Love the Life You Have

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We are all dealt a set of cards. The cards are a metaphor, of course, for our life. How we choose to play our cards is key. Do we hold our cards close? Do we show our cards? Or, do we keep the cards we like and trade in what we don’t like?

In life, we cannot always draw a new card. Win, lose or draw, we have to play what we’re dealt. I was dealt a hand of Crohn’s disease. Almost 800,000 other Americans have been dealt this same hand.

We all play our cards a little differently. When I was first diagnosed, I held my cards close. I kept my Crohn’s diagnosis secret from most people. Crohn’s is also known as the “bathroom disease” because the main symptom is diarrhea. Well, who wants to talk about that? There is a lot more to Crohn’s. It affects the entire digestive tract. It also affects your entire life.

When I was younger, I loved books and writing. I always wanted to write. I was also a news junkie in high school and college. I studied journalism. I thought I wanted to be a reporter. I moved home after college and started working in medical offices. I used to beat myself up over not writing or doing anything related to what I had studied. I kept thinking that maybe, just maybe, one day I would get back to writing. The more time that passed, it seemed unlikely. I worked in medical offices for 15 years. And, thank God, that’s where I was when I was diagnosed.

I would not trade my experiences for anything. But . . . for many years, I had regrets that I was not working in my major. Then, when I stopped working full time, I was embarrassed to say I wasn’t working. I felt like I was doing something wrong because my life didn’t “fit”. My life didn’t fit the mold I had created in my mind. It also didn’t fit the mold of what I thought everyone else thought my life should be. It took me years to embrace my life. I’m so glad I did.

Once I decided to love the life I have instead of pining for the life I might have had, everything fell into place. I am writing and spending time with friends and family. I never would have thought that this illness that changed my plans and took me on a detour would bring me back to my dream of writing.

Reflection: Spend your time being thankful for the life you have. Love who you are, where you are, and how you got there. Don’t waste time on what you think your life should be. Your life is exactly what it needs to be.