[Krista]

I know I've posted something like this similair on the site under Aplastic Anemia, but I haven't had a whole lot of luck with reply's. Perhaps you guys are just better with the formal side of things, the things with concrete right and wrong answers. I am 21 and was diagnosed with aplastic anemia a year ago next month. So the anniversary is approaching, and I've just read statistics that 78% of ATG w/cyclosporine patients relapse. I don't know exactly what this means, since it doesn't have a "within five years" or anything attached. I'm concerned. Anxious. Worried. A little depressed. About making plans for the future, about getting my first job and paying my first school loans and my new health insurance all at once, about moving closer to my family "just in case." I feel like my whole life is lived right now "just in case." Have a suitcase packed "just in case," a list of things I'd like to do before I die "just in case," rethink every bruise and sneeze "just in case," write letters to my teachers explaining my life "just in case." I know adults pity me a little because I'm so young, but others just shrug it off. I have some friends that understand, and others that just change the subject. I get so angry because I still want all the same things, still want to work really hard and stay up late on homework and prove my professionalism like everyone else (I go to art school with a really intense program) but, at the same time, I'm not the same person I once was, and I can't always keep up with everyone else. I want to. because I know the kids that can't or won't work up to the school's high standards, and we are taught not to respect them. I don't want to be that person. I've worked really hard the past two years to not be that person. And last year my teachers treated me like I had suddenly stopped caring about class, and that I wasn't worth bothering with anymore. No matter how hard I worked. No matter that I still had a B+ average, and I was in the hospital or in quarantine for half of the semester. I have a new start, but I'm afraid I've internalized their attitude. I don't know what options are left open to me now. I want to be a graphic designer. And now I have to miss so much class I don't think I'd ever be able to work to the strict deadlines. I'm afraid my teachers will lose respect for me all over again. Thanks for letting me rant, its been a really long week. I swear I still have a sense of humor, just not tonight.