thing like being hit by a bus or I'm in a plane that goes down - infection is going to be what ultimately kills me. It's been trying for years and I've thought many times that I must have the Mark of Cain on my body somewhere because I've cheated death several times. Unfortunately, my oldest sister didn't have the Mark and I'd have given it to her in a heartbeat if I could but cancer came and stole her as it steals so many. I, however, survive that which I shouldn't. Severe sepsis with a 106.2 degree fever should have ended me or at least landed me in the ICU for days if not weeks but instead I was back to normal and home the next day. Yes, it left me with what I refer to as "septic headache days" when there's a constant throbbing in my head that nothing touches and was caused by boiling my brain with that fever. In the long run, though, my body will give in to infection no matter how hard I fight because my body is tired and my well of strength is diminished more and more with each infection and each surgery. As the character Dean Winchester says, "I'll keep fighting. I'll keep swinging until I've got nothing left" which is exactly how I look at my situation.

It's not just the show, though, that has helped and continues to help me through the darker moments of my journey. It's the actual people who make the show what it is. It's the actors who I've watched far too many youtube videos of who are truly good people. It's knowing that behind the characters you see on the screen are real people who know they are lucky to be in the position they are in and use it for good and who truly connect with their fans at conventions. I had a complete geeked out Supernatural fangirl moment when I posted a simple tweet thanking the actors for helping me get through so much and Mark Sheppard who plays Crowley: The King of Hell, liked my tweet. I took a screenshot because I was so geeked out. The actors are constantly reminding their fans that bad times don't last and that there's always hope and promote doing random acts of kindness. I suppose what I'm saying is that the actors behind the characters on the screen aren't egotistical dicks as is unfortunately quite often the case.

Supernatural has allowed me to ponder mortality and the facts of my life with both realness and comedy. Do I believe in vampires, werewolves, possession, and leviathan? Of course not. Am I amused by the episodes full of such things? You bet I am. Do I believe in heaven and hell? Honestly, I tend to believe that we make our own heaven and hell in the here and now in how we live our lives. Is there a real hell with a King? Is there a real heaven with angels and God? I don't know but I'd like to believe that if they do exist, they exist much as they do in the TV show. I'd like to believe that my oldest sister is up in heaven with the likes of Castiel and that when it's my time I'll join her there. Until then, and for as long as I am able, I'll keep on fighting and I'll keep on swinging.

Christmas When A Loved One Dies

My sister, Michaeleh, died on November 2nd 2014. She was 37 and she was my oldest sister. It is due to her dying in November that though she's only been gone for 2 years, this is our third Christmas without her. In my personal opinion, I think it is only natural that the holidays no longer feel the same after a death such as hers in a family. How could they? In our case, a key piece of our family unit is no longer physically with us. What was once a holiday celebrated by a family of five is now celebrated as a family of four. I've been told by others, and have slowly begun to discover for myself that though Christmas will never again be the same, the spirit of the holiday remains and  we slowly begin to create a new "normal" Christmas for ourselves. There are some traditions such as putting up a Christmas tree, that will remain and there will be new traditions created. 

My sister LOVED Christmas. She loved everything about it. She loved picking out a tree, putting it up, and wrapping paper chains around it as well as placing various decorations she'd collected over the years. Michaeleh also loved Christmas music. She'd play it loudly whether she was at her home, in her car, or here at the family house. Personally, Christmas music annoys me after a few days because it's the same songs played over and over by various artists in various forms. However, her love of it and her constantly singing along and dancing to it made the music far less irritating to me. She was just too excited and cute for me to let the music get on my nerves. She loved giving and receiving presents, being together as a family, the general holiday feeling, and was a master at making Christmas cookies. No matter how old she got the magic of Christmas was alive and well within her. She worried that as we got older, Christmas in the Jones house would change but none of us ever expected it to change like it did. 

When we lost her on Nov 2, 2014, we spent that Christmas 5 hours away in NC instead of being at home. We were all equally numb and yet in tremendous pain at the same time. None of us could handle doing Christmas in the room where where my sister took her last breath as it is also the room in which we always put the tree and open gifts on Christmas morning. It didn't feel like Christmas. It also didn't feel like she was truly gone but instead just "away" somewhere. It was almost as if she was simply already married and doing Christmas with her own family even though she was not married nor did she have any children when she died. 

We stayed home for Christmas of 2015 but did very little decorating. We originally bought one of the live trees figuring we could later plant it in the yard. We belatedly realized that those trees can only be indoors for a very limited period of time so we put lights on it and put it on the back porch and got a second tree for inside that could stay up far longer. The only decorations on either tree were lights. None of us felt capable of going through our multiple boxes of decorations especially since a large amount of them are decorations that we either made as kids, were given to one of us from someone, or ones that hold special significance in regards to my sister. We also could not bring ourselves to go through her boxes of decorations. The living tree on the porch was later planted in the yard and has become known simply as "Michaeleh's Tree." Again, it didn't feel like Christmas that year and again it didn't feel like she was gone forever just that she was "away." 

This year we're home for Christmas again and this year is the first time that it feels real that it is actually Christmas and she's not here. Michaeleh died. Glioblastoma (brain cancer) took her from us and due to that there once again will be one less pile of presents under the tree. I hate it when people ask me what I want for Christmas because there's only one thing I want more than anything and it's the one thing no one will ever be able to give - what I want for Christmas is to have my sister back. I have, however, come to realize that the best way to honor her during the holidays is to channel her love of Christmas. She loved and collected nutcrackers so I put them out this year and even bought a new one. We've played some Christmas music and put up the tree though again we only put lights on it still unable to go through the ornaments.

I've been asked multiple times over the last few years what it is that I miss the most about my sister during Christmas. It used to irritate me when people asked because all I could think to say was, "EVERYTHING! I miss everything!" This year for the first time when I was asked I thought more in depth about it. What do I miss about Michaeleh at Christmas? I still miss everything but here's what I miss the most. I miss that she will never again sip her tea on the couch in her pajamas on Christmas morning. I miss that she will never again be giddy with excitement as we start opening gifts. Our gift tradition is that my sisters and I go through our stockings together and then we take turns opening gifts from "Santa." After that, my parents open their gifts and then my sisters and I hand out the gifts we personally bought for each person. I miss that we will never again hear Michaeleh argue that she should be the first to open gifts because she's the oldest and in her personal opinion...it is her right to go first.

To those who have also lost someone they love dearly and find Christmas a very hard time of year, here are some of the things I've slowly been learning since the death of my sister that I hope you'll be able to find helpful in time.

• You are going to find yourself thinking things along the lines of "I wish (loved one) was here to see this" or "man, (loved one) would have loved this."

• You may find yourself feeling guilty for enjoying various moments and for laughing and joking because your loved one isn't here to share in the joy, laughter, and jokes. DON'T! Not only do you have NOTHING to feel guilty about but remember that your loved one wouldn't want you to feel guilty. They'd want you to be as happy as you can be given the circumstances.

• Tears are going to come. You're not always going to know when or why but they will come. Let them.

• Take time to be with your thoughts, some of which will be painful but I promise you that some will make you smile.

• Talk about your loved one. Speak their name. If you have a thought that you think others might also be thinking or a feeling you want to share...speak up and share. Remember past Christmases with your loved ones and share those memories such as "Remember that Christmas when (loved one) did this?"

I was just starting my 30's when my sister died and I never in a million years thought these would be the lessons I'd be forced to learn in life and that I'd be sharing them with others at only 32 years of age. I hope that in sharing, others in similar circumstances find some solace or at least some things to think about.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! 

MAY IT BE FULL OF LAUGHTER AND LIGHT!