What I'm Hiding

It's weird to get ready for the Jewish New Year, a time of soul searching, opening up, letting go, letting in, self-awareness, and reflection realizing that I've been doing myself a disservice in keeping a secret, which has, in turn, made me feel unfulfilled, frustrated and generally, resentful of those closest to me. At least, I hope that I can blame my lack of honesty and not the people.

Why have I been hesitant to disclose? For the most part, I think it's that I don't want to be a burden, because asking others to do things for me doesn't match my personality. I'm a 'do it yourself' kind of girl, independent and self-sufficient, and admitting that doing it myself is impossible is ... well... darn near impossible. So, more often than not, I have been putting on a happy face, and when I can't muster that, a blank expression. I've been ignoring my budget by taking advantage of soap.com and fresh direct. I had no clue that 3 blocks from my apartment was a drugstore clearing everything out for 50% off. And, I've been eating beans straight from the can.

Now, if you follow my food blog, you know that while I may consume chickpeas straight from a can, that wouldn't happen with anything else. Well, these were black beans. I've eaten cheese straight from a package, cereal dry, and I've stared at beautiful food on the brink in my fridge, and reached for yogurt instead ... in the last week I managed to make myself one meal, and, while delicious, I haven't touched a dirtied dish from that or the two weeks prior.

What I've been reticent to share over the past five weeks is that I've been in agonizing pain. Not just minor injury pain, which is, likely, how people perceive it. Laying down hurts. All the more so, standing hurts. A hot shower is the closest I've come to feeling good - but if that lasts longer than about 7 minutes, it's all fruitless and I'm back in pain. I have the tiniest of injuries causing all this pain, of course, just a little torn cartilage, and I've been sticking my knee brace under leggings and quietly using the chair next to me to keep it elevated.

And I've been hiding it by attempting to be social, where I can have alcohol in excess to disguise the pain, or by taking drugs that make me feel loopy and disconnected from what is going on around me. I've managed to get through my workdays, strained. Sitting up with my leg elevated for nearly 8 hours is completely exhausting ... but what I've most come to understand is that while I resent my body plenty for making me endure this - I really resent that amongst the community and the friends I boast as amongst my dearest and closest, I haven't gotten much of the support I need. All I can do is hope that it is my fault for not expressing my needs clearly. I want to believe this is true despite the fact that a number of friends have reached out, have delivered food, have come over for meals, have been tremendously, wonderfully accommodating. So I do wonder how much it's been me, and how much I must reevaluate my relationships to understand that not all of them are what I thought they were.

But then I realize, I am so profoundly grateful for the people who have been understanding, who have been supportive, who have offered me genuine well wishes, and I acknowledge that the resentment doesn't serve me. But when I'm crying on my 3 block walk home from the subway station, all I can think about is whether it's my own fault I'm not being fully supported through this.

In my heart I know that I will get through this, that I will return to my truest self with a smile, and, I hope, dancing and heels and yoga, too. What I'm unsure of is the relationships that don't emanate support now, especially the ones that don't offer as much as a "get well" sentiment, and whether I will be able or willing to foster those relationships in the future. It feels easy now to conflate the two types of pain, that of the physical and that of the soul, and I wonder whether it will wash away in this season of new beginnings, or serve to open my eyes and clear out wasted energies and fruitless friendships.