Part 3~Coming to Terms with IC~Anger/Depression~

    We are continuing on in our series of stages of coming to terms with IC.I want you to close your eyes for a moment and picture this scene in your minds. You may understand all these feelings that your going through or it just may all be new to you and your trying to figure it all out. So the stages we are going to discuss will be Anger and Depression.

   A young woman in her 20s just graduated college; she has been married only a few short months. She and her husband want to start planning a family…. And then the unthinkable happens. She goes to the doctor and she find out that she has a chronic bladder disease interstitial cystitis, and just like that her little world in a nice wrapped package unravels.

    That night over dinner she lashes out at her husband over some stupid little disagreement. They finish dinner in silence. Later that evening while sitting on the couch sipping her hot tea, she realizes she wasn’t angry at her husband, she’s angry at the news she got today while at the doctors. This can’t possibly be by new reality she says out loud. She is angry at herself. Have you been there in her shoes, feeling those emotions, feeling that anger at your circumstances, I have. It all sounds so familiar.

   These circumstances are beyond her control. Yet the anger feels like its going to boil over. She’s is angry at the fact she might not be able to work in the field she just went to college for and gradated at the top of her class. What kind of wife will be, will I be a good mom, will I be able to give my child all they need. Instead of indentifying each emotion for what it is, the anger is turned inward on herself and then outward to those around her.

  Anger is another natural human emotion. When faced with struggles that are bigger than us, we have a tendency to get angry and try to fight back. When the anger rears its head it can build up and fester inside and then what comes next is the resentment.

    When I was diagnosed with IC and fibro I was angry.I had already fought through years of mental illness and then cancer I saw the struggle I went through then, what was taken from me, and I got so angry went misdiagnosed with the  IC for years so I felt I had the right to be angry, I lost years, of not having treatments, but I had to choose was this going to confine me win chains, and become bitter, or was I going to be willing to work through, and use my emotions to fight back in a positive way, in a way that I would not loose myself in this Disease, and not lose my voice, but speak out and  do MY part of being part of the change, we all HOPE for every day.

   Remember the serenity prayer, we can’t control all in our lives, yet we can control how we react to circumstances. We can’t run and hide from the pain, embracing pain and learning to accept is not the same as, giving to defeat, letting it take you down and change you. Anger does not benefit anyone in the long run, I do believe there is righteous anger, that is what we feel when injustice is done, but that is not the anger that tries to define you, that’s anger that consumes you to the core of which you are.

     And then the anger subsides, and the depression comes roaring in to take its place. Instead of fighting back with anger, you just feel as though you’re fading. You don’t even want to take the covers off your head, and face what’s out there. I know those feelings, oh boy do I know those. What mattered one day, doesn’t matter anymore. You feel hopeless, and scared, where did this darkness come from you ask?It tries to crush your spirit, and who you are. You maybe even ask WHO am I? im different. Pain does that it changes us, but part of learning how to work those changes in our lives, before we can even attempt that we need to work through this agonizing process. Its easy to feel overwhelmed. Depression remembers not a sign of any kind of weakness. So before you go any further, you need to understand that. You’ve been given a hand that you didn’t ask for, and now life is changing.

   I know God is walking me through this journey. But there are still days I feel defeated with this disease. See just like when your grieving a death, and you come to terms with it, now that there is a empty place where that loved one or friend once occupied. There will be times from then on out, you break down and the loss is as raw as the day you heard the news, as raw as the new life you had to adjust to without them in it. In the same way, you work through, you accept, you become your won advocate, and then it hits you just like that. And you find yourself bawling your eyes out into your pillow, so know stages of grief whatever it maybe were grieving, we will experience those stages over and over again at times.

   I want to live, and live the best life I can, Yes even, with chronic diseases. I cnat be hard on myself, a lot of times we are our own worst enemies. So ive come to accept that though I know this pain is out of my control, I don’t beat myself up, when I feel the anger, I feel the depression, im gentle with myself and that’s a reminder WE all need daily! Were quick to offer encouragement to those we love and care about, maybe its time we offer encouragement and patience with the person staring back at us in the mirror.

   Know God is there in the midst of the pain, in the midst of the anger and the darkness. Let him reach down and be your ultimate source of strength to lean on, lean on his everlasting arms. And lean on your IC and fibro families, they’ve been a blessing in my life, I wouldn’t be able to make my way through this crazy life of pain without their voice of reason and loving kindness to be a ear to my hurts and my frustrations.

   As we walk this road, remember this, anger is a feeling, not a way of life. It’s a journey with deep vallies and high mountain peaks. a journey with tears and beautiful views. It’s a journey of finding out what your made of, finding the courageous warriors inside I KNOW each of you are. We keep believing, one day there will be a cure. In  the meantime taking it moment by moment one small step at a time is all any of us can do~