A contribution by Maria McCutchen, author of “It’s All in Your Head – A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain”
When tragedy strikes, it’s not always easy to stay focused on what matters, but rather your mind drifts, and you start focusing on the negative; what is different, what is wrong, and what could be, but what is not. This is not healthy. It is a way of thinking that will have you, soon, being consumed with feelings of “poor me.” It will have you feeling sorry for yourself and maybe even develop feelings of negativity and hate, rather than positive and upbeat.
If you have ever had something tragic happen in your life that brought negativity or feelings of despair into your life, then you know how hard it can be to climb out of that hole. You know how hard it is to stay focused on who you are – normally. This new, unrecognizable person takes over – maybe depressed and down and you want to get your old-self back.
In order to do this, you must first start with remembering who you are/were, before the tragedy started. You must reconnect with yourself. When you reconnect with yourself, you find a sense of self. You find your old self and are able to start connecting your old self with your new self.
Remembering who you are in your heart, is very important – especially when dealing with conditions that steal “you” from you; such as, illnesses or long term medical conditions. You lose site of your old self, and this new, sick or disabled person takes over and you forget. But you need to remember. As painful as it may be to remember the days when you were young, healthy and happy, it is important so that you can accept the new you. And you can work toward becoming her again – if that is what you choose. Maybe you just certain aspects of your old life, to shine through again. But in order to do that, you must remember and you must accept.
It can be difficult to think about happier times. It can be difficult to make goals to get, at least a part of you back from that time when you were healthier. But it is a great step in moving forward. A positive step in acceptance. And, it will keep you from spiraling downward even more.
Be true to yourself. If I could tell people who have gone through long term medical conditions, one thing, it would be: Be true to yourself. Don’t ignore your feelings, brush them under the rug, or try to pretend you are something you are not. Acceptance is key to overcoming, and turning things around for yourself. Once you accept, then you can work on doing something about it….making changes, and overcoming.
It’s a one-step-at-a-time process. If you try to do too much at once, you are surely going to fail. I recommend baby steps. Use baby steps when trying to reconnect with your old self. If you try too hard, or go overboard with trying to be your old self and you find you just cannot, this can send you into a tailspin or depression.
Most of all, learn to embrace your new self. Learn to accept who you are now and don’t get hung up on the fact that you are not the same person you were 5-10 years ago…..last year or maybe even last month. You are who you are, now, so accepting it is going to be key. Realizing there is nothing you can do to change that is key.
Finding a new normal – a new balance in life is what has to happen in order to move on – move forward. Staying stuck in the past and focusing on who you “were” but aren’t anymore, will get you no where. The more you do to work on creating a new normal for yourself, the quicker and easier it will be to move into your new life.
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It’s All in Your Head – A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain
by Maria McCutchen
Maria McCutchen did not have time to be sick. With a husband who had just lost a job, two young sons, and a cross-country move on the horizon, who had time to be sick? Maria didn’t have time for a common cold, let alone a major medical condition. But one day while shopping in the grocery store where she had shopped hundreds of times before, she couldn’t find the milk. It was then she knew what she was feeling was more than just stress or exhaustion. There was something very wrong.
After consulting a few doctors, Maria discovered she had a rare brain cyst known as a posterior fossa arachnoid cyst—a very large brain cyst. Hearing these cysts were normally asymptomatic was of little comfort, especially because she felt her mind and body slipping away more and more every day. Normal mental and physical functions were becoming harder to control. Even if the doctors didn’t believe the cyst was a problem, she knew it was.
It would take months of living inside a shell of a person that she’d become, months of living in a mental fogginess and sometimes even physical pain, before she would finally get the medical attention she needed. It’s All in Your Head chronicles her harrowing medical odyssey and her attempts to regain some sort of semblance of her old life after treatment.
