I started noodling at four in the morning a few weeks ago on The State of America¹ and this is what I have to show for it.
“There is a feeling like the clenching of a fist.
There is a hunger in the center of the chest.”
I reread that post from November 2020 and what bums me out the most is the anger. Is my rage apparent to a casual reader? Or am I reliving the rage I felt while writing? Maybe both. But I wish I had a snapshot of my health at that time that wasn’t also a snapshot of how bitterly angry I was.
A more precise desire: to have the topic of my health sundered from the topic of my anger.
Yeah. I’m still angry.
This is what I'm not experiencing: anger at the universe for dealing me this hand. No offense to people who live in that kind of anger, but it feels like a disability cliche. Passing through it as a stage is reasonable. But never leaving it is immature. Do the work to get past it.
…that's so much big talk from me. Because I didn't even have to give that Fate-directed anger a nod of acknowledgment as I went on my way. I'm extremely grateful that there hasn't been a second of me railing against Fate. I got no beef with Fate.
But maybe that's because I could direct my anger at something less abstract but no less intractable. Ladies and germs (LOLSOB), I'm talking about the U.S. government. Been so angry at that bastard.
January 20, 2020 was the day both America and South Korea recorded their first confirmed cases of COVID-19. Go have a little frolic on Google to find out how we failed where South Korea succeeded. The visual aids make me gag. The superiority of their response is so thoroughly documented by reputable sources. Laying it out myself would be redundant. I'm bringing up South Korea to explain that I'm angry at the U.S. government for a reason. That COVID-19 absolutely did not have to be everywhere within months. That we didn't come close to South Korea's testing per capita, nevermind their commitment to tracing and isolation. That it's not irrational to conclude that our government's blundering pandemic response was the major factor in my catching COVID-19 and developing Long COVID. And that's all on the science-skeptical first Trump administration.
That is the anger that colors my post from November 2020.
HOWEVER.
Our government has also failed to learn anything from the pandemic. Where was the political will to increase investment in public health agencies? To implement universal healthcare?² COVID-19 is still around, and each infection increases a person's likelihood of developing Long COVID. Where is the federal funding to find an actual goddamn treatment instead of the ad hoc off-label trial and error I've been undergoing? Why do people applying for SSDI or SSI have to wait a couple years only to be rejected, and then maybe approved after retaining a disability lawyer to appeal? And why are disability benefits still so impractically low? Why does SSI penalize married couples through income and asset limits? Why does SSI penalize people who receive in-kind support and maintenance? If Social Security can't be reformed, can the Democrats at least make an effort that raises consciousness of these issues so I don't have to keep defending myself whenever somebody asks why I'm not on disability? No, they can't. All that is on the Biden administration.
That is the anger I've carried for four years.
Then there's the anger that's only a month old.
Among the many reasons to feel despair, despisal, and disgust when contemplating a second Trump administration is the nomination of RFK Jr. for Health and Human Services Secretary. The man is a misinformation (disinformation?) geyser, especially when it comes to accepted medical interventions such as fluoride, antidepressants, and vaccines. A lot of health policy happens at the local level, but RFK Jr. is positioned to sow distrust in public health interventions. That doubt can trickle down until states no longer require vaccinations and private insurance companies no longer cover certain medications. This clown could be the reason an unvaccinated person gives me COVID-19 in the future. And SSRIs are one of the many off-label treatments for Long COVID. I will go to the barricades for my sertraline.
Figuratively speaking, and only as much as my brain fog allows. I need others to actually stand up for me. There's some more anger right there, dedicated to those loved ones who voted against my health and safety. Again. No, I don't expect any voter to prioritize the issues that most directly affect me. I understand that the only vote I have a right to assign a candidate is my own. But people who care about me—in real life, to my face—selling my well-being for someone so baldly racist, xenophobic, vindictive, and vulgar? Trading my well-being for someone found criminally liable for sexual assault? Prioritizing a Christian Nationalist power grab by a party puppeted by oligarchs? I can't understand any of that. The extreme compartmentalization demonstrated by people I know to be good is dispiriting. And it makes me feel abandoned at a time when my poor health impedes self-advocacy. How else should I take it when they align themselves with the people whose political messaging attacked the use of face masks during a global pandemic? I. am. angry.
And though anger is suboptimal, I don't exactly wish I felt differently. I wish the world weren't so ready to provoke me to anger.³ But it is and it does and I don't regard that as a personal moral failing. My attitude towards anger aligns with that of Discworld witch Granny Weatherwax.
“Granny Weatherwax was often angry. She considered it one of her strong points. Genuine anger was one of the world’s great creative forces. But you had to learn how to control it. That didn’t mean you let it trickle away. It meant you dammed it, carefully, let it develop a working head, let it drown whole valleys of the mind and then, just when the whole structure was about to collapse, opened a tiny pipeline at the base and let the iron-hard stream of wrath power the turbines of revenge.”
This passage appears immediately before her final contest with a MacBethish couple. I don't encounter too many of those myself. So the Granny Weatherwax wisdom that is both resonant and useful comes from several books later, where an even older Granny helps a young witch get back on her feet after a traumatic experience.
“‘You hold that anger,’ Mistress Weatherwax said, as if reading all of her mind. ‘Cup it in your heart, remember where it came from, remember the shape of it, save it until you need it. But now the wolf is out there somewhere in the woods, and you need to see to the flock.’”
I'm not looking to purge myself of anger. I'm not going to have any conversations or confrontations about my anger.⁴ I'm going to continue to hold my anger close and just get on with it. After all, I have so much to do in order to continue healing, and so much to catch up on as my capacity for living grows.
Please don't feel like you have to discuss this post with me. I sincerely did not type this as a passive-aggressive blind item calling you (yes, you!) out, or even as a cathartic rant in search of a "There, there, dear." I've taken the trouble to write about anger because I do intend to post a proper health update soon. I don't want to have to address all this at that time. But it's important to know that "Angry, thanks for asking!" will always be the unspoken answer to questions about how I'm doing. Anger is the gelatin mold in which my fruit salad is suspended.
Footnotes below!
Gross. How pretentious. I should have to run laps.
Oh my gods health insurance is so sadistic. I'm covered (at great expense) through my spouse's employer. The legion of physicians who treat me are at Mount Sinai. Mount Sinai recently sent us a letter that described the precarious state of their current negotiations with my insurer, whom Mount Sinai may cease to accept across the board. My family 100% does not need the stress of finding me different coverage and/or doctors.
On days I feel up to taking the subway to a doctor's appointment, I still end up paying for a taxi because subway stations are shamefully lacking elevators in good working order. Wouldn't a $100 round-trip charge on top of a copay make you angry?
If I have to implore you to care about policies that directly impact my fucking health, I've already lost you, and grieved.