The Waiting Game

“Why are you not coming?” It’s the question I hate to answer. Because the why is complex. It’s not as simple as I don’t want to. It’s not even as simple as I can’t. It’s the brutal in between of a life living but not being fully experienced. It’s the limitations of the physical body paired with the aching of an overactive mind. It’s the space where we want something so desperately and nothing, not even our physical selves comply with our will. Sometimes I’m okay with it. I’ve learned how to want less out of a day, how to let the tiny razor sharp paper cuts of limitation not rock me to my core. It’s gotten easier. I can no longer remember what it feels like to stand tall on a yoga mat or recall how my muscles feel after moving for an hour. I have learned how to want less and expect much less from myself and my experiences because sometimes the expectation and falling short of them hurts more than the choosing to sit out.

If you’re someone who has experienced limitations of any kind you know the sensation I’m talking about. Plans made become plans managed. We negotiate how much we can do with what we want to do. It’s a constant evaluation of stamina, fortitude and desire and more often than not, the best laid plans become the plans that never quite happen.

Outside of my physical experiences with this, the notion of waiting and aching can apply to the moment in life when you want something so desperately and yet, it hasn’t happened. You’re past the point of revving your engines on the starting line. The delays becoming so great, you sometimes stop turning them on in anticipation all together. It’s the moments that come after the excitement of potential, after the hope that this time will be different. It’s the reckoning of who you are right now with where you are right now and where you are so desperately trying to go.

Sitting in this space can break even the strongest of spirits. God knows, it’s nearly broken mine a few times. It’s challenging to stay in the space where you are grabbing at anything, anyone that could change the course of your life. For me that looks like doctors, solutions, interventions, tools, resources that could take my ability to live from what it is now back to what it used to be. Because god do I miss it. I miss it so deeply I don’t allow myself to feel that type of ache anymore because it’s worse than any heartbreak I’ve ever had. It’s the experience of looking not only others, but yourself in the eye and saying all the things that go unsaid. Things like “I’m sorry I cancelled our plans. I’m sorry I feel like a burden to you. I’m sorry I am not who I used to be. I’m sorry this is happening to me, to us, to my life because we never planned on this version occurring but we don’t have a choice in the matter.

I would love to tell you that in this space of waiting, and what feels like eternity, is something more than aching. But for me, in this moment, the aching encapsulates the hope, the desire, the fortitude. It encompasses the worry, the fretting, the frustration. Most importantly, it encapsulates the dream that one day, hopefully not very far from now – this life, my life will look worlds different from what it does right now.

If you’re in this waiting space with me, welcome and  I’m sorry we are in this together. I share your frustration, grief and anger. I shake my fists into the air and yell at God and the Universe asking for the answer to “why.” I stand next to you in the moments where we have tried so, so hard to make things better and then they fall short. I sit down with you when our bodies say “enough now” and we are forced into rest.

I align my heart with yours on this journey towards more than we have right now. Because despite all of this (the pain, the hurt, the worry), the deepest part of my soul says “don’t let this break you. This will not be the thing that breaks you. You have come too far and worked too hard to let this day, today of all days, be the one that breaks you.

Today is not that day - Not for me, not for you. Not for your spirit, your soul, your heart or your mind. Today is the day that will not break us.