There's an elephant on my face: coping with

It's new years eve and as always, I have been reading messages, statuses and tweets all day about how awesome 2016 is going to be. I am not a pessimist, but I am definitely a realist. This means that if I am to be honest with myself, I will say it's been quite a hard year. In fact, if I am really honest, it's been a difficult year every year for a while now. Yes, there have been good times, successes and happy moments, but in reality, they have been in spite of all the other crap. Some may say I am too negative. That just by thinking this way, I am being ungrateful. I beg to differ, and since it is my life, I have a right to.

So what does this have to do with TN? Well, everything, actually. If I wasn't a realist, I don't think I could have survived the journey that TN has taken me on thus far. I don't think I would have been able to avoid the depression that often comes with chronic pain, go to work when my pain levels were bearable or be the wife and mother that I am. If I didn't take things as they come, use my low pain moments to accomplish things I couldn't the rest of the time, I would be in bed permanently, in a mental health clinic, or dead. That, my friends, is the truth. I had to be realistic this year about what I could and couldn't do.... even if it was something as simple as opening the door on a breezy day. It is truly, in my opinion, the only way to live with TN.

So for 2016, I am not going to post a status that says it is MY year, I won't be telling the world that I will conquer it.... I will take each day as it comes. TN has taught me that, if nothing else, and for that, I am grateful.