It was a Fight Club quote. I used to pretend (still do) I am Edward Norton's character, a corporate slave by day but really Tyler Durden in my head. I fulfill this Tyler Durden fantasy when I travel: everything in life gets the volume turned down. All the work stress, the family drama, heart woes, nothing mattered but what I am experiencing and seeing at the moment. The grittier the experience, the better. It makes me feel alive, connected. I wanted to touch everything, eat everything, smell everything. Anything but my real-life sanitized environment where the closest relationship I have is with my keyboard.
Now it has come true, I will never be perfect and I will never be complete again.. And despite everything that happened, I'm still grateful.
I left Prey Veng, Cambodia on the dawn of July 31st a broken woman. At approximately 4am, my old life ended with a bang. Literally. When I opened my eyes, I expected to be dead already. The news reports surrounding my accident has already rehashed how I kept my wits and checked myself for injuries, reciting the alphabet in my head and did some complex multiplication to make sure I'm not bleeding from my brains . How I stashed a copy of my passport in my bra in case the police needed to identify my corpse.What people doesn't know is that for the 2 hours that I was stuck in there, I was scared and I wanted my daddy. And I want the crying woman in front of me, who is hugging her dying son and whose other two daughters are bleeding beside me, to stop because it breaks my heart. How I longed for someone to make eye contact with me so I can tell them to please be careful with my mangled body. And that when I was finally loaded into an ambulance and got to see the extent of my injuries, I laughed. I laughed at the absurdity of my situation, laughed at the thought that I will not be an inspirational disabled person, laughed at the thought na masamang damo talaga ko, I'm still alive.
I am now entering my 3rd month without my leg, or an RBKA (Right below knee amputee) in amputee parlance. And life's both a bitch and a breeze. I live with pain everyday but I have my family's love and support 24/7. I'm officially bionic because of the hardware in my left leg and I am 130 pounds of pure upper body strength. I am shopping for a new leg like I'm shopping for a new car: I think of suspension, how much mileage I can get out of it, what accessories will fit my lifesyle. I have an entourage: an orthopedist, a physical therapist, a prosthetist and my brother as my personal nurse. I never expected it, but a lot of people has come into my life and further enriched it. Strangers, fellow victims, friends I've reconnected with, acquaintances I have long ignored.
I can say I am a changed woman, in more ways than one. But my journey has just begun.
May I never be complete. May I never be content. May I never be perfect. Deliver me from being perfect and complete
