I walk a lot. I walk in short bursts, 5-10 minutes every couple of hours. I walk with fast, confidant strides, music blaring, around my block, maybe two blocks. I walk even when my joints are sore, when my bones throb, when I am short of breath. For those few minutes, I am not sick. I am just me.
It takes me a few minutes to recover after these walks. As the night grows later, I am increasingly exhausted by these brief moments of exercise. I lay on my couch and am too tired to get up. I want something to drink but my legs feel impossibly heavy and I have that warm shudder starting up my spine. Even simple tasks become insurmountable. In these desperate moments, I recognize my body for what it is: a prison. These shackles have been on for so long that I barely notice their weight.
You can get used to anything. It feels in some ways like this has always been my life, that I have always had this broken body. It seems impossible that I could ever just go for a walk without consequences.
I want so much to believe in an afterlife where I will be healed. I want to know that after all this pain, there will be this oblivion and that I will be whole again. This is all I have sometimes.
Tonight is one of those nights when I am so tired that my eyes hurt but I cannot sleep. My body is struggling against itself and I am so tired of this illness that it makes me cry. I have to believe that it can’t go on forever. I have to believe that there is an end.
I just want to be free.