Naked Before God...

Last night I had a complete and total meltdown. One that forced me to become naked before God.

It is no secret that this week I have been sad beyond all of my understanding and all the positive thinking quotes and scriptures I could muster up. No matter how hard I tried to call on Super Woman, she just wasn't rising to the occasion.

It is no secret that these last few months have been harder than usual. Shoot, if I'm real honest about it, this year has been a blessing and a curse all wrapped into one. I defied the odds and lived to see 50 years of age! I should have died in my 30's; and be clear, at one point I was sick enough to die. But with God as overseer, a great doctor, a will to live and doing everything medically possible I made it.

Then in the midst of the countdown celebration I got sick and ended up on IV medication. Then to add to my injury, my honorary membership in Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. was rescinded over tweets I made 14 months prior. And it was done in the coldest and cruelest way, with no warning, preparation or defense. That made me physically sicker and I ended up on IV medication for 34 days instead of 20. But I seemed to keep it moving.

While I hurt, Super Woman came through for me. I wrote a book, The Politics of Respectability in 22 days and I was still able to get my Summer 2012 RLT Collection completed and on the website in a timely fashion.

Yep! Super Woman was in rare form and I didn't miss one beat. Then the fall came and my world started to fall apart. I learned that one of the closest persons in my life was an altered reality; everything I knew about them was a lie. I had been living in their lie for almost two years. That betrayal made me sick and I ended up on IV.

It was beyond anything I could have ever imaged and some Lifetime Movie shit. And honestly, I'm still not over this betrayal. Everyday I discover something new that makes me ask myself, how did I miss it? And makes it even clearer how disturbing it all is.

My world started to crumble. I went from herpes and IV medication for 19 days, to serious nerve pain in my back, face, and legs that shut me down, then a serious cold that shut me down.

 In the meantime work was lagging. I'm still trying to get the new designs for RLT Collection completed and that's been a lot of pressure because with no new bracelets on the website, there is no money coming in. Shoot it's bad, I got a sell last night and I wanted to hug and kiss that customer, #ForReal

 Email's and Facebook messages are piling up and I seem to be falling down like dominos, one at a time.

Then to add to my injury, I developed another herpes infection. That's some shit! I've only been off IV a little over a month. The doctor was even stuck. She couldn't even believe it, so I had to go and get a couple of cultures to just make sure. But one look made it clear. Yep, I have herpes.

And the herpes I get is on steroids or something. I typically get one lesion on my clit area that grows into some super sore.

But occasionally I get more lesions on my vulva and it's like someone just took pilers and pulled layers of skin. Yep, each day since Monday I have gotten a new infected area.

What a Mediport looks like...

I will start IV medication on Thursday. I'm waiting on my appointment to get a mediport placed. I've had so many picc lines and there's so much scaring on my left side veins, that I need to receive the IV medication in a different route.

The decision to get a mediport was the best decision, but it felt like I had been crushed. A permanent line in my body makes this aggressive herpes so permanent. In the last 5 years I kept hoping that we would be able to get a handle on it and I wouldn't need to keep going on IV medication, but that is not the case. That was a devastating realization!

So as my infection grows, I wait to be treated. You get the point! I got so much shit pilled on top of shit, I feel like I'm about to lose it.

So last night it all came to a head. I was really hurting both physically and emotionally.

 I called one friend and they didn't pick up. I know I could have called my BFF Luke, but he's been holding me up all week and I wanted to give him a break. I can't tell you the aloneness I feel sometimes with no family at all.

As I sat in bed listening to Walter Hawkins Pandora, (my fav) Byron Cage song, "Broken, But I'm Healed," came on. Tears started to flow.

I started listening to this one song over and over and over in my iTunes and the more I listened the more the tears flowed.

Super Woman was nowhere to be found. It was just me, Rae Clara and God until 3:00 A. M. this morning.




Broken, I became naked before God... Then this morning it hit me! God wants us to want Him. Matter of Fact, God wants us to understand that there is nothing we  can do without Him. The sovereignty of God is Gods gift to us. However, when you are so use to being in "control" you develop this false belief of  who really is in control. We begin to think that our free will is God, when in fact, even our free will is a gift from God. I was reminded that I am nothing, nor can I do a thing without God. My resilience is even a gift from God. I was so busy trying to conjure up Super Woman, when I should have been calling on God.

It's amazing how we begin to think more of ourselves then we really are, when in reality, we are because God is!! All of our greatness is because of God's plan for our life.

The more God blesses us, the more we seem to forget the sovereignty of God and that arrogance becomes our God.

The first step in Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon is to admit that we are powerless over alcohol/drugs and our lives have become unmanageable. Mainly because the addict thinks that they can out think the drugs and those affected by the addict think that can out think the addict. When in fact, the drugs becomes the addicts God and the addict becomes the God of those impacted. Whoever, whatever you think  and talk most about is your God.

The second step is to believe that a Power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity. It says, I am not God, but there is a God who can. Both of these steps are critical to a better life and can be applied to every aspect of life issues, not just drugs and alcohol.

