Morning, afternoon or evening.
In my last post I wrote about my therapist and I discussing my purpose in life and how to fulfil that given my current limitations. One way to start that was making my blog onymous. Which is what I am doing in and following this post.
My name is Chloe. I also go by Chlo, or Button, if you’re my mum, on account of standing at just 5ft tall. I’m a 29 years old woman who worked as an engineer, competed internationally as a powerlifter. I’m a daughter, sister, best friend and pain in the arse and for these I am proud. For everything I have achieved, endured, conquered and learnt I am proud. With these things I hope to help others.
What I am now is a young woman disabled by a chronic rare illness. Who now spends the bulk of her life confined to the four walls on the house, led in dark rooms. I am still the same person as the first woman, though now I have different knowledge and experiences than before. My existence has changed significantly, along with my quality of life. But I’m still me, inside my soul. I have the same fire and fight to achieve things, though now those things are to survive and find a treatment that works to get my old existence back. Also, when I say survive I don’t mean my condition, I’m not dying. I mean to survive the mental battle it’s brought me into.
My current hobbies include staring at walls, reading my kindle and waiting for bedtime. Most days I have coffee with my dad, I now live with my mum who also kinda cares for me and does the things I can’t. I have a dog, Bella. I’ve had her 9 years and she’s been by my side nearly every night and day of that. I think I’ve only spent a week in total apart from her in all that time. She’s the light of my life and my unofficial therapy dog. Though she does join me in my therapy sessions too.
The main condition that has brought me to where I am is called Hemicrania Continua. It’s as it says on the tin, permanent head pain on one side. I’ve had it since December 2015 and I’ll discuss my journey with this more in another post.
The other main issue I have is depression. This started many years ago and went ignored by me. I thought I just had seasonal depression as I’d usually be a bit lower around Christmas time. This was a lie. I didn’t know I was lying at the time if that helps, I like to think I’m an honest person. My depression got pretty bad late 2019 and the following year was when I really started trying to heal. Again, I will continue that part of my story in another post, because I think it deserves its own page. It’s a very important, wavering and beautiful journey.
So there you have it. That’s me. That’s my bullet points…my rather long bullet points. Now I’ll pad them out bit by bit, with various other little nuggets in between. There may not be a sequence to my posts, as I said before, I never write with an agenda or destination. But I’ll share as I write so you can be as surprised by what’s comes out as I am. Though I expect I will keep my more private writings to myself, to share absolutely everything would leave me feeling to vulnerable I think.