The Life of a Walking Mermaid
A Story of Resilience
by
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So, what does cystic fibrosis feel like? Well, I can tell you that I wake up in the morning and feel my lungs. Do you? I don’t feel the rest of my body or give it much acknowledgment. I do feel my chest. I feel the air flow, or lack there of. I don’t take notice of my feet, legs, and head. I feel my chest though.
And then, there’s that morning cough. It feels like what I presume an owl feels like when dusk finally hits and it can come out into the wild world and see clearly. Or what a tired babysitter feels like when the parents finally return.
I like to imagine a white light in my chest. I see it breaking up the mucus and setting the musical instrument in my lungs free to help lessen the severity of disease.
I also dress the disease up in a disguise sometimes, like an octopus. This allows me to not be as afraid of what is going on during difficult exacerbations. Yes, CF feels like I have an octopus in my chest.
Did I answer the question?
I can feel CF. I know it’s in there, in my chest. It changes like the seasons. On the days that symptoms are less, I take the freedom and embrace it. I love these days. It’s like a fall day when the leaves are drifting off of the trees and the tress feel the wind and air on the tips of their branches.
There are other days, similar to a cold winter day, where CF is frozen inside me and requires to be defrosted with chicken soup.
CF feels like luggage on a long road trip. You so desperately want to leave it on the side of the road, but for some reason you can’t detach from it.
It feels like a secret you put in a time capsule. It’s buried deep underground and can’t come above ground because its location has been lost.
It can make me feel like I’ve won a marathon every single day, because lets face it, I have.
CF feels special, in a unique, distinguished way.
It’s hard to explain what CF feels like when it’s the only thing I have ever known. Until the day when I know what CF doesn’t feel like, I can only answer the question with the response that cystic fibrosis feels normal. So I leave you with the question, what does not having cystic fibrosis feel like?
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About the Book
The Life of a Walking Mermaid looks into the life of an angel, disguised in a 90-pound body with a smile and laugh that lit up the world. Young Vicki Thompson could have been the next Gandhi or Abraham serving as a magnet for love, kindness, and goodness. She wrote from the heart and, without knowing it, transformed people’s lives. Her memoir will open your heart and soul whether you suffer from a physical or mental illness or have perfect health.
Through Vicki’s inspirational blogs, she gives readers a glimpse into what it felt like being forced to live with Cystic Fibrosis and the lessons she learned through her experience. Most importantly, though, Vicki’s blogs attest to not allowing a disease define who you are. Vicki never did and encouraged others not to do so, either. Right up to her final days, she spoke of what she was going to do after she received her new lungs, thrilled to no longer be a prisoner of Cystic Fibrosis.
About the Author
Vicki Thompson never allowed fear to stop her. An avid snowboarder, she attended Sierra Nevada College in Lake Tahoe. When not traveling, she created the non-profit Boundless Art and wrote for the Cystic Fibrosis Lifestyle Foundation. Her final quest was founding Salt and Soul, a salt therapy and yoga center. She was always busy planning her next adventure.