LeivaL_Week11:This is my IBELIEVE

I believe in acceptance and would like to begin with a scenario: If Mr. Y was invited to a party by classmates and he expected to meet the perfect woman or make new friends he would be disappointed if none of this happens. However, if he had accepted the invitation as a simple social gathering and he happened to meet a woman of his dreams or if he makes some lifetime connections, this would all be a bonus. Some people have impossible expectations and usually for things they cannot control.

Acceptance is not only my belief it is my way of life.  I had an epiphany during orientation my first year at graduate school. During an icebreaker activity to get us to know our fellow classmates our task was to write down our favorite quote below our nametag. How could I pick one? I have heard so many important quotes during my life? Then it came to me and I wrote down something that kept presenting itself in my mind, “Acceptance Not Expectation.” Classmates asked whom or where did I get this from and why was it important? I replied it is just what came into my head and started brainstorming on why it felt so powerful to me.

After much internal searching I discovered why. I heard many times from friends and family that certain events, persons, places or things did not fulfill what they were hoping for. Most of the time, in my own experiences, I found that many things did not live up to my expectations leaving me disappointed, sad or angry. Thoughts and ideas can consume us with all the wondering why, “what could I have done”, “should I have done things differently.” I found that not accepting life in all aspects leaves room for disappointment and stress. Stress can manifest into symptoms that negatively impact our health, and all this from things not turning out how we planned.  Are we like toddlers having a temper tantrum? Yet, as adults we just get frustrated and attribute our disappointment to things not living up to our expectations.

Acceptance does not mean submission or defeat. It means having faith, being tolerant and staying receptive to the world around us. An expectation, by definition, is hope or anticipation of something happening.¹ One should truly only expect something they can control because they know their own limitations and abilities. Anything outside of self should be acceptance. I believe to just accept life, people and the events that come your way for what they are and not what you wanted them to be.  Not accepting others for who they are can come off offensive and now your expectations have had a negative affect others.

I believe simply to only expect from oneself and accept others. I will conclude with another favorite quote, "G-d grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change and the strength to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

LeivaL_Week 9: Coping With a Loss

It is still to hard to talk about the people in my family that I have lost and probably due to the fact I never properly went through the stages of grief. I actually have a habit of blocking memories like they never even happened as a coping mechanism. My brother, on the other hand, is very outspoken and talks about the tragedies he has experienced over and over again to this day. It is like he cannot accept and I cannot even deal with it. For thinking about my personal feeling when I die is a real reality I have experienced. I have had to sign a living will in the hospital and designate someone to make decisions for me. I assigned my husband. I told him if there are any chances for me to live then keep me living but if I am on life support incapacitated physically and mentally than to let me go so I do not torture my family. When I was put on bed rest during my pregnancy and for a while after, I was around 85 lbs feeling like a ghost. I lost my hair and had to go to an infusion center weekly. This was very hard because my husband worked and I scheduled my infusions on his day off so he could watch our newborn at the time. What is more emotional than for a new mom to schedule her life saving procedures around her husbands work schedule in order for the baby to be watched and not be subjected to the side effects of the medicines being administered. I was getting Remicade and Benedryl. I would be there for >12 hours because of the amounts of benedryl I had to stop my allergic reactions to the medicine. Finally the nurse said it was enough and stopped the treatment. They were going to give me a colostomy bag (while stating it may NOT EVEN HELP) and let me go home, on my way slowly to death. An angel, a nurse in the hospital, told me of a doctor in Gainesville that prescribed me humira and another chemotherapeutics to save my life and it did. I took my self of one of the meds and am starting to feel a little different. I hope I did the right thing. Long story short is that I have faced death and it was surprisingly easier than I thought. I was more concerned about my husbands choice of 2nd wife being a sweet person and good to my Elijah, rather than just another pretty face. I was most concerned about my son's well being and that everything was taken care of for him. No one wanted to have this conversation with me and thought brought much anger and frustration. "Why would no one deal with it? Why do they deny what is going on? "Those are the issues that actually upset me the most.All I wanted was to make the transition an easy one if 'god for bid" something happened and the nurses were the only ones I really could express myself to. That was most surprising!