Latest / Beyond the Arc: Reflections on Resilience, Identity, & Life Podcast / I Used to Wonder Why Her Illness Got Empathy and Mine Got Shame

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I Used to Wonder Why Her Illness Got Empathy and Mine Got Shame · Beyond the Arc: Reflections on Resilience, Identity, & Life Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Beyond the Arc, I'm Amy Gamble.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't planning to record another episode before heading off on vacation,
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: but sometimes something moves you enough that you just have to sit down and write.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: For me, this one started with Bruno Mars singing about love.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Then an old friend shared a video that took me back more than 20 years to a time
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: when both of our lives were changed by illness.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Her illness was met with empathy.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: Mine was often met with shame.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: For a long time, I wondered why.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: More than 20 years later, I see our two journeys very differently.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: And strangely enough, what connects them for me now isn't illness at all.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's love.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: This essay is called, I Used to Wonder Why Her Illness Got Empathy and Mine Got Shame.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: There's no greater feeling to me than being loved unconditionally.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: I thought about love a lot over the past week after I was lucky enough
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: to see Bruno Mars' romantic tour concert.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: As Bruno sang one song after another about love,
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: I was truly moved by his passion for sharing his musical talents with the world.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm getting ready to go on vacation,
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: so I wasn't sure I'd write one more essay before taking a break
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: from my everyday life.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I was so moved by an old friend's video that I decided to take to the page
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: and express my overwhelming gratitude to the pets and people who have loved me.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Let me begin by telling you a story.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: This friend of mine and I were both taken down by illness over 20 years ago.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: At the time,
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: I was hurt by all the outpouring of support people showed her
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: while I was relinquished to the shame and blame routine
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: that often accompanies someone with serious mental health issues.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: People were going out and holding fundraising events for her cause.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: For mine, I was abandoned by more people from my past life.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: They weren't sure how to deal with me anymore.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: They weren't sure they could trust me as they once did.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: And this was long before doing a NAMI,
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: National Alliance on Mental Illness walk, was acceptable and cool.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: She was actively shown empathy while I experienced tremendous grief over losing
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: the life I'd once known and the friends who came with it.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: If there was a black sheep, I was it.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Or at least it felt like it at the time.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: The people who didn't abandon me during my worst times were my family.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Namely, my mother, father,
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: Aunt Mary Francis, Uncle Sam, Ashley, Natalie, Shelley, Bob, Sherry, and Gary.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Of the long list of people I know,
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: those are the ones who stood by me through the darkest times in my life.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: I could feel their enduring love and support even when I wasn't capable
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: of returning it or appreciating it.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: It was true love,
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: the kind where no matter what happens,
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: you know you can rely on that person or people to show up for you,
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: no matter the circumstances or situation.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: And boy did I have some dark times.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: But the truth is I've always had light amongst the darkness.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: I may have struggled,
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: cried some ugly tears,
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: asked why God cursed me,
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: wished that all my friends would have treated me like they treated my friend with
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: the physical illness.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: But today, I almost feel guilty for having those thoughts.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: Because after my hard times, I've been blessed with a rich and fulfilling life.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Not perfect,
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: not always easy, but I'm capable and able to care for myself, the land, and my pets.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: Capable of writing books and essays,
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: coaching others, and giving of myself with my time, talent, and treasures.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: My friend, while she's in a wheelchair, 100% reliant on caregivers and her partner to help her.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Struck with a physically disabling condition that is relentless in deteriorating
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: the mind and body, and yet she persists.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: She keeps trying.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: Her video was about the wonderful caregiving organization she relies on to help her,
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: along with her partner.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Her radiant spirit continues to thrive.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Lives running parallel with little more in common than similar dates of onset and
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: the life-altering nature of illness,
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: but very different in terms of how one illness continued to devastate while
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: the other went into remission.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Very similar, though, in terms of the love we've been given.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: You see,
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: when life hands us difficult challenges and throws us off our path,
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: the natural tendency is to think, why me?
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: I admit I spent two solid Lying in my bed during a depressive episode
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: and medication adjustment period, crying to God to take my life.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: My suffering was immense,
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: emotionally painful,
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: and there weren't a lot of outside answers or explanations for what
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: the hell happened to me.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then I learned how to take one day at a time.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: I came to realize that when someone is diagnosed with an illness of any kind,
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: there's a grieving process that comes with it.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: Something no one had ever told me.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: Something I discovered on my own.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: I allowed myself to grieve for the identity I once had.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: I allowed myself to mourn all the friendships lost.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: I learned to forgive myself and others.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: I learned to appreciate the little things in life in ways that filled up my heart.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: And every little thing helped me heal.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: But the one non-negotiable piece of the puzzle was the fact that,
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: like my friend, I needed help too.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: More than anything, I needed love.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: I needed people to look me in the eye and treat me with the same dignity
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: and respect they did before I had an official diagnosis.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so it is love that moved me to the page today.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm grateful for all that I have and for the shortlist of people
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: who have made this journey with me.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: Last night, my cat, Mr. Kitty, jumped on my chest while I was lying down.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: He wanted me to pet him.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: He wanted his love time.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: I reflected on the fact that this pet has been part of my life's journey for 18 years.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's a lot of sunrises and sunsets.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I remembered that the last thing my brother-in-law did before leaving my house for
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: the last time ever was come back inside so he could say goodbye to Mr. Kitty.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: He stood in my kitchen talking to him, petting him, and well, loving on him.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: You don't even have to like cats to appreciate the impact one special pet had on
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: a man's man, a tough guy on the exterior, but filled with love in his heart.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: My heart is saddened by the difficult journey my friend continues to endure.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: And at the same time, it's filled up with gratitude for the way my life has turned out.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: Love doesn't take away pain and sorrow and suffering, but it sure does heal the spirit.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: As far as I'm concerned, Bruno can keep on singing about love forever.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: His voice and passion as he sings die with a smile, moves me to tears.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: The kind of tears you have when your heart fills up with love,
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: joy, sadness, and gratitude all at once.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: To all my readers and listeners, I'm sending you lots of love today.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's really I wanted to leave you with today.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: Some people will come into our lives and leave.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: Some will disappoint us.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: Some won't understand what we're going through, no matter how desperately we wish they would.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: But then there are the ones who stay.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: The ones who sit beside us during the darkest times.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: The ones who look us in the eye when we don't recognize ourselves anymore.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: The ones who remind us,
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: sometimes without ever saying the words, that we're still worthy of love.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And apparently,
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: sometimes that love comes with four paws,
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: whiskers,
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: and expectation that you stop whatever you're doing because it's time for some love.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Mr. Kitty has certainly taught me that.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for spending a little bit of your day with me.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: This is Beyond the Arc.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Amy Gamble.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, take good care of yourself and the people and pets you love.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: And Bruno, if you're listening, keep singing those love songs.