Tag: fibromyalgia

Two roads diverged in a wood.


The issue that has been using most of my brain power lately is whether i should take a break from university to focus and deal with the FM and CFS, Monash calls it an Intermission. There are days that i think i should and others where i feel that i can deal with the FM and CFS while going on with classes like  I did last semester.

Last semester I come out successful but since then things have changed, the FM has gotten worse and another thought, next semester will be harder. I found it hard to deal with my summer unit and had to drop out, and even dropping out of that has been giving me headaches and has been getting me anxious. On a side note, I took the summer unit optionally as a method of being productive during my break instead of just chilling with my friends and family, and instead of learning more about Financial Accounting, I learned that FM can be quite disruptive to say the least. After my previous exams my FM started getting worse so much so that I couldn’t focus during my summer classes (i sat and stared, i couldn’t absorb anything), waking up got harder, the fatigue, brain fog and muscle aches got worse, my moods made me seem bipolar and I just couldn’t handle the stress of knowing that I was bound to fail, I couldn’t do it… the only positive and most important point that came out from the summer unit is that I finally accepted that the FM needed to be dealt with and that I needed to bring my parents in 100%, before this I didn’t really let on how bad times would get. I guess i thought that if I ignored it, it didn’t exist… I guess i thought wrong.

Now, we are in the process of dealing with it, not me but we. I should have realized along time ago that I wasn’t alone in this, but why did it take me so long to admit that I needed help? A combination of my Ego mixed in with the fact that I’m used to doing things alone with a hint of “didn’t want to bother everyone else with my problems”.

So now, to the point. Should I take a break or not? How do i make a decision when my position on this matter changes day-to-day, (further elaborated in A Tale of Two Minds http://arkay6.com/2012/02/05/a-tale-of-two-minds/ ).

Why shouldn’t I take a break? Well first of all because I’m am so far behind, in terms of education, the people i graduated secondary school with, so much so that most of my new friends are about 2 years younger than me. Do I really want to be left back some more? Still be in university when friends my age start working?

But then again, I don’t want a repeat episode of Summer School Dec 2011 where I drop out because I haven’t dealt with the underlying issues and waste more of my father’s money which he works so hard for. I’m scared. Scared that I will let down my parents,  I’m scared that I will let myself down again…that I will fail next semester due to factors out of my control which will only further waste away confidence when I’m already using out my reserves. I don’t know how I would take it if I failed next semester, but I highly doubt that it will be good… as it is my moods are more bad than good, more depressed than happy, more cloudy than clear…

I guess…. i guess that I will have to see whether  have more good days than bad days in the next 2 weeks… and make a decision by my birthday… my birthday… what a depressing thought, 22 years old and still in my first year of university. It’s just so… so… upsetting… but before I go off on a tangent let me just finished this post up. based on what i just wrote it would seem a better option to take a break a deal with this goddamn FM and CFS and know how much of it I can cure and how much of it I will have to live with for the rest of my life.

But making this decision is so scary… what if I take a break and suddenly in less than a month im feeling better? what then? Would that mean that i just wasted another semester? It’s times like these… when i think about my future that i get depressed… that things get darker… that things just seem a little more hopeless…

It makes me think… is there a “correct” choice in this situation, or am I screwed either way?

A Tale of Two Minds


Sometimes I feel like Dr. Jekyll with a portion of Hyde on the side, or maybe even Hyde with a portion of Jekyll on the side.

At one moment I feel great, happy and optimistic and the next i can feel like there is no hope in the world, that everything is dark, like I’m in this deep dark hole that i just can’t get out off. For the most part, the latter occurs more than the former. It’s like I’m two different people, and the days i feel more fatigued or fogged up, well, don’t expect me to be all cheerful, to say the least. Of course i try my best to put my best foot out when people are around, but sometimes it just takes too much out of me, and then you can expect me to be on a short fuse. At times i may just leave, but then there are times when i may let some steam off.

This “Tale of Two Minds’ is driving me mad, on one day i’ll be positive and another i’m not so. This doesn’t help when i need to make decisions. Especially now, i have to decide whether i am going to take the next few months off and focus on fighting the FM, or for later whether i want to go to Melbourne to do my 2nd and 3rd years (but i’ll discuss those 2 in individual posts).

Another problem, probably the one that worries me the most, is that I don’t know who I am anymore. Sometimes I feel that I don’t need to accomplish great things in my future to make me happy but then there are times when i want to be the best and become the best and that only by reaching great heights will I be happy. So how do I make decisions when i don’t know what i want?

When i don’t know WHO i am.

I read Robin Sharma book’s and one of his most important lessons is that greater Awareness, leads to better Choices which then leads to better Results.

But how do I get better results when my choices change day-to-day because my Awareness is impaired. I’ll be aware of this one point today, but i’ll forget soon after, that’s the most frustrating thing about FM, the Brain Fog. My mind feels clouded and clutter, which make me feel clogged (one of the reasons i started blogging was to help reestablish my train of thought, to improve my cognitive power etc) and that’s why my writing can get messy, confusing and convoluted. But anyway, your awareness is affected by how you think, so if how you think changes every other day, how do you make choices?

There are two different versions of Roshan Kanesan, one that was formed over the past few difficult years and the other was the original version, but as this new version begins to take over the old version is fighting to ensure that doesn’t happen, like the Empire versus the Rebels, and right now I can safely say that the Dark Side RK is kicking the Light Side RK. I guess it will all come down to whether these two opposites can come to a compromise and merge.

