I got sick in 2017.

I’ve gotten familiar with hospital beds, the beep of a heart monitor, the loudness of an MRI, the spiciness of anesthesia in my blood, the heartache of an echocardiogram, and eight years of nights and mornings obeying a pillbox.

And I know the panic of when healthcare doesn’t arrive at all, and access to all that bothersome equipment and medication runs low.

When nothing feels within my control, writing is my fortress. A blank page is open to interpretation. My interpretation.

If I want to complain, I jot it down. If I want to cry, then I weep over my words. If I want to be angry, I allow it to flood cityscapes with ink, until nothing is left of the words, “I’m fine.”

But writing isn’t the full purpose, just like illness isn’t the full story. The full story is thirty years long, breathing with a heart that keeps beating.

I got sick in 2017, but I survived.