Perception. The act of perceiving something or someone. How someone else sees YOU through their eyes. What someone thinks about you. This is my laymen definition here, I am too lazy to get the real one.
What you see in yourself and how others see you and even what you let others see are very different things. When you are at your thinnest, people still think your fat, when people think your angry, you could just be shy and when people think you are crazy with a capital C, you think get the hell out hell out of my face because I'm not crazy you are!
May, June and July.
These months are filled with pretty much the same routine. Wake up, go to work, come home, sleep, eat, meds, sleep, eat, meds, sleep, text, call, sleep, sleep sleep, drink, sleep drink, drink, friends, cry, drink, sleep, eat. wake up, repeat.
For awhile, this was okay with everyone. Lauren was happy. Or so everyone thought. A happy friend is a friend you don't need to worry about, mess with, talk to or TALK TALK to, a happy friend doesn't impede on your day, a happy friend isn't a burden in your life. This is what I needed to be a happy friend. I felt as though I had two lives at this point or maybe three or four. I was keeping it together damnit! Work me was quiet, kept the i pod on, got the work done and left alone pretty much, sometimes would fall asleep at her desk because she was always very tired and heavily medicated. Family me, had a very remove, distant, angry me, and friend me (when they saw me) for the most part was either sleeping, medicating, or ready for a party. Not happy but not horrible.
I was cool in my head. An angry little beaver. My one triumph over the summer or around that time. My fight with the Medical Board. The number one Cervical Cancer doctor in AZ was assigned to my mother. I will not say his name. Mainly because I do not believe in giving bad horrible murderers positive attention for negative behavior. Not only did this dick, miss blood poison results, he up and walked out of my moms treatment with out so much a word. HE moved to Florida. Gone, bye, yelled at the family all the time and her as well. WHO treats a person with cancer like this? The devil does.
We were fighting and fighting for a mal practice suite against this monster in order to take away his medical license. We didnt care about the money, we didn't care about any of that. All we cared abo ut was the other women that would be under his care. I was frightened for them. The medical board is a scary thing. You have 20 or so doctors sitting staring, you need to get up in front of all of them, speak into a mic and convince these medical professionals that you, a regular human being without a doctors degree, that this doctor, friend, and comrade, killed your mother. I prepared a 9 page letter with all my emotions and great points. We each had 5 minutes to talk. My dad, my grandma I think, my aunt Janice and myself. They all spoke. My time to shine was here. I stood and read, my hands were shaking and my voice was trembling. As the tears rolled down my face and the spit flew from my mouth, I remembered the children my mother worked with. The children she loved, the children who signed her petition for her to be granted her degree. I thought of them. My voice grew stronger, louder, prouder, more convincing, more, more, more, "Shit, my 5 minutes were up" I looked at this board of people some with no facial expressions, some with tears and some who really couldn't give a shit probably, my voice spoke, quietly, timidly, "may i finish please?" All my rage went away and I turned into the little girl with a soft voice who was empowered by a woman- by her mother. Something allowed these people to let me finish. I finished the last two pages. looked them all in the eyes "Thank you"....They sat and contemplated. We didn't win this day. Although the doctors all pretty much agreed. My mothers doctor acted unprofessionally,inhumanely and had something to do with the discourse of my mothers death, he could not be fully punished. His punishment- A Scarlett letter. A slap on the wrist. To this day, if I see this man....He is someone worth going ape shit crazy for...God gave me two fists, two feet and a voice and this woman is not afraid to use them.
Back to perception. During this time I heard a lot....a lot of "blah blah blah blah" In one ear and out the other. So many "You are SO strong, you are amazing, You can get through it, You will get through it, you need to be happy, every day can't be a sad day" All of these words just pissed me off....I didn't want to hear it. I didn't need too. All people have good intentions done wrong. I perceived this "doctor" as a murder, his peers perceived him as having bad judgment. I perceived myself as a brick wall. Smile, laugh, smile, laugh, happy. But really,what I didn't see was myself.
I was running on empty and slowing down fast, My car was over heating and the engine was going to explode. I didn't take the time to slow down because that would mean I would need to process everything. Processing everything would mean moving on to the next step. The next step in the stupid 5 stages of grief...acceptance....the funny thing is I don't even think I had hit on the first two in order to get to acceptance, I knew she was gone, I knew she wasn't coming back. To me that was acceptance. I could live my life on the wild side because now I didn't have anyone to answer too. I could hang out with who I wanted to because who cared. I could have 20 people in my little house like a Greek orgy because it was better to be around people rather than be alone.
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