icovellauna's Journal: Solstice

This is the shortest day and the longest night of the year. But this year there is no ritual at my house to celebrate this turning of the wheel - I don't have the energy to get one together, to bring all the disparite members of my household together and make all that happen for us all. It is the first time in a long time there has been no ritual for this, and that is a sad thing for me. Ritual marks for us where and when we are in time and space, and brings us together to mark our unity in those moments. I guess that this time I mark a new coming of the light from a different place and I don't really know where that place is yet. I think that this heralds a new kind of strength and rebirth, but I haven't quit got there yet. This is ten weeks of Chemo and I'm sick and tired and having a bad day. I know the sun will return, I know that the Goddess watches over me, but right now, I wish for comfort and joy. I'm tired of the darkness.
This is the long night. The sun returns and the days grow longer. Joy is afoot in the world, and all we have to do is be open to it. I think I'll go light a candle. Blessed Yule everybody. Light a candle with me, and across the world watch the sun rise, and the joy of life fill your spirit.

My mom

[blinder]

My mom faught with Leukemia (CML) for 11 years. It was eventually a losing battle (February 28, 1997). She went through 10 day chemo sessions every 6-months. She hated it. I hated it. She got to a point after many years of this treatment where her hair no longer fell out, but at the end of each treatment, almost like clockwork, she'd get a serious infection because her immune system was almost completely wiped out. She'd have to spend a week or so in the hospital, and I would go everyday to sit with her and

Re:My mom

[icovellauna]

Thank you. It is valuable to me to hear the experiences of other people close to this kind of strugle. It gives, in a way, a context for this long strugle that I haven't seen any other way. This doesn't relate, in a way to the whole rest of my life. In a way it does, but in a significant way, this is different from everything else in my life. My life changed when I started chemo, and I know that it will change again when I am done. But I also know that it will not change back. I will never be the same as I

Re:My mom

[SolemnDragon]

you know, i'm glad you had me read this post, because it's hard for me to know that a lot of the stuff i'm going through, you are, too. I mean, i know it intellectually, but because we don't talk much about that thermos feeling of being isolated from our 'real' lives, i tend to forget that i'm not the only one feeling it.

Then again, maybe that's a side effect of feeling that way in the first place.

Thanks for mentioning this so i came back to look.

X-mas

[mekkab]

Sorry to hear that you can't get your crew to have a physical moment together.

I have a theory that most mid-winter celebrations were a historic form of a lightbox for countering SAD... when things get super cold, it gives you a defining moment to look forward to at its very worst, then you bask in the glow for days after that, until the winter thaws and spring comes.

If you can't have The moment, I hope you can have many moments with each of the people that matter.
Keep it up.