I’m not going to sit back and sugar coat a gratitude post for you today. This week has been mentally taxing and physically challenging. My body did not react well to that antibiotic I was taking for the whole gross cyst thing and I ended up covered in a rash and at the walk in clinic on Monday. At the walk in clinic, yet another sixteen year old boy calling himself a doctor looked at my rash and prescribed an extra strong antihistamine. I went to bed at 8:30 Monday night thanks to the new drug. A new set of harder exercises were added to my physical therapy routine and at my follow up exam with the bone and joint doctor, the doctor just told me to watch out for buckling in my knee. I’m ready to move forward and go scooter shopping, but every day this week someone at work has come up to me to express how sorry they were to hear about V. Also, I think we might be couch shopping again because a new email about our couch arrived with a new estimated delivery date of February of next year. By Thursday afternoon, I was feeling really cranky, which I’ll take right now because it’s better than feeling nothing at all.

Which was where I’ve been leaning ever since camp.

A series of minor illnesses has accumulated into a massive feeling of general unwellness that has left me contemplating cleansing diets and acupuncture, drinking more juice, eating more mushrooms. Falling for a fad, which is when I know I’ve reached desperation mode. At the end of each day, I promise myself to do better, be better because I know I’m not doing my best, but just repeat the cycle the next day. I’ve filled a pool full of my own expectations and standards in which I am barely keeping my head above right now. I’m drowning in a pool of my own making and from what I have been hearing from those around me, I’m not the only one. I think many of us have been holding onto some great expectations that this time this year would be different from this time last year and it is, but it isn’t.

So, how do you find gratitude when all what you really want to do is hide inside a blanket fort?

No…really, how do you do that?

There is gratitude in the ability to confess that you are struggling. For me, admitting that I’m struggling makes me feel like I’m whining or feeling sorry for myself. It is a sign of weakness and not allowed for someone who has tattooed “Je suis forte” onto their wrist, but that tattoo is not a statement. It is a reminder to myself on days of weakness that I am strong. With that reminder comes the knowledge that I am only as strong as my support system and if my support team doesn’t know I’m struggling, they can’t support me. Yesterday, I was holding two slide books in which I had balanced ten slide holders and had picked up the heavy metal structure all of those things go into. Then I went to open the door to carry those things to my desk so I could start loading slides and I had no hands available to turn the door handle. A coworker was walking up behind me at this moment and then seeing the mess I’d put myself into, asked “Do you need help?” And I hesitated. For a moment I was really going to say “No thank you, I’ve got this.” Hands completely full and precariously balancing all of the things, I still thought for a moment that I would find a way to open the door with my foot. Instead, I came to my senses and asked him to please open the door for me. My first instinct for everything is “I’ve got this.” Slap on a smile. Fake it ‘till you make it, but you know what? Sometimes your hands are full and you just need someone to open a door for you. And you have to be willing to not just accept the help but to admit that you can’t do everything.

This might be a stretch for gratitude, but these are the days that demand reaching. It’s worth the stretch.