Today is the ninth anniversary of my liver transplant. This year feels so different from every year that came before it, and that’s been true of each passing year. I have written about the experience of illness since it happened, I had to. It was a compulsion for many years. The body fascinates me, and that has not changed with time. But what I wrote about in relation to my own body and my illness certainly has.
My transplant doesn’t define me, but it has refined me. It has made me into the person I am today, so of course, I can’t imagine how it would be different. In this body, I’ve had the experience of what it might be like to die because I stood at the precipice of it and was pulled back to life. For many years I thought that by virtue of having nearly died I somehow had to prove that the rest of my life was worth something. I had to spend the rest of my life giving back because I had been given — what is referred to in transplant communities — a second chance at life. It was the contract I signed when they saved my life, and I wore it like a heavy chain around my neck.
This idea, the idea that I was so lucky to be alive — and that I must be relentlessly grateful — was detrimental to my vulnerable state. I spent quite a few years thinking less about what I wanted and more about how I had to give my body over to service, it didn’t matter what it was. It also created an inflated ego in some ways: that I somehow had the power to heal because I knew more. The concept of the wounded healer exists for a reason, but I think I claimed that identity from a skewed perspective. I’ve come to understand that I definitely don’t know more than anyone else, but I do know how to hold space for grief, despair, and healing. Those two things feel different to me, and I’m more comfortable with the latter.
And now, with time, healing, and age - I’ve realised that actually, it’s not so much about what I have to prove and more about how I want to live. Of course, I still have goals, ideas, dreams, and projects just like anyone else (I do love a project). But I want to live easily and softly, I want to be around people I love, I want to eat well and often, I want to move my body each day, I want to consume good art on a daily basis, I want to create things with my friends, I want to meet new people, I want to romance myself and others, I want to collaborate, I want to learn new languages and get better at the ones I already speak, I want to learn how to sing (but really sing), I want to know what it’s like to spend a prolonged period of time in nature, preferably writing, I want to learn how to make music, I want to be in love, I want to be a better friend, daughter, niece, aunty, I want to live my own life because I just don’t know how long it’s mine. I want to choose myself over and over and over again. So then I can choose life, I can claim my place in the world and I can truly have enough life in me to be of service.
I say this every year, but I really do continue to feel grateful for every person along the way who has helped me get through being alive in this broken body. This year I went to Glastonbury, which felt like an insane thing to do (for me), but if you had told me in August 2015 that I’d be using a composting loo in 2024, I’d have told you to fuck off. I’m so beyond imperfect and always have been, my body reflects that and humbles me on a daily basis. I’ll keep using my imperfect incarnation until it runs out of steam. In the meantime, calling in a lot more life, a lot more connection, a lot more bodies of water, and a few fewer neuroses. As they say, you gotta die a few deaths before you can really live (I don’t think anyone says that, but I did just now). I die a little death every day, and thank god for that.
In the inimitable words of Arthur Lee:
Everybody's gotta live
And everybody's gonna die
Everybody better try to have a, a good time
I think you know the reason why
It feels fortuitous that the second episode of the new season of my podcast So, Life Wants You Dead comes out today. I interviewed my friend, the director, and musician Chris Tartaro, about his experience with meningioma, his approach to making art, his love of music, and balancing full-time work with recovery. I love this conversation so much. It makes me happy to still be alive, that’s for sure.
With love,
Nora x
God Bless and congratulations on your anniversary.