Pinch me! Slap me! Am i Dreaming?

I just got the long awaited letter from the CI-team at Rikshospitalet! YES! 🙂

Finally!

(read on below ;-)  )

The long wait is over, and I can now start to look forward to the beginning of the process of becoming a candidate for CI! (sounds like I’m running for the presidency, and in many ways it feels that way too! THIS IS BIG!)

Phase one of the pre-screening, pre-qualification process starts april 28. THIS YEAR! 😛

Then followed by phase 2, which in turn should end up in me being qualified for the procedure AND A NEW CHANCE TO HEAR AGAIN!

I have to tell you, I started crying when I realized what the letter said… It was a good cry!!!  I’m so happy it just happened to be a day when my girlfriend was with me. It was a day to remember, indeed! Thank you, my dear, for being with me and sharing that mammoth moment with me!!!

I love you, my love!

 

I needed to share this with the world today!

I want to thank everybody who is reading my blog for all the support, comments, insights and INSPIRATION you provide me! Abby, Jennifer, Jeff, Sam, Roberta, Arnt, and many, many others, you know who you are!

And to everybody close to me in my everyday life, thank you for being patient with me and supporting me throug this!

Since 2006 I’ve known this day would come, but I still can’t quite comprehend it. I’m in a mild state of shock, I guess 🙂

HAVE A GREAT DAY EVERYBODY!

Patience, understanding and love

When I started this blog in late 2006, I had a feeling it would be a long journey (that’s why I started the blog in the first place). That suspicion became stronger after receiving a letter from the hospital saying that they had an obligation to operate on me before 2010. What I had ahead of me back then, has been more or less as expected. I was prepared for a long haul.

“To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly”. ~Henri Bergson

My every day life has changed a lot. More activity, never a dull moment. I wish the day had more hours :-)  I’m not “waiting” for the CI anymore, I let that struggle go this winter, focusing more on my own life and people around me. (Mind you, I still need the CI desperately!) I’ve had enough of trying to understand why Rikshospitalet are not able to operate more than 50% of what the Health ministered ordered last year (see some of my previous posts). I don’t think my engagement into this issue has any meaning or bearing anymore. I’m sad to say this. (I hope I had a little impact, but I have achieved no real results, to my knowledge anyway.)

Waiting, waiting and more waiting. In fact, it has been so much waiting, that life happened during the waiting 🙂

And life is what everything is about, isn’t it?

In retrospect I can with great certainty conclude that I did all the right things back in 2006 and 2007. (You have to read the past posts on this blog in order to know what has happened to me and what I have done  :-)  )

I have managed to get my life back. I am in a place that is brighter and better, even though it has it’s challenges. I am where I want and need to be.

I am able to cope with life, and take care of my loved ones and myself (somewhat).

But I’m walking a fine line. Experiences from every day life tells me that I have very little to go on. Only thanks to the slow process of acknowledging that I’m by definition deaf, I have come to understand better what the process of loosing one’s hearing does both mentally, physically and socially. And take some precautions in order to preserve myself from exhaustion.

I am deaf, I use hearing aids to take advantage of the very little hearing residue I have left and thus suffer from a rather severe case of “recruitment”. I have tinnitus on both ears, get tired really quickly in general (and then the tinnitus really howls!) and have no chance of keeping a regular job. I need all my strength to take care of my son, my dearest girlfriend and her son, and last but not least, myself.

I had to fight to get my life back. I had to fight with my willpower in order to do all the right things in many areas of my life. I changed a lot in my life. I changed myself in many ways. I changed how my family perceived me. I had to get them to understand me better. And it helped.

In a way I had to try NOT to fight, too! By accepting my fate and my condition (it is by no means a surrender, mind you! :-)  ) I have learned that my mind and willpower can work against me as well. Rather than standing tall in the strong wind, risking to break something or get hit by flying debris, it is better to bend over and lie down on the ground and survive. Sometimes it is much better to accept fate and accept conditions, rather than opposing the facts and use a lot of energy trying to get things my way. The consciousness of this “bend before you break” is helping me in many areas of my life.

This blog will remain active at least until I have received my first CI by the end of this year, but it will be less active due to lack of time and energy to keep it updated.

I have learned to suck things up. Take a punch. Even though life is hard when it comes to my health right now, I have so much to be grateful for. I will not allow myself to turn sour or negative. What happens happens. I’ll do my best and want to keep a positive mind about everything. All is good until proven otherwise 😉

I’m going to use this experience to improve my own life in the future. No matter what. There is another day tomorrow!

“If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow, we are not really living.” ~Gail Sheehy