As you saw in I’m Fine, talking about how you’re doing when you’re sick is tricky. You don’t want to totally withdraw and seclude yourself, but you also don’t want to worry the people you care about. At this point, in addition to the symptoms of a severe Crohn’s flare, I had insomnia from the high dose of prednisone and the shakes from the high dose of cyclosporine. My body was failing and I was starting to doubt that I was going to recover.
If you read my post on Depressing Music, you know that I often rely on music to get me through times when I’m overwhelmed emotionally. I was listening to a lot of music those nights when I couldn’t sleep. If I found that a particular song struck the right chord, I’d put it on repeat and just purge the feels. This night I needed a warm fuzzy that only childhood nostalgia could provide. However, these are the kinds of personal things that you don’t share with others at the time. When you’re desperately clinging to an outlet, you don’t go around talking about it. It isn’t worth the risk of that outlet closing up. Or, to put directly, you don’t risk the coping mechanism.