"Rethink Possible"

I've had a rough time since Monday, February 19.
Ongoing vertigo, like I've never experienced before.
In the past 2+ weeks I've had only 2-1/2, non-consecutive days where I haven't been spinning or swimmy.

I've seen my GP and my neurologist.
I was hoping my routine epidural on 3/05/18 would stabilize my stance.
But it didn't.

The experience has jolted me, once again, into thinking about how I managed my life in my previous decades of chronic illness.
From 1982 through 2005 I managed asthma, sinusitis with polyps, hives, and other immune dysfunctions.
Though I don't recall ever feeling that I'd actually get well, I kept trying.
It was when I listened more intuitively to my inner GPS that I found answers.
And I got well.
I got well.
It really is pretty incredible.

I thought on how I've managed life since April, 2011, when the polyradiculitis began.
Polyradiculitis means my nerve roots are swollen at my spinal cord affecting all sorts of functions.
This is like my second life of chronic illness.
To my recollection, I never labeled or thought of the first one (in those previous decades) as "chronic illness," even though it was.

In the present I find myself thinking/feeling that I may never get well from the nerve damage and its repercussions.
At times I accept that.
Other times, I don't.

And, just like in the first chronic-illness life, I keep trying.
Because I continue trying, does that mean I think I will get well?
Or rather am I learning how to manage life but not necessarily with complete wellness in mind; that is, do I keep trying in order to learn how to thrive despite the dis-ease adversities?

It's probably a mix of the two.
Trying because I have to cope with it day-in and day-out.
Trying because maybe I can get well.

I think of the serendipitous events that have presented themselves along this journey with polyradiculitis.
They are like stepping stones.
And I have significantly improved in some areas.

But, even if I do get completely well, I'll be hitting 60 years old in 2020, and aging is a factor as to how well I will function compared to when I got well at age 46 from the first chronic-illness life.

***

In our home, we don't have WiFi or dial-up internet.
To connect to the internet, we use a hotspot device from AT&T or the hotspot function on our cell phones.

"Rethink Possible AT&T" pops up on the hotspot-device screen every time I turn it on.

I never paid much attention to the phrase.
I felt that it was just a phrase to motivate a consumer to buy more digital stuff, more ways to supposedly stimulate the imagination.

But yesterday, the phrase caught my attention.
I wasn't thinking about electronics or digital life; but rather, this life in which I live and move and breathe and be.

Carol, why not "rethink possible" in this 3D life of substance, instead of limiting it to the 2D life of the digital world?

But does the digital world have substance?
On the surface, I don't think so.
But on a deeper level, I think it does.
The results of the 2D certainly manifest in the 3D.

Does all 3D life have substance?
I think so.

***

I'm continuing to read Victor Frankl's book, Man's Search for Meaning.
It's a short book.
I started reading it in December, but set it down for awhile.
I picked it back up last week.

Following is part of a paragraph I read this morning from a section entitled Life's Transitoriness.
I'm pondering it and it's practical application in life; especially in regard of a way to think about the past, where and how to file the past, and how the past fits into life in the present.

I never tire of saying that the only really transitory aspects of life are the potentialities; but as soon as they are actualized, they are rendered realities at that very moment; they are saved and delivered into the past, wherein they are rescued and preserved from tansitoriness. For, in the past, nothing is irretrievably lost but everything irrevocably stored.
~Victor Frankl