Signing Off,

Arkay6

(this article reminds me of an essay i wrote on the Id versus the Ego illustrated through Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, i’ll post it up soon)

Potential


“Don’t get caught up in wasted potential from years past. Potential is all we ever have”

I guess the biggest “asset” that all of us have is our potential. Unfortunately it has been this “asset” that’s been causing me to be less-than-happy over the past few months. It’s caused me to be frustrated, angry and at times depressed. Why you ask?

For most of my life i’ve always been told about how well i’ll do in “life”, all the things i’ll do, all the places i’ll see, the impact i’ll have. They always talk about my potential. This always encouraged me, it helped me believe in myself and helped build confidence. And as it would turn out, I did achieve things and make little impacts here and there.

Unfortunately all this also inflated my Ego.

So as life moved on, it seemed as though i was heading towards the goals that I had set for myself. Become Head Prefect, Ace SPM, go to UWC and this is where it… paused, i unfortunately couldn’t take the next step and reach my next goal, studying in the States. When my health deteriorated i still held on to my dreams, but as time passed it seemed that it was moving further and further away and that day-by-day my “potential” was diminishing due to health problems that never seemed to leave me be. The hardest part was accepting that a lot of my “dreams” are not going to come through, and for the most part it is due to factors beyond my control, but my Ego has been having a hard time swallowing this… that the “potential” that people used to say I had, might never see the light of day.

 But then, i read the quote above, the one right at the top, and it made me think. Why should i fret about the potential that has already gone to waste? Potential is something I will always have, something that WE will always have. Because as long as I am breathing, there’s potential for something, it may not be the same “Potential” and  I may need to re-adjust where I want to go in “Life”, but isn’t that Life? Plans are important but life has a tendency to throw a wrench in the works, we just need to learn to adapt, and i guess I’m going to have to learn that if i want to be happy, cause isn’t that what we all strive for…. to be Happy.

I still haven’t dealt with this issue and I struggle with it everyday, wanting to reach the stars but my current state isn’t exactly ideal, but it’s a Work In Progress, and one day i’ll except that it may take longer or that I just won’t reach the stars, but hey… I’m sure the clouds ain’t too bad either.

at this point i am so very tempted to put some sort of Gossip Girl influenced catch phrase (yes i watch GG, i just started, curiosity got the better of me) but can’t think of anything… yet.

Happiness


The past 3 years have been rocky,i’ve had to drop the pace to deal with my health issues that never seem to end. From weekly infections, to mycoplasma pneumonia to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) and then Fibromylagia (FM), which was diagnosed about a year ago. So as for now, my problem is FM, which to be honest I’m still not sure what it is. Whatever it is, i’ve finally acknowledged that the FM or whatever it is, is a problem and i’m not going to be able to move on with my life if I don’t deal with this damn thing. So i finally told me family that i need help and for the next few months i’m going to focus on beating this so that i can finally go through university and have a life that isn’t regulated by the FM, but by me.

FM has taken things away from me. It pisses me off, frustrates me and depresses me. Not a great way to live. But then again those are the bad days, there are good days but the problem is that the bad days outnumber the good days, and not by a close margin. So my mission, should i choose to accept, will be to flip the ratio so that the good days outnumber the bad. But in order to do that, i’ll have to accept limitations to my life, things that i won’t be able to do, dreams that i won’t be able to reach, achievements that i will miss out on… which brings me to the title of this post, Happiness.

I’ve been so used to defining happiness in my achievements and successes that the mere fact that I have to re-evaluate my life, to lower my goals and expectations so that I don’t aggravate my health is something that i haven’t been able to process yet… actually, i guess i’m processing it now. I’ve been putting this off for some time now because it just depresses me. I’ve been so used to dreaming big and for a long time, I was on the path to achieving most of those dreams. I always envisioned myself as a Suit, a successful business person, living in luxury, living the Good Life and enjoying the work i was doing. That was what i thought Happiness would look like for me. So I guess “my ego was writing cheques that my body won’t be able cash.”

I have to be realistic, there are more hurdles in my life now, I just need to get to the next level of life.

I need re-evaluate my goals.

I need to deflate my ego.

I need to maintain a Work-Life Balance so that stress doesn’t drag me into a relapse in the future

I need to redefine Happiness.

(sorry if the post is…. screwy, started feeling really blur midway… damn Brain Fog)

Why?


Why start a blog?

Well I’ve been thinking about it for a while actually. Thinking of it as a means of expressing my thoughts out of my cluttered mind. Ever since I got sick I’ve felt that my mind has been slower, that it was lagging … It felt rusted. I thought going back to school, CPU, would restore my mind to full fitness, it helped but didn’t restore it. Then there’s Uni, which hasnt really helped, yet.
It’s been almost 2 years like this and it’s not been very nice or easy.
I recently realized that the culprit of my sluggishness could actually stem from the ideas, thoughts and opinions cluttered in my mind. Like how functionality in a messy room or disorganized working structure, would be greatly diminished. So, my hope and plan is that this blog and comments validly challenging my points (I appreciate and welcome constructive criticism most of the time) will further help mentally stimulate me.
Hence, why I would start a blog.

As can be expected, my initially posts will probably be messy and disorganized but I’ll work on it.

A lot of my posts will probably be based on thoughts, opinions and ideas regarding and/or from Fibromyalgia, Steve Jobs, Apple, Arsenal, Money, my favourite companies, books that I’ve read, my favorite brands etc.

Arkay6’s Thoughts #1