I realized it\u2019s been a good while since I\u2019ve written in here. So many things have happened this year that it honestly just blows my mind.<\/p>\n
Back in January, I was diagnosed with seronegative RA-type arthritis, and what\u2019s wild is that just a month or two before, a friend told me maybe I should try \u201cmind over matter\u201d for pain. I was completely speechless\u2026 like, what?! I\u2019ve lived with back issues since I was 18 years old and always managed, but then my health declined fast \u2014 to the point where it was completely out of control. I was dealing with full-body pain and trying to get it under control, so hearing that just blew my mind.<\/p>\n
After that, a few more things came up with this same person. Eventually, I got brave enough to say something that had been bothering me, and it wasn\u2019t received well. That ended up being the last conversation we had. At first it pissed me off, because it always felt like they could nitpick everything about me \u2014 my friends, what I do, how I handle things or if I posted it on Facebook before I told them \u2014 and it just felt never-ending sometimes. But me? I never said anything about their life because it\u2019s not mine to live. That\u2019s how I\u2019ve always been unless it\u2019s something I needed to say.<\/p>\n
Then February hit, and I lost one of my best friends unexpectedly. She was only 65. I met her through my \u201csister,\u201d and we built such a strong friendship over the years. I only had about 10 minutes\u2019 notice before it was posted on Facebook, and that part was really hard. But with the support of my close friends, my two other besties, and my husband, I got through it. From what her parents shared, it was quick. She had a lot of medical issues, and her body just couldn\u2019t keep up anymore. The hardest part is that we had just talked not long before she passed. We were both looking forward to her getting her legs under control so we could start up our Wednesday crafting days again. We used to do that all the time until COVID hit, and then her health declined over the last couple of years. Now Wednesdays just aren\u2019t the same.<\/p>\n
That \u201csister\u201d I mentioned is a childhood friend \u2014 we\u2019ve known each other since I was 3. She\u2019s basically the big sister I never had. Her parents helped mine on their new journey of raising a deaf child back in the early 1970s. \u00a0We\u2019ve gone through times where we didn\u2019t talk for a while, sometimes 1 to 4 months, but every single time we pick right back up like no time has passed \u2014 and we still do. I trust her completely, and she knows I\u2019m always here for her, and vice versa. I love that she\u2019s laid back and never judgmental.<\/p>\n
Then March came, and honestly, it was rough health-wise. I\u2019ve had ongoing issues with my potassium levels dropping, and it got as low as 2.5 at one point. Between managing the arthritis and the potassium issues, I mostly kept to myself. And if I\u2019m being honest, part of that was because of that same \u201cfriend.\u201d They would belittle me about posting things on Facebook before telling them directly. (Side note \u2014 it\u2019s not my fault you\u2019re not on Facebook. I have other friends who don\u2019t get upset about that.) Yeah, I\u2019ll admit it \u2014 I compared them to my other friends just to piss them off because I was tired of being bitched at. That ended up being the last time we spoke, and honestly, I\u2019ve made peace with it.<\/p>\n
But here\u2019s the kicker\u2026 there were two situations in their life that they posted on Facebook without telling me beforehand. Did you see me going off on them? Nope. I left a comment and went on with my day. That\u2019s when it really clicked for me \u2014 that’s the game they’re playing…. \u00a0trying to get a reaction out of me. \u00a0Well honey, that\u2019s not going anywhere anymore, because truthfully, I was already done. It just took me a little longer to fully wake up.<\/p>\n
Which brings me to this\u2026 the Big Man up there has a plan, whether we understand it or not. Like I always say, everything happens for a reason \u2014 even if we don\u2019t see it right away.<\/p>\n
I do have a few more things I want to talk about, but I think I\u2019ll save those for future posts. For now, I\u2019m going to hop off the computer, and go take care of a few things.<\/p>\n
Have you ever had to walk away from someone like this? \u00a0Also, have you dealt with chronic pain and people not understanding?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I realized it\u2019s been a good while since I\u2019ve written in here. So many things have happened this year that it honestly just blows my mind. Back in January, I was diagnosed with seronegative RA-type arthritis, and what\u2019s wild is that just a month or two before, a friend told me maybe I should try … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":729,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=727"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":859,"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727\/revisions\/859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jeniferbenner.com\/life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}