As children, we all learn the ABCs. These letters lead to comprehending words in sentences and, eventually, being able to page through long books. For me, the ABCs eventually began to represent something else: lists of letters that represented names of health conditions in their shortened form.
These words could have defined me, but I refuse to let that happen. Once I developed blood clots, I learned that drawing the ABCs with my foot during a long ride in a car or airplane could help prevent lower-extremity deep vein thrombosis (DVT) by maintaining circulation in my legs.
After my first couple of blood clots, I experienced an interesting phenomenon: word recall issues, those frustrating moments where the word you are looking for is right on the tip of your tongue, but you can’t quite find it. That’s when I started to use the ABCs as a way to find words. I visualized each letter and usually landed on a certain letter—say “s,” for instance. Then, something lighted up in my mind, and the word came to me.
The first episode when I recall my head not cooperating was in my junior year of high school. I walked down the hallway—straight into a locker. I'm clumsy, but this was a new level of physical awkwardness. I saw my friend Jack staring at me, looking concerned. After I took a few more steps—bam, I walked right into a locker again. He said, "Hey, Sami, maybe you should get to the office." I didn’t think I needed to go, but I zigzagged my way down to the office anyway. "My head is really hurting," I said when I got to the office. But what they heard was completely mumbled and slurred. I couldn't pronounce my name or remember the first name of a classmate I’d known since sixth grade. I was taken to the ER, but no medication relieved my pain.
It turns out I’d experienced a migraine, a problem that didn’t become persistent until I was 19. I get Botox now, which has helped immensely with the pain. Before that, I had multiple episodes every week. But I still see an aura and often mix up words that sound alike but have different meanings. Not entirely noticeable, but quite frustrating when you are a writer.
A diagnosis doesn’t solve everything, yet we cling to these labels to help us make sense of what is going on in our bodies. I was so frustrated before my clotting disorder, antiphospholipid antibody syndrome (APS), was diagnosed. What did these three letters provide me? Not a thing. I have a condition that there is some knowledge of, but name or no name, it is challenging to treat.
A lot of labels have been changing in my life. For instance, the boyfriend label: 13 and I are no longer together. It ended shortly after I came back from graduate school residency last summer. He was going through some frustrations in life and took it out on me, frequently nitpicking my health issues. I’m allergic to bananas, and when I mentioned it wasn’t safe for him to eat one around me, he sent a text message to his friend mocking me, or at least he thought he did. He actually sent that text message to me. I ended things shortly after that. We talked for a while and hung out for a few months. But after a while, our friendship became too toxic to sustain. What I’ve found is the label we place upon ourselves is irrelevant. You either choose to be a positive contribution in someone’s life, or you don’t. I believe I mean more to my purely platonic friends than I did to 13, someone who was supposed to care more.
I recently moved away from an apartment complex that had been my home for six years. My parents finally purchased a beautiful home with a three-tiered garden in the backyard. We didn’t move far, but I felt like so much in my personal history was left behind, tied to the complex. This is the 11th location I’ve moved to. It’s coincidentally in an area I lived in when I was 6. It doesn’t feel like home. There is that labeling tendency, though—home. What is it, even? Do I get to decide what my home is? Am I home, but just denying myself the settled-in feeling?
As usual, there is a lot changing in my world. I could try to label and categorize everything to make a semblance of sense, but I have a feeling it’s a no-win situation. There’s too much grey area to be defined. I feel trepidation when I don’t know what to expect out of life. If I’m sick with “A,” I want to be given “B,” and then all will be well. Or if I’m accepted to graduate school, I wish it meant I could write everything with ease, and all will be perfect. And if I cared for 13, shouldn’t he have cared for me when we were together?
This is how life is in Hallmark movies, but my life is not a Hallmark movie. I don’t want to miss out by looking for certainties and absolutes. I appreciate this time when I’m not expected to have everything figured out, and I hope that following my intuition will lead me toward the right path. For now, I’m a student in life, and I want to learn without labels.