I wish I could still live up to expectations. I wish I was still reliable and the person that can be counted on to give 110% to every task. I wish I didn’t feel guilty when I don’t because in my heart I know it’s not my fault. But I do.
I wish I didn’t have to ask you to understand and accept that this what a life with me is like. It hurts me to ask; it kills me when you turn away from me until I return back to my baseline level of functioning.
I am not two people; I come with both the good and the bad, just as you do. My bad is just more extreme at times. I hope you never face something like this. But you can bank on it that I will be there for the fun times and there even more for the bad times if you do. I will lean in, not out in those moments. That is just me. I don’t say that to make you feel guilty or make me look good; I just merely want you to know I’ve thought this through as if I were in your shoes. That said, is it too much to ask that of you? I don’t know. I feel like I have a lot to offer, that it compensates for the rest, but maybe that’s not your reality when you are with me.
I often wonder if it is embarrassing to you that I park in handicapped parking? Are you worried what your friends and family will think? That they will think you are dating down? That you are missing out on your life by being with me?
On my hard days I feel I take your words and actions more literally. I don’t know what’s real - I know I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt more often at times than I should. I also know that those actions and words, simple and innocent as they may be, hurt all the more on those days. Am I asking too much to ask you to be sensitive to that?
Myalgic Encephalomyelitis is a whopper of a disease. I am doing my very best to live a typical life with it. The reality is that that is not really possible. But I still try with everything I have. Try as I might I can’t create the impossible. Is it fair to ask if that’s enough?
I always try to judge my expectations of others by what I would do in that situation. Perhaps that isn’t fair. I’m the person that always leans in, the person that is always there to listen. Not everyone has that personality trait. So, while I know none of this is anything you could ask of me and I wouldn’t dive all in, I don’t know that I can ask you. Only you can tell me.
Is my chronic illness too much for you to truly live with? For you to accept me, all of me, fully. Chronic illness and all?
I love you. Do you love me that much?
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