Funeral planning

Some might find this an uncomfortable subject and I am bearing that in mind as I write. But the subject of funerals and how I want mine to be done has been on my mind recently.
Well, for a few years really. When I had treatment for cervical cells was when I really started thinking about it. My son was only 11 at the time and I didn’t want him to be affected more than he had to by my funeral arrangements if my treatment hadn’t of worked. I have had a will in place since I was 17, which mostly detailed custody of my son to go to my parents. I wanted to make sure he was ok if anything did happen to me. Now that’s irrelevant as he’s an adult and I really need to update it which I will as soon as I can.

Anyway, due to my being as I am health wise now I have been seriously thinking about how I want my own funeral to be and what plans I can start making. I want to be buried and I know where, there is a burial ground a few miles away where my family are and my own parents will be buried. But how it will be paid for and arranged is something I am going to arrange. I looked into it last night, and have decided to start a payment plan as soon as I am more financially stable. Which should be by the end of the year. It’s something I want to do, I want to pay for and arrange my own funeral and not put the burden onto anyone, especially not my son. I don’t want him to have to deal with that, or pay for it as it’s very expensive. I will be paying monthly into a fund for it and hopefully I will have many many many years to pay it off. And before I pass on! 🙂

I will feel more secure in myself by doing it, and be safe in the knowledge that if anything did happen to me then at least the burial burden and expense wont be put onto anyone else.

The subject of my death has never been something I am afraid to deal with. I am not afraid of my own death at all, it’s something that happens to us all eventually, nothing will change that fact. I have faith in what I believe happens when I pass on and this helps me to deal with it much more easily. It’s the people you leave behind that suffer, and I aim to ease that just a little for them by doing what I plan to via arranging things etc..

On a happier note, I started my card making and ordered more supplies. I found it extremely relaxing and therapeutic making them. Theyre aren’t works of art, but works in progress. Once I have gotten a lil better at making them I will post pictures, and won’t photo shop them! Promise 🙂

‘Cures’ and chronic conditions

Most people when they find out they have an illness look into cures, what will help or eliminate. When I was told M.E had no cure then later, neither did Fibro I was to put it mildly horrified. You just don’t expect in this day and age to hear there’s no cure, we are brought up to believe tablets, Doctors, Specialists will be able to cure what ever you have. I mean, they show it on T.V don’t they, someone on a programme becomes ill and they are miraculously cured or have treatment and it cures them. I haven’t watched mainstream T.V in years so maybe that’s changed but I remember it being the case when growing up and later in life.

Real life however is very different, but still there is that belief that when they tell you what illness/condition you have the next sentence you are waiting for is how to cure it. Unfortunetly in many cases this just isn’t the case and you hear “there’s no cure, BUT we can manage it” which depending on what you have managing levels are on a scale of 1 to 100. I recall my doctor at the time saying, ohh we can get you better with painkillers and in a few months you’ll feel so much better, smiling as they do.. Which to me shouts Alice In Wonderland Cheshire cat grin with all the falseness and Doctor assurance behind it. The fact that I am now in a worse state than ever I know slighly or greatly annoyed my Doctor, it was though I was going against everything they said by becoming worse and in some way degrading there assurances and practices in the illness they had so tried to accomplish along with the cheshire grin. I’m not against the health proffesion, far from it but some of the people working in them can be very dismissive of how you feel or what you say that it just makes things a whole lot worse and can make you bitter towards them. I would rather hear the truth than be fed a lie, no matter what that truth is. Ofcourse no one could’ve predicted that my health would spiral so quickly, but if I could of been prepared for the possibility then I really don’t think I would of struggled with it as badly as I did and still sometimes do. And having discussed this with others with chronic conditions, the truth about the illness/es is far easier to accept.

So what happens when there is no cure, but you are trailing the internet to find ways of managing it you suddenly see ‘cures’ coming at you left, right and centre? Pages and pages of people saying they were cured, that so and so treatment made them better than they’ve ever been. You become hopeful and many many people do try them, put all there energy, resources and money into it, because after all Doctors have been known to be wrong and you just can’t believe that nothing will cure you or that you will never be the same again. There has to be a cure right, you want it so desperately that you know you’ll find one!

Wrong. The sad fact is there is no cure for Fibromyalglia or M.E, no miracle pill, no spa, no health centre that can cure you. Yes there are programmes that help you manage it, tablets that help you manage it, aids that give short relief but there is no cure. All these ‘cures’ usually cost money and that is the main aim here, to make money from your hope and illness. To pray on people who desperatly want to get better, be who they once were, struggle with their conditions. They are the vultures of the internet, people making money out of misery. The stories people write about coming cured are brilliant in their writing, their enthusiasm and hope to make everyone better. But sadly they are just stories. Anyone who has been ‘cured’ in my opinion never had full blown M.E or Fibro in the first place because THERE IS NO CURE. I may get a lot of backlash for that sentence but truly there is proof you can get post fatigue viral infection that can last up to a year but that is not M.E. That is why they became ‘cured’ because that can be. I myself spent hours on the internet when first diagnosed and looking into peoples cured stories, hoping that I would find something that would make the nightmare I was living in go away. That I would find something the Doctors didn’t know about so I know from first hand experience that feeling of hope. So I know M.E or Fibro is not curable at the moment, that is one thing you can trust the medical profession saying. If it was curable what would be there aim in telling us it wasn’t so? Why would they let millions of people suffer, millions of peoples lives be devestated and millions of hours and man power put into doctors/hospitals/centres schedules when they could just give you the cure and send you on your way. It just wouldn’t happen.

The only way to help yourself is to find what works best for you, everyone suffers and feels differently living with chronic illnesses. It is unique to you. Be it support groups, medicine, G.E.T, management M.E and Fibro centres, blogging, support networks whatever helps you. Only you can know how you feel, how it’s affecting you, your life your body. Ignore the charlitans waving their cures about and save the energy and time looking through the net for cures and put it into looking up things that will benefit you personally. And hopefully these vultures will eventually fade away, along with no more of our money and their false ‘cures’.