Spring has arrived and I spent many hours this past week with my hands in the ground of my garden, clearing it of dried leaves and dead branches. If you don’t know me you will read this as a normal sentence. But if you know me, you probably have to read it one more time just to make sure that you read it right. The thing is: until very recently I absolutely HATED anything having to do with gardening. Hated it with passion. But this past week, for the first time in my life, I felt a deep longing in my body to physically be in contact with the earth.  

When I removed leaves from a patch of ground in my garden, I found the tiniest flower buds emerging from the earth. New life arriving, preparing itself to bloom. Let me tell you: the spring season and me are incredibly in sync at the moment!

The author Christine Caine said:

Sometimes when
you’re in a dark place
you think you’ve been
buried, but actually
you’ve been planted.

This feels incredibly true for me. A little over a year ago I felt completely buried in the darkness of covid symptoms, one even crazier than the other. Few people believed me when I reported brain fog (I called it Corona Brain) or severe stomach issues. Also hallucinations, rapid heartbeat, crazy anxiety and fatigue like I was hit by a truck, to name a few. There were no dedicated websites on (long) covid, let alone scientific reports and studies. No long covid clinics or even testing available. The medical community did not know how to treat me. So there was no way of knowing: will I survive? Will my symptoms go away or are they chronic?

Being ill during the ‘first wave’ of the virus was scary as h*ll and feels like a quite unique experience when I look back at it today. I believe no one can really understand this feeling except for the people who were in this first wave together with me. I feel a strong connection to the people in this group! Long Covid feels like hell and as first wavers, we experienced our own special form of hell.

As a first-waver today, I feel the experience in my body located in the area of my heart. When I connect with it, it physically hurts and sometimes I still find myself crying at unexpected moments. It feels enormous and powerful, the grief and remembrance of the fear and anxiety from those early weeks and months that lie there. As I feel this so clearly in my body, I asked myself if there is any part of my body where I feel calm? Entering: my feet. When I feel my feet on the ground, and I mean really feel them, I feel an incredible calmness.

I believe this is the reason for my newfound love of touching the earth. There is something so powerful in physically connecting my body with the earth. By consciously feeling my feet on the floor or putting my hands in the soil of my garden, I ground myself. Literally.

I love it so much!

From feeling buried I realize today that I really was planted. In the darkness of my Long Covid-year I had to face my own deep fears and anxiety. I could not use my mind as a tool to disappear or ‘power through’ anymore – I had to be absolutely 100% present with whatever was happening in my body, surfing the waves as best as I could manage and face whatever came at me head-on. And here I am, one year later, almost symptom-free. I can breathe freely again, I feel more energy and a lightness in my body. So much crap has vanished!

I feel ready to bloom. Into what exactly, I don’t know yet. But to be honest: that’s kind of not the point either. I don’t have to know every detail of my path anymore. I feel exactly at the right place at the right time in my life right now, and that’s all that matters. There’s a form of simpleness connected to this, like it’s so natural and obvious. In the same way it’s natural for a flower to grow in nature. A flower has no ambition, no feeling of wanting to be bigger or more beautiful than the other flowers. It just is and unfolds in its own time. Totally itself, unique. I love that.

So, onwards I go, honoring my experience as a first-waver and giving myself more time to process, integrate and heal from everything that has happened in my life during the past year. I am so grateful for everyone who helps me on this path; family, friends and even complete strangers online. The community, solidarity, knowledge, insights, empathy and love I’ve received from the people in the Body Politic online support group on Slack as well as here on my blog is absolutely amazing. Thank you all…

I hope to report that I’m completely healthy in my next writing! That would be something. We’ll see what happens.

Until then: I wish you lots of connection to the earth, whatever that looks like for you. With love ♥

Photo: Abhidev Vaishnav – unsplash.com

This writing is part of what I call my Corona Chronicles. On this page you can find an overview of my stories since March 2020.