Today is My 4-Year Covidiversary
Today marks four years since my first symptoms of Covid-19. I am, as you probably know, still living with long Covid. Many of you are living with chronic illness, too. All of you are living with some sort of suffering that just won’t quit—because that’s apparently how this whole being human thing works. With all that in mind, I thought maybe you would like to read this letter from my today self to my four-years-ago self. Here goes . . .
Dear, darling Four-years-ago Self,
Something unexpected is about to come into your life. It will feel less like a coming in, though, and more like a draining out. It will feel like a hole cut in the center of everything, and you will watch things that felt like parts of you fall out of your life and disappear. It will feel sometimes like the end of the world. It will feel sometimes like you can’t go on. But you will go on. Body aching, heart pounding, room spinning, brain a fog, you will climb out of bed to care for your kids, collapse back in bed or on the floor, and repeat that process over and over and over. You will be scared of losing them—your kids. It will be the biggest, most bodily fear you’ve ever known. I know this sounds terrible, sweetheart, and it will feel terrible, but what I want you to know is that terrible things pull treasures in their wake.
You won’t lose your boys, sweetie, though your heart will be stretched because it will hold the pain of parents who didn’t get so lucky. Your body will heal enough that the biggest fears will fade—most of the time, anyway. What I want you to know, though is this: that even in your darkest days, when you go still and yield to your experience rather than resisting it, you will find a power flowing through you, you will feel understanding growing inside you, and you will feel compassion burning like the brightest flame. You will feel, sweetheart, more intensely than you’ve ever felt before, and yes, that will be painful, and yes, that will be beautiful.
Four years on, you will sit down to count the beauty, love, growth, and gifts that you wouldn’t have experienced without this “loss.” It will take you hours. You will have to sharpen and resharpen your pencil. You will have to shake out your wrist.
What’s the truth that shakes out from all of this? That even with the pain, even with the loss, even with the ongoing uncertainty, the life that will emerge for you out of all the muck will be far more beautiful than anything that preceded it. So trust the process. Trust your own unfolding. Decay exists to feed new growth. Allow parts of yourself to fall away because guess what, if they can vanish so completely, then they were never really you. You are okay. Even in your darkest moments. You are the stillness below the waves—no matter how big the swells. You are a drop in this interconnected sea. Let the water hold you. Relax into its support. Breathe into your connection with absolutely everything. You will get through this. Better yet, you will get through this changed.
Love,
Your March 2024 Self
Me (and my sis) on March 7, 2020, ignoring our sore throats to go snowshoeing
Me in 2024, my perspective apparently so broadened by the experience of illness that my head no longer limits itself to the confines of my neck.
What have your experience been surrounding the interplay of loss and growth? And how are my fellow long-haulers doing out their as you navigate the day-to-day and possibly approach your own anniversaries?
"Terrible things pull treasures in their wake." This line literally sent a shiver through me. Thank you for sharing this beautiful tribute and the wise retrospective view of your 4-years-hence self. And as to your 2024 neck...#elastigirlkicksass 💪
My four year anniversary was March 5. I think you've found a lot more gratitude for this struggle than I have, so maybe I should work on that, since I did get many gifts from covid. But I'm in the strange place of being well enough that everyone thinks I'm fully well, while the internal reality is much more complicated. I feel like I'm back to living at the pace of outside world, and I'm grateful to be able to do it, but there is still a deep, core level of TIRED. My fantasy is to have 6 months to pause, reflect on it all, focus on exercise and sleep and good food, and then maybe I could be truly well. The kind of well where you *want* to do things. Not the kind of well where you can once again force yourself.
But, at any rate: Congratulations to us all for making it through! And congratulations to you, Lisa, for being able to offer yourself so much kindness. Maybe I will get there later on. :-) Fighting!