So How Are We Different?

Life with chronic disease

life with minor cuts and bruises 

    regular, day to day bumps, trips or falls.

Even with a condition well controlled,

we still have ordinary trips, falls or bumps.

Some folks ~ too many ~

have conditions so brittle that little is ordinary.

Invisible Stop signs, Caution signs and Yield signs 

decorate walls, floors and ceilings ~

the clothes we wear inside and outside of our homes.

But what makes us different?

discussion

    planning, 

        sometimes daily, 

    depends on

• control and management
• doctors’ appointments, emergency rooms, 
• wary of time frames, noise and light levels
• in general, rule changes to societal norms

But are we really that different?

Inside our hearts and minds,

desires and hopes, 

    dreams and wishes, 

        goals and aspirations.

For some, all of these things can be pursued and often won.

For the individual with brittle epilepsy, 

heavily treated with medication or surgery,

hopes, dreams and aspirations become

    shunted or shattered,    

        dulled 

            many times forgotten.

But don't similarities trump differences?

Each soul touched lightly or heavily

by the calamities of epilepsy

still need shelter and food,

love, belonging, and self actualization.

Abram Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs 

does not identify health conditions!

So how are we different?

Only in expression of our basic neurology

our brain function gifts 

that cannot be re-gifted but

must be accepted,

along with ordinary 

    bumps and bruises, 

        trips and falls.