Life after SAH...

That's what it is. Subarachnoid hemorrhage. Or the short version - SAH. This is what I tell people now. This is what I have to tell all doctors now. This is why I can never audition for WipeOut now. This is what will always be a new little fear that now lives in the once fearless mind of Jami McCoy. This SAH is what should have killed me. The more research I have done, the more reading I have done, the more doctors I have talked too, the more people I have talked too I realize - I'm a miracle. That's what a woman called me yesterday. This jeweler we visit at the OC Fair every year that my dad has developed a friendship with. Her eyes widened when he told her what happened to me. I smiled sheepishly saying "Ya, I'm lucky as hell". "You’re a miracle" she said. "You do realize you were put on this earth for some higher purpose?! That's why your still here!" I don’t know about that, but I certainly consider myself a very lucky and very grateful girl. I wasn’t ready to go. But wrestling with that thought. Knowing the statistics and how very very low the survival rate is and how even lower the percentage is of those who have no after affects. Here I sit - a little over 2 months later - Pretty much perfect. Back has stopped hurting. The entry point of the angiogram still a tad tender now and then but pretty much gone. No headaches. Just a little tired. And now having to learn what "ease back into" active life means. I met with my neurologist on Monday. (That's weird in of itself - I have a neurologist now). He told me again how lucky I was. That the risk is slightly higher of another bleed than it was before this one but still way way low. I'm to see him around my birthday next year for my for now yearly MRI to watch the tumor they found. I can go back to exercising as vigorously as I was before. Just no trauma (no problem) and don’t lift anything super heavy....like a refrigerator. Have a good day. That's it. I survived something very serious. I survived something most people don’t survive from. And I recovered amazingly well. I do attribute my good health and good shape to the quick (which of course didn’t seem quick to me) recovery. I am truly looking forward to starting up my active life again. There's a new yoga studio in the Orange Circle I'm going to check out to start back in. Yup. Starting out slow. I didn’t think much was different but I'm starting to realize it is. I think it will grow more with time also. This different look on life. I already never took things for granted. I already enjoyed life. I already was on the positive train, trying to change my way of thinking for the better. I was already on that path. So soon after this incident I thought - well I already thought all of those things. It's not like I needed a lesson there. But what I've noticed lately is all of that is even more so. I move a little slower. I enjoy simple things more. I enjoy life even more. But - my tolerance for some things has gotten less. My tolerance for people who chose to be miserable just to be miserable has gone way down. My tolerance for childhood gossip and drama has gone way down and I didn’t think that could go down any more than it already was! My tolerance for someone getting worked up over something so unnecessary has gone way down. Now don’t get me wrong - everyone has a right to bitch and complain about something, or vent about something and it doesn’t matter how trivial or how small it is - it's upsetting that person at that moment and they need to get it off their chest. But if you dwell on it - get over it. When I hear the same complaint over and over again - do something about it! It's strange to me to slow down. To enjoy a life more that I was already enjoying. To strive to be positive. Me. Positive. I mean - my snarky sarcasm isn’t going anywhere and no matter how hard I try I can’t seem to stop talking like a sailor but I feel a little less strung out. There are still a lot of the same problems going on: I worry about my Papa. I worry about money. I worry about our world. But I seem to handle it a bit differently. I'm really really overwhelmed with the idea that I survived. Why did I survive? Why did I scare the shit out of my parents and a lot of my dear friends that knew what it meant when they were told "brain bleed". The worried faces, the prayers, the fear that I was going to die or live but not be the same or have to be cared for the rest of my life. But nope - I'm fine. I'm having a really hard time wrapping my head around that thought. I'm also having a hard time accepting the fact that I'm not fearless anymore and probably never will be. It's heavy. BUT - onward and upward right? I still plan on filling my calendar with friends and physical activity and everything I enjoy doing. I want to rebuild some friendships with some people I have grown away from, but now we seem to be on the same path. I want to separate myself even more from people who are self-absorbed. I want to strengthen the bond with some of my already amazing friendships. I want to keep doing more random acts of kindness and paying it forward. I do find myself at a point where I really do want to meet that guy. A companion to share my life with. It seems some prospective prospects are just not panning out as I had hoped, but I'm even looking at that differently. I'm not down about it but I'm hopeful. I'm not going to put aside anything anymore. No more notes reminding myself "Oh - I want to do that at some point!". Time to just do them. I want to live my life. And I will.