My COVID-19 Recovery Story

 

Yesterday, April 2^nd, 2022, marked the 2 year anniversary of being put on a ventilator due to COVID-19. I was not expected to live through the whole experience. For the 8 days that followed, Barbara received a phone call from my doctors telling her NOT to expect me to come home. On the 7^th day, I began breathing on my own. On the 8^th day, I woke up.

During my total time in the hospital, (15 days, April 1 - 15), I lost 40 lbs. of mostly muscle (not much fat on my bones). I could not walk due to my weakness. Sitting up straight was even a chore. I have never felt so helpless in my life.

I was sent home, even though hospital policy was to keep until I could get to the bathroom on my own, or with minimal help. The problem was that physical therapy could not get into the hospital to see me because of the lack of PPE. The feeling was that I could receive PT at home more easily than in the hospital, so I was taken home by medical transport.

My home health nurse and physical therapist were the most caring people I have come in contact with. I should add that the entire hospital staff were pretty darn awesome too! (Especially the nurses who snuck popsicles to me from their own stash!)

As I began PT, I was told it would be a minimum of 4 months until I would graduate from PT. I had to re-learn how to walk, and my fine motor skill were pretty much gone. I had 40 lbs to regain, but it needed to be muscle.

While my physical therapist was great, I really didn’t like him much during our sessions. He pushed me to exhaustion. He gave me exercises that seemed impossible at the time. It was the same thing every time, work up to doing 30 reps of whatever torturous exercises he assigned each day. During each session, he’d give me an exercise that I would struggle to complete 10 reps. Then he’d say, “Work your way up to doing 30 reps per day by the time I come back in 3 or 4 days.” This man is a MONSTER! But, he encouraged me to understand that it was possible.

I tend to be a little bit of an over-achiever, so, I would begin my exercises by doing 10 reps (or the most I could do until I had no strength left) 5 or 6 times a day. On day 2, I wouldn’t stop until I did 30 reps in a single session. But I tried doing 3 or 4 session each day. To compound the struggle, my lungs were still not completely clear. This exercises caused me to cough (a lot). I would get weak from the coughing, let alone the exercises. But I kept pushing through. I graduated from the wheelchair after a few days and later the walker after about 15 days.

After a few weeks, it was time to try to climb the stairs. Something so simple, and yet, 13 steps looked like hundreds. I climbed 3 or for steps and had to sit down to catch my breath. I held onto the rail as if my life depended on it. But I made it to the top of the stairs that first day. But here was the problem, I had to come back down! THAT was even harder than going up! My new assignment was “do all my other exercises AND climb the stairs a couple times each day.” This guy was WAY worse than I had imagined! No one has ever been so cruel to me. But he continued to encourage me that I was capable.

Again a week or so later, he’s got a new challenge. Now that I can climb the stairs and come back down (and finally got a shower seated in a tub), I should try to walk up my driveway. For those of you who don’t know, my driveway is a steep hill up to the cul-de-sac. Not too long, but very steep. Of course I can do that! And so I did. His hand under my arm (just in case), I made it to the top. He quickly says, “Let’s take a lap around the cul-de-sac.” My reply, “Oh that’s not gonna happen.” I felt like I had nothing left. But after a few minutes I regained some strength and we started the first (and only) lap. I stopped 2 or 3 times to catch my breath and cough. But we made it back to the driveway. Then my taskmaster says, “Now we have to go down the driveway.” Are you kidding me?!?! But when you think about it, what choice was there? On the way