This morning, my feet got loud after only 30 minutes. That was it. No more walking. My hope for a quick trip to the farm market was gone.
Grief hit me hard, and I cried like a three-year-old who's pet just died.
I know grief is normal. After all, it's only been two years since I first tried on the label "disabled."
That was so-o-o-o liberating.
I'd been losing function for thirty years, but since I always found a way to get what I wanted--especially hiking alone in wilderness areas--the losses never registered as such. But the last three years of struggling to work had been h*ll. Giving up that struggle was a relief. A disability identity was comforting.
I can handle the pain--though, yes, I hate inspiration porn. The isolation is harder (among complaints, I have erythromelalgia which makes wearing shoes and socks excruciating--so no outside excursions in winter--while heat exacerbated pain keeps me inside in summer).
Walking has always been my main deal. Regular in-wild-ness time feels as necessary as food--in all seasons. (I can spend hours lying comfortably in a snow drift.)
Now, I usually can't sit on the deck.
Grief has it's own rhythm. It can become less suffocating while never going entirely away. But then when it hits, it can still hit hard.
