03/05/2018
I had pain, I was exhausted, I was miserable.
It suddenly felt worse than just sore muscles. Sure, you get a build up of lactic acid and fatigue every now and then, but that shouldn’t leave you unable to really even breathe. Not to mention I would bump into something and my whole side would get bruised. I bruised worse than a banana. Once I hit the bed frame and a golfball sized blue lump appeared on my leg. There’s this whole jumble of weird colds that won’t go away, or just getting worse and worse. Of taking five naps, and still unable to really sit without dozing off. My joints were creaking in ways that suddenly seemed worse than rusted door hinges. But, I was used to breaking down, and then pushing through barriers like this.
I assumed I’d pull through, It was all easily explained with excuses I was familiar with. “You’re training too hard.” “You’re not eating enough."
"You're a klutz-bruises happen." “Did you sleep at all?” “Maybe you just need to stretch out.”
It's scary to not know, but I chose to be stubborn and ignore it. After all, my family's favorite saying is 'shake it off.' (We said it before Taylor Swift made it cool, alright?) It's like our motto-well, it was. It felt like my body was against me. I didn’t know what was happening, and I felt more than what people could see. So, I stopped talking about it and hoped it would just go away.
These assumptions sort of kept me from thinking or assuming the worst, and being the stubborn oaf I can be, I just kept pushing through it. Until that day. We had just finished chasing a Mothman all around a twenty mile radius. I couldn’t really see straight. I had a possible black eye from scratching a mosquito bite on my face too hard, it seemed. I was wobbling, I was teetering. I had never felt that way before. I ached to my core.