IS THIS WHO I ALWAYS WAS?

I had an 'epiphany' the other day, as my friend Dottie called it. One of those 'Ah ha moments' where you shake your head and think Wait a minute, how could I not have realized this?

If you read an earlier post, long time back, you know I no longer have the typical trigeminal neuralgia pain: the spontaneous and triggered pains that hit like lightning inside your skin. Also gone was the atypical constant pain.

I consider the way it happened to be a Miracle, although everyone has their own interpretations. The reason I explain is because I was praying, thanking G-d that I could touch my face and not worry, not be afraid. Before the intervention I could not tolerate any touch to my face. Since then, 14 years this November, I can wash my face and hair, go outside in any weather, tolerate any touch to my left face and scalp without giving it a second thought.

I started my prayer "Thank you that I can touch my face and the words reverberated back. How amazing is this? I could never touch my face. And now I can.

Wait a minute. Wait a minute! That is not true. Not "never".

I was not always this person. I talk about when I was able to work, when there was no pain, when I did dinner theater, the most fun and best part of my life, but those are memories, pictures and feelings of a time so very long ago. They are real, and yet somewhat disconnected. I feel the truthfulness, the comfort and warmth of the good memories, for that moment when I relate them or think about them. Talking about them with others is enjoyable, they make me a part of the world again. Thinking about them tends to more often impart a sadness.

It is another instance of needing to change my thinking, as well as my perception of what my life is, and what it was.

There was a time when I was a lot more then pain, when I was a part of the world, when my ups and downs were the regular ups and downs of life.

Someone had posted a note elsewhere about there being two groups, those with CIP and "normals". That offended me. I am not my pain, I am a regular person, my life interrupted by the pain.

It is ironic. As I write this I realize I am of two minds, the one that expects the pain to be fixed and my life to continue from the point where it was interrupted by the pain. I will be 26 again, taking up where I left off, back to the aspiring singer/actress, making friends, finding my niche.

The other mind is the one where I started this post. There was no time before now, before the pain.

It is a matter of integrating: the knowledge that I will never get back the time between 26 and now and the acceptance that my present is not the always was.

I am not sure this is an "Eureka" that I want, but it may be one I needed.