There is a brutal paradox in being chronically ill and still fully alive.
I see clearly.
I see my body, my illness, my limits.
I see the present for what it is.
I also see the future, dimly.
Because the future is already here.
Not dramatic, not sudden, but stretched thin over time.
A slow deterioration.
A life that keeps shrinking, quietly.
That is why clarity can become unbearable.
People try to protect me from it.
Doctors. Friends. Sometimes even myself.
They tell me it does not have to be this way forever.
That it might improve.
That my body could respond.
That the fog might lift.
Not Everything Translates 