Living with a new heart.

It's hard to explain to someone who doesn't have any type of "mental illness"- I hate that term by the way.
How you are unable to control the things that come out of your mouth, or fingers whichever the case may be.

It's even worse when you can't explain it to yourself- knowing that I wasn't always like this, makes it ten times worse.
It all started when I had a heart transplant- I don't know if it's the med's or they kicked me in the noggin during surgery- what I do know is that I haven't felt the same sense.

Aside from feeling like I don't even know my own body- I don't even like my own body. I don't like knowing that someone else's organ (gross) is keeping me alive.
No one- other than a heart transplant patient could or would understand that- and there in lies the difficulty in explaining some feelings to people.
You feel like you have no control over your own life, the medications control you. It's a constant reminder of who you were and who you will never be.

Please do not get me wrong- I am forever grateful for this chance that I have been given, I just wish it hadn't come with so many strings attached. They don't prepare you for living day to day knowing your alive because someones son or daughter isn't.
The reality of it is- there isn't a day that goes by that I am not reminded why I'm still alive.
You factor in all that bull shit- and add- the fact that all my future plans are gone.
Why you may ask- because- along with having the transplant, I now have chronic back pain....

It still amazes me that people wonder why I lash out- think about it... one day when you're 23-24 you have a doctor tell you that "Hey we're going to have to crack you open like a walnut- take out your heart- that's ya know killing you, and replace it with a dead guys!"
(pretty blunt, and it's not word for word what was said)
So, you the life as you know it ripped away from you, and you really aren't given a choice- I mean not really- it's just a gimme that you're going to have it done.
While your friends are going to college, getting married and having babies- you're trying to survive- trying to learn to live again, trying to accept the facts. You aren't the same person you were- despite what people may say, it changes every aspect of your thought process.
Your body changes, your mind changes.

Again, I don't want to sound ungrateful, and I know that's how it sounds- I promise you I am not!
I just wish- for one day- I didn't have to think about my mortality, the fact that I'm not comfortable in my own skin- that I can't go out in public without feeling judged or rejected.

~JKD~