One hot summer day I went rafting with a friend and my younger daughter. The river was tame with little bursts of fast water that was pretty easy to manage. Nothing taxing or even very exciting. So there we were just floating down the river; beautiful day, beautiful scenery and an afternoon on the water - what could be better? Then poof - I wasn't in the boat any longer. I didn't feel a thing, but I was catapulted over the front of the raft and landed under the boat, which was still floating down the river. At first I was confused - where the heck was I? Then I realized the raft was directly over my head. Not a good situation! So I did a hand-over-hand and tracked my way to the end of the boat and got myself pulled up and out of the water. We continued our float after that little mishap and had a really fine day.
When I think about that rafting trip though, falling out of the boat seems to define it. I don't remember a lot else about that afternoon - but I do remember that I bounced out against a rock and went into the water. Because it was dramatic and a bit scary, that experience then defines my perception of rafting. But what if I were to shift that around and see it as only part of the trip and a part that had a happy ending? What if I saw it as an adventure - something unexpected for me - but surely part of the landscape of a rafting experience?
Just as I don't need to define my dump in the river as my entire rafting experience, I don't have to let fibro or chronic fatigue define all of me. I can choose where I put my emphasis, work around it and each day, make the most of what I've got. At the same time I'm managing that focus I am also doing whatever my Lady Doc has assigned me as part of my recovery plan. That creates a tough balance for me - how do I keep my focus of fibro not defining me while I'm deep in the heart of a program to fight it? It's a tough balance, but worth my thought and attention. My goal is to do what I can do, whenever I can do it, to experience my fogged out and crash days if I have to, and then quickly put them behind me. It's just like getting back in the boat.
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