My Happy Place

When you think of the word "hospital", what comes to mind? Stress? Fear? Death? Illness?... To me, the hospital is a safe place. I've spent a lot of time in hospitals in my life. My most recent long stay was after major abdominal surgery - a bladder augmentation - a couple of years ago. As I think back, it's always been a place of comfort for me, as strange as it may sound. I've needed critical care several times since I was born, and that's a very emotional and intimate situation to find yourself in. I had always had conversations with the staff that distracted me from why I was there in the first place. I have a very vivid and beautiful memory of one of my nurses from a couple years ago when I was being treated for sepsis. While she was checking on me, she asked me about what I wanted to be and what I loved to do, and it was the first time during my stay where I completely forgot that I was a patient in the first place. It just felt so normal and beyond comforting for someone to not discuss my health status at that point. I've gotten to know the hospital staff and have had a close relationship with my doctors, and they always treated me and my family with the upmost respect, so in a way, it's felt like a second home. It allowed me to experience a temporary pause from particapting in society. I never had to worry about saying the wrong thing, or feeling insecure about how I looked or how intelligent I would present around others. It felt like a huge relief to know that the only people around me cared about me so deeply and were doing everything in their power to make sure that I was okay. I frequently wonder if this is a bad thing. Shouldn't I want to be back out in the world? Shouldn't my health scares consume my thoughts while I'm there? But they don't, or at least they haven't in the past. Maybe in the future they will. But for the most part, when it came to my health issues, I went with the flow, expecting the unexpected. It was when it came to socializing, to school work, and life in general, that I could find myself nearly cracking under the pressure and freaking myself out more than I need to. I have never understood why those details in life stress me out more than the concept of death. I try to imagine death as an infinite dream and as an escape from the anxiety that life brings, which I know sounds depressing, but in my eyes really isn't. I feel that when it is time for me to go, I know that have fufilled my purpose and that I will be ready for a different reality.