Live In The Moment by Claudia

Live In The Moment by Claudia - April 2021 Scholarship Essay

Five years ago my eleven year old self was plagued with no issues. As young children typically are I was bursting with energy and a thirst for more. I wanted to grow up immediately, the future could not come fast enough. Being older meant finally receiving a phone, being able to drive or maybe even getting my first boyfriend.
Almost two weeks after my thirteenth birthday I had been given my first phone, been through my first relationship, albeit a very short lived one, and was only lacking a driver's license. It was then when I was diagnosed with a life threatening disease. My lupus nephritis thrust me into a world of pain and confusion. Lupus has no cure, and at the time there were no medications invented with the explicit intention of treating it.
Between the never ending surgeries and infusions I began to really miss the life I had before. I missed the normalcy of dreading a math test, or worrying over which friend I would sit next to at lunch. I had no wants for the future, only regrets of the past and barely enough hope to make it through the day.
I am still living with the chronic pain, fatigue and scarring that will never fade as much as I want. But my experience gave me more than just grief. Lupus forces me to live without dwelling on the future, and for that I am forever grateful.
To my eleven year old self, appreciate your youth. The present may seem trivial in comparison to your future, but if you go through every day without living in the moment you won't see what you have missed until it is long gone.