A simple truth of a battle fought

Sometimes you need someone else to say something to remind you of a simple truth that you yourself may have forgotten, for whatever reason.

My simple truth is that my husband and I are fighting a hard battle and we are fighting it well and with much love.

Our former roommate is moving back up to the northwest for good, and our small knot of friends are having one last fling before he leaves in a few days with Olive Garden, various types of alcohol (for those who imbibe), and Dungeons and Dragons.

As Drogo, the roomie, and I were in the truck earlier during various stages of errand accomplishment (i.e. fetching food and liquor), the roomie (whom I will call The Viking) suddenly and seriously said to Drogo, "You know, I think you're a better person than I am. What you guys have to deal with, her being sick and all, and how you handle it… I just don't think I could do it. I mean, you just deal with it so well. I can just see the love between you two, and it gives me hope. But I don't think I could do that, and it makes you a better person than me."

We talked about it briefly, but it has been resonating around the inside of my head like the aftershocks of a gong ever since. It is so easy to get swallowed up in the sheer frustration of it all, to let the unspoken thoughts and words and fierce primal screams build up like sandbags against the doors of my heart and keep him out, keep everyone out until I am just alone, forever alone, rocking back and forth inside my own head and keening my sorrow and my loss and my pain to the hollow stars. But I can't let that happen. I've been trying to be proactive about communicating with Khal Drogo, about adapting our relationship around what my sickness is and what my abilities are, but it can be very difficult when I can go days without hardly seeing him at all because I am sleeping almost around the clock due to the fatigue that comes with my diseases and side effects of medicine and being worn out and worn down from such constant levels of very high pain.

Today, though, I was reminded of the simple truth that we are fighting a hard battle, and to go easy on us. There is no manual for this, no way to make it easier… and there is no one to take the pain and the symptoms for me to make it easier for either of us. There's a lot to deal with, any way you slice it.

We are fighting a hard battle, both of us, but we are fighting it well and we are fighting it with much love.

Update: 04/12/14
I mentioned the thoughts I had on this subject, basically a very distilled version of this blog post, to Drogo last night as we were out meeting friends for dinner. We were in the parking lot awaiting their arrival and I was keeping up a steady stream of conversation to distract myself from I-need-to-scream high levels of pain. I told him that what we are doing is very hard, but we're doing a very good job and there's no manual for this at all. It's unprecedented. He kind of paused for a moment, thought about it, and then said, "Yeah, we are. We're doing a really good job. Most people would crash and burn." It wasn't much in the sense that he didn't wax eloquent, but I could tell that it was both a novel concept to him and a very heartening one. It is something that will bolster him for the coming days as this fight for our marriage and our happiness and our life together continues. He's a good man, and this is a hard fight; he fights it well, and with much love.

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