It is time...........

The day has finally arrived. Two and a half years in the making one little letter has changed my life for the foreseeable future. We had decided together that fighting for my rights as someone who battles a disability everyday was worth the sacrifice the two of us would have to make. That first step was not decided by just myself but by the collective thoughts and hearts that the two of us shared in those dark silent moments where every thought hit the ground and shattered the silence sitting there between us. A decision was made based on what was best for us and more importantly, what was best for me. 

The selfishness we both found ourselves drawn to finally had to take a back seat for the time being. The big dreams we had for our lives would have to pause for a brief moment in time. That moment was brief when you compared it to the time we had left. What was once considered brief was too much for you and I to withstand together. The time and care I demanded of you was no longer yours to give to me. Instead of fighting with a united front the battle lines were drawn and I found myself on the outside looking in. The battle would continue on but with one less fighter fighting for my life. 

I will go in front of a judge in two months to plea my case. How has my disease affected my life? The question truly should be how has this disease not affected my life. From the loss of employment, independence and a home that was all mine that once was over flowing with love. How do you take thirteen years of change, challenges, heartbreak and situations where you were left alone and sum it up in a matter of moments. The pictures of the brief moments of pain and loss now must be shared with a stranger by a stranger that no longer is a piece of my life.

I will be surrounded by unconditional love from my best friend to the new amazing rock in my life that never lets me wobble alone. However, I will look upon your face and pray worth all of my heart and soul that you will do this one last unselfish thing for me before our lives truly part forever. I am afraid to see you, afraid of what you will say and even more afraid of what you will not say. I feel a sense of weakness calling on you when all I want to do is move on and really move past the healing process and into the arms of the man who will undoubtedly love me just as I am at this exact moment in time. 

Until then I must ask you for the last time to go into battle not ahead of me, not behind me but right next to me one step at a time. This too shall pass and the light at the end of the tunnel is calling my name. I know once I step into the light that is shining far in the distance it is warm and welcoming not because of the radiating sun but because of the hearts that will be waiting for me at the end and on the other side of my new beginning to a new life for myself and my loved ones. 

I will leave you in the tunnel and will finally close the door that must stay open until that exact moment. Once it arrives, I will not look back. I will not waste one more moment or tear on what might have been but instead embrace the ones in front of me. I will see their hands gently reach for me and as we intertwine our fingers I will finally know I have found my family and the building blocks I have searched for all of these years were always here in my heart but forgotten in the fear and sadness of the life I have been muddling through. 

No more I say. On this day I take my life back. I find my true independence with the love of friends and family and the one special one that exists in a fairy tale that has become the life I now lead......a true reality. I am someones daughter, aunt, sister, niece, friend and true love and those are the relationships that had time stolen from them and now I will water them daily and continue to watch them grow as my body emotionally and physically heals from the damage done over the last few years. 

With one more hello the final goodbye will be said and life will officially start over and a new book will start for my brand new life and whatever may come my way. One thing is certain.......I am more than ready for that one special step into my new life. Until that moment comes I will settle for the day dreams that are slowly becoming my very own reality, Stories once only told in the inspirational stories of others. Now those inspirational stories will belong to me and I will carry them around not as a badge of defeat but as a badge only I can earn honorably. .