You always think it won’t be you. You’ve been healthy; oblivious to illness even. But here you are: the one living under the immense burden of an incurable degenerative disease.
It’s not about self-pity or attention. You only just found out and you’re not totally sure what the Doctor said after “degenerative.” It’s not good, to be sure, but maybe it isn’t the hammer of doom.
The time for investigation is tomorrow. Tonight you must grapple with the vague life goals you had that now have to be recalibrated or completely erased. That word is wrong. Erased is too final. Too complete. And your story isn’t over. It will be different and unsettling and a battle. But that might give it a meaning it never would have had before your diagnosis.
© 2022 Jeff E. Brown. All rights reserved.
Writing and Photography by Jeff E. Brown 