Often times we try to assume the roll of God in our lives, when God just wants us to depend on Him. So I'm surrendering! I can't do this on my own. The more I try to be all that, the more insane I become.

What I know for sure is, I can do nothing outside of God's Grace. But I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

Even my ability to think is a gift from God. Sometimes we become to smart and to great for our own earthly good.

In my brokenness, I became naked before God. When we strip before God, there is healing for the mind, body and spirit. I'm Broken, But I'm Healed!!!

Overcoming Shame...

Having herpes is literary a pain between my legs that goes straight up to my heart and effects everything there is about me from my health to my self-esteem.

It leaves me helpless and hopeless. But most of all, the shame that I have is insurmountable. I think at the core is the insensitively that people have for those with sexually transmitted disease. I say it to myself, so I know others must say it, "It that heifer had kept her legs closed, she wouldn't have herpes; she wouldn't have AIDS."

Having to tell someone that I am sick and then take that deep breath as they wait to hear more, is a painful journey every single time I do it.

Having to explain to my Pastor today that I'm sick yet again was like being kicked straight in my freakin gut. Of course he's compassionate and a pretty progressive man, but I can't help to think what people may think of me, including him. I mean I am a minister and a member of the ministerial team at my new church.

Just at the base line, how do you support someone who has a very serious and chronic sexually transmitted disease?  How do you separate how they got there to how you can help them?

For that matter, how does anyone support me specifically? This thing is crazy for me; just plain old crazy. It's not "normal" herpes. It's herpes complicated by AIDS. On one level I ask, how does one leave their judgment at the door and on the other, once done, how do you continue to support such an ongoing chronic illness? I almost hate to say that I'm having another outbreak. It's like, "Here we go again." But this is my life and there is no place for me to hide. I have to endure, even if you choose not to. It is what it is.

Typically I don't give a damn what people think of me, but there's something about herpes that I haven't yet been able to conquer.

The fact is, I contracted herpes in college. The fact is, having AIDS has complicated my herpes. My impaired immune system has literary become a feeding ground for herpes. The fact is, I have to take an anti-viral medication intravenously to rid my body of herpes each time I have an outbreak.

The fact is, the anti-viral medication Foscarnet is aggressive and a very hard medication to take. My regimen is 2 hours a day, twice a day.

The side-effects are equally hard, diarrhea, nausea, fatigue that's so bad some days washing my tail is an effort and cooking a meal is out of the question, also Kidney damage and burning when I use the bathroom. It's exhausting physically and emotionally. Not to mention that I hurt like shit right between my legs. I don't want nothing to touch my vulva and I mean nothing.

The fact is, this is all medical related. There is no way around the fact that developing drug resistant herpes 5 years ago has effected my health greatly.

I've had so many picc lines in my left arm that it has created so much scaring, which has now caused a blockage going to my central vein from the left. Now, the doctor wants me to get a medi port permanently placed. It's either that or make my way to the right arm until thats been damaged like the left and then I would have no other choice.

This is all medical, clinical and there should be no shame in the fact that I am having a health crisis.

Yes, I said having. It's been a month since I had my last round of IV medication for 19 days. I was hoping, even praying that herpes wouldn't come back anytime soon. But the fact is, I had a really bad cold a week ago and that weaken my immune system even more and left me vulnerable, so now I've been developing a new herpes sore over night for the last two days, but I started to have the flu like symptoms caused by herpes on Sunday, just as I was ahead of the clod.

So I start IV medication as soon as I get the medi port straight, probably next week some time. In the meantime, I just have to endure the pain and the spread of the infection until we can begin to put it in check.

It's crazy that I have AIDS and I have no shame but yet herpes has some kind of hold on me. For people to know that I have this aggressive infection between my legs does something to my womanhood. It makes me feel dirty on some level.

But yet, the secret of why I was on IV medication was killing something inside of me, so after 3 long years, I told. I figured that I needed all the good emotional health I could get to deal with the IV medication, that I didn't need the burden of the secret.

So I told... I'm glad I told, but I seem to be stuck somewhere in the ugly of this disease. I'm not sure what it will take to get me to a better place; probably time.

There was a hope and a prayer that this nightmare would go the hell away. But today it seem to have been made permanent when the doctor suggested that I get the medi port.

It was a very sad moment for me. I'm in what appears to be a cycle that seems to dominate my life. AIDS is here to stay. My immune system took a serious hit in those early days, now this herpes infection wrecks havoc on my body and yes my spirit because of the environment created by AIDS. It's enough to have to contend with AIDS, but both of them together, feels like hell on earth some days.

There is nothing worst than feeling that burning tingle between my legs that says, "Im back!" Just like in some horror movie when the monster just keeps coming back, no matter how dead you think he is.

Not only do I have to contend with the emotional and the physical drama each time I have an outbreak, but while I'm on IV medication, all my projects lag behind herpes. The IV regime is so aggressive, I operate at sub-standard and that in and of itself creates something sad inside of me.

