The last week has been no damn joke. Last weekend, I started my HIV medication, Complera. I was surrounded all weekend by some really amazing human beings, old friends and new possibilities (thanks Pete), and all week long I have received texts, emails, real life, and telephonic love from, literally, all over the world. My blog about starting meds was reposted on TheBody.com, and I have literally received notes from North Carolina to rural Africa. How much amazing love is that?
Part of my legacy of how I grew up is that you deal with the crisis by smacking it down and then you bully ahead. I had a calendar full of things that had to be done this week. I have remarked to some friends that being an executive director, even a co-executive director, is like ascending to the throne. Your body now belongs to the state, or in my case, Queers for Economic Justice. It's pride and there is just a lot of must do shit that...welll.....I must do. And the fact that this medicine makes my body vibrate and bounce like I've had a Tigger shoved up my ass, well, as I said....bully through and have at it.
Yesterday though, I just couldn't do it. I needed to break the fuck down and feel some shit and let it out. I was supposed to meet my girl Tasha and my boy Von for drinks. Walking to the bar, I realized exactly how exhausted I was. Two of the side effects of my medication are....get this...fatigue AND insomnia. What kind of shit is that? Imma make you reallllly tired but then make it so you can't sleep. This is some Abu Ghraib shit. Anyway, I got to the bar, and Von walked in (I so apologize Von), but I realized I could not do it. He'd hauled his ass up from Chelsea, and I sent him right on back out the door. I went home and Tasha came and met me.
And this is why I love Tasha, and I love Tasha for many and plentiful reasons, but at one point, I just laid my head down on the bed and said Tasha, I am so tired. And she looked at me and said....then boo, go to sleep.
We were waiting for food (and Tasha had the bad luck to be on a wine run when the food arrived....and I ate every damn piece of calamari before she got back.....ooopsy!), but my girl said....just go to sleep.
I didn't. I stayed awake, because Tasha is good medicine. Complera is the medicine keeping my body alive, but it's been Tasha, JT, Peter, Amber, Lily, Hallie, Jay, David, Brad, Sohail and so many others that have been the medicine keeping my spirit alive.
Sometimes it is good and necessary to break down, fall apart, and feel what needs to be felt. Then you can let it go, get back up, and build yourself into something more powerful. That's what good medicine does.
Part of my legacy of how I grew up is that you deal with the crisis by smacking it down and then you bully ahead. I had a calendar full of things that had to be done this week. I have remarked to some friends that being an executive director, even a co-executive director, is like ascending to the throne. Your body now belongs to the state, or in my case, Queers for Economic Justice. It's pride and there is just a lot of must do shit that...welll.....I must do. And the fact that this medicine makes my body vibrate and bounce like I've had a Tigger shoved up my ass, well, as I said....bully through and have at it.
Yesterday though, I just couldn't do it. I needed to break the fuck down and feel some shit and let it out. I was supposed to meet my girl Tasha and my boy Von for drinks. Walking to the bar, I realized exactly how exhausted I was. Two of the side effects of my medication are....get this...fatigue AND insomnia. What kind of shit is that? Imma make you reallllly tired but then make it so you can't sleep. This is some Abu Ghraib shit. Anyway, I got to the bar, and Von walked in (I so apologize Von), but I realized I could not do it. He'd hauled his ass up from Chelsea, and I sent him right on back out the door. I went home and Tasha came and met me.
And this is why I love Tasha, and I love Tasha for many and plentiful reasons, but at one point, I just laid my head down on the bed and said Tasha, I am so tired. And she looked at me and said....then boo, go to sleep.
We were waiting for food (and Tasha had the bad luck to be on a wine run when the food arrived....and I ate every damn piece of calamari before she got back.....ooopsy!), but my girl said....just go to sleep.
I didn't. I stayed awake, because Tasha is good medicine. Complera is the medicine keeping my body alive, but it's been Tasha, JT, Peter, Amber, Lily, Hallie, Jay, David, Brad, Sohail and so many others that have been the medicine keeping my spirit alive.
Sometimes it is good and necessary to break down, fall apart, and feel what needs to be felt. Then you can let it go, get back up, and build yourself into something more powerful. That's what good medicine does.
