Fear

I got a text the other evening. "ummm, that's not you on fire is it?"  I laughed and said no.  But decided I should go outside and check on what it was all about.  And the house two doors down from me was fully engulfed in flames. 

I instantly felt panic.

Fear.

My heart was beating a little too fast. 

My mouth went dry.

And the police said we should probably get out of the house until the fire department got it under control. 

We were all lucky.  Well everyone but the owners of that house. Even they were kind of lucky. No one was hurt.

And a little while later, as I was able to be back in my house, but I sat outside watching the firefighters work in the dark, I remembered when I had felt like that before.

It was October 2009. A few days before Thanksgiving. I had not been feeling great for a while.  But things were getting worse.  Leaving work, I almost collapsed walking to my car.  I managed to get home, make it though some of the evening, but when I had finally started to sit and try to relax...I couldn't. My heart was beating to fast. My mouth was dry.  And I started to panic, because I knew something was wrong.  

I went to the hospital.  The nurse gave me a quick assessment, and within 2 minutes I was being hooked up to machines.  An intern came an looked at me. Then the ER doctor. And then they called in an internist. I said "but you're going to send me home" it's just a panic attack or something, right?  But the doctor patted my leg, and just said that they were going to admit me, that they thought maybe there was something else going on...and they wanted to make sure I was okay.  And that is when I became afraid. Really afraid. 

I was in the ER until about 1am. They had run as many tests on me as the could for that night. They took me up to the second floor; into the HUB.  Sort of this hospital limbo, when they don't have anywhere else to put you.  And then they left me alone. In the dark. Hooked up to a machine that would let them know if my heart did anything it shouldn't - like stop. Oxygen and an IV. Scared, sweaty and alone. That was the first time in my life I ever fully felt and understood alone. 

Over the next several days I would be poked, prodded and monitored. I'd have a CT Scan, and ultrasound.  Most every part of my body would be touched without thought, poked or examined by different nurses, doctors or technicians. My favourite part of the day was when the nurse would help me take of the telemtry unit so I could go into the shower and spend a blissful 15 minutes without other sick people around me.  Hot hot water.  And then I'd come back to bed, and nap. Because the effort of a shower was almost too much for me.

They did figure out that I had many many many blood clots in my lungs. I'm lucky I didn't have damage done to my heart.  More then that, I've been told by every doctor who has seen my chart (and it's many) that I'm lucky to be alive. I take a little rat poison every day now.  It's keeps the blood clots away.  

I've always been afraid to live.  Things and people scare me.  But in those moments at the hospital I learned there was something I wanted that trumped my fear of living.  I learned, I wanted to live. In those moments, when they wheeled me up to the HUB and left me alone in the dark with my fear, I prayed to live. 

Life is a funny thing.  Sometimes it takes a step closer to death to make you realize you want it. 

The Four Agreements

There is this book I read. Years ago. "The Four Agreements" by Don Miguel Ruiz. I loved it when I first read it, but somehow what I took from it didn't stick. I often think about it - "Be impeccable with  your word", "Don't take anything personally", "Don't make assumptions", and "Always do you best". Seems pretty simple - but it's not so easy.

Like don't take anything personally...there is the obvious understanding that people will say mean things, not everyone will like you... That's just the way things are. Don't take it personally, the other persons objections really have nothing to do with you and everything to do with them.  But the kicker is, that is also means when someone adores you, loves what you've done, or praises you - it's not about you either.  It's simply because you've met some imaginary check list in their mind that has nothing to do with you.  So the bad is not personal, but neither is the good.  And that is harder to accept.  Because we all want to be loved, valued and appreciated.  The secret is to love, value and appreciate ourselves.  To stop judging ourselves, and realize we are perfect as we are - when we are ourselves.

And to be ourselves, we have to live the other three agreements.  Don't assume anything anyone does is about you. They do it for and because of themselves.
Be impeccable with your word - say what you mean and mean what you say. Always.  How many little white lies do we tell every day to others to keep them happy.  To ourselves, to make it so that we check all those little boxes on our check list of who and what we think we should be.
Always do you best - how many times have you just been good enough, when you could have done better?  How many times did you lie to yourself saying you couldn't have done things differently.

None of it is about being perfect. It's all just about being the best version of who we are here and now. And loving ourselves as we are.  Because it's in those moments when we can truly accept and love other people for who they are. Because that's really all we all want, to love and be loved.  So I agree to live the Four Agreements as best as I can.  I won't be perfect. But, I'll learn a lot, and sometime, I might learn to love who I am. All the silly and serious that is me.