I'm so affected by this herpes, in so many different ways. I hate what it is doing to my life. I HATE it! I HATE that I have this shame associated with it too. I may not know how to get over this shame, but I know for sure, holding the secret fosters an even more unhealthy environment. So I will continue to talk about it until I can get to a better place.

What I do know for sure; naming it, is a road to healing....

Monday Reflection: Bounce Back!

I'm the freakin bounce back Queen! Over the years no matter what knocks me down, I always find a way to get back on my feet.

But sometimes the going down is so hard that the coming back up is even harder. Can I talk to some real folks? This life can be a bitch with a capital B! For Real.. For Real... And there ain't a positive thinking quote that can make it better and the best scriptures go in one ear and come right out the other.

And all those people who want you to be better like right now, only takes you into to a deeper depression. They want a miracle for you and there becomes a guilt within because you can't deliver what they want at that moment in time. The bounce back seems so far away, if not impossible. Yet deep in your heart you know that its possible; the bounce back that is.

That's been my life lately. Life has been a bitch with a capital B and just when I think I'm about to pull it together, I get hit again and then again and the bounce back seems to get further and further away. And the further away the bounce back gets the deeper the depression becomes.

Can I talk to some real folks, with some real life issues? Depression is real for people living with HIV/AIDS. Bullshit ain't nothing! No matter how well put together I am when I face the public, there are no clothes or makeup that can take away the emotional pain, and even the physical chaos that I live with daily.

Yes, I do have to deal with the same stuff everyone else deals with, like disappointment and hurt, but I have that extra, i. e. HIV/AIDS and that Bitch is extra extra...

I'm always amazed at the HIV infected person that says HIV changed their life for the better. I wonder what pills they are taking because there ain't shit about HIV that made my life better

I had a life and career before HIV/AIDS. That's for real. I didn't stop using drugs and alcohol when I learned my status because I didn't drink or do drugs before I became infected. And hell naw, HIV didn't stop me from lovin men or wanting men to love me. Nor did it stop me from fucking. My journey  and healing with men would have happened with or without HIV in my own time and space.

So when I say there's not a damn thing great about having this disease I mean that shit. Yes, I am LIVING! Yes, you can LIVE with HIV! But this bitch ain't easy or cute. It adds a burden beyond explanation. There is nothing I can truly say to make you understand the magnitude of this journey.

Yes, I've made the best out of my situation. Yes, God has blessed me in my mess. I won't deny either of these things. But when a cold every normal person has, becomes a major production in my life, I know that I know, ain't nothin easy about HIV/AIDS. When disappointment and betrayal happens in my life and the stress from it lands me on IV medication for 19 days, I know that I know ain't nothin easy about HIV/AIDS. When I wake up after 12 hours of sleep and it feels like I haven't been to sleep at all, I know that I know, ain't nothing easy about HIV/AIDS. When nerve pain becomes my constant companion, I know that I know, ain't nothin easy about HIV/AIDS. But when all this happens within a two month time, I know for sure this bitch is a motherfucker to contend with; and honestly it all gets the best of me sometimes.

People want me to be "normal" and I want to be "normal" too. But there is nothing "normal about living with HIV/AIDS. I want to be that STRONG black woman all the time. I want to be that SUPER Bitch people expect of me. But honestly, when I have diarrhea in a restaurant after dinner more often than not, the truth is, all I want to do is crawl into my bed and stay there for the rest of my life. This shit is so hard sometimes, I just want to quit!

This is some real talk right now! And don't be confuse, I don't have to kill myself, all I have to do is stop taking my medication and watch myself slowly die a horrible death. That's for real. Don't get it twisted, I have advance AIDS and those 15 pills a day are my life line.

But for as much as I want to quit, I also want to see how remarkable God is! Yep, I continue to endure the madness because I know somewhere in it all, God is going to do the impossible. I say often, just keep living and watch God blow your mind. So my desire to see the wonder of God, becomes the motivation for me to bounce back. Yep, it's that simple; I want to see what the end is going to be! I know what my right now is, but I have no idea what tomorrow will be. God has already done some awesome stuff for me and through me for the goodness of others and I want to see more of His wonder.

The 1962 Bracelet Is Coming!

So even in my darkest moments, I have to find ways to get to the light. It's interesting that I'm most creative in my darkest times. I couldn't talk last week, my voice was totally gone and I didn't have the energy to engage conversation on the phone or virtual and be Super Bad when I was Super Sick... But I had a vision for my Fall/Winter RLT Collection and I laid in bed and created my best designs, I think EVER, just one bracelet at a time.

They say some of our most creative people went through bouts of depression from composers to artist. So like many other creative people, in my darkness I make a way for the light to shine bright. It shines bright on the wrist of  each person who wears my designs; and watching God grow RLT Collection one bracelet and one customer at a time, is more than enough to bounce back.

For every damn good reason I want to quit life, there is a pretty damn good reason to live in my life, so I  find the way to bounce back and see what the end is going to be.

What I know for sure is simple:  Keep bouncing back, no matter how hard the drop and watch God blow your mind on the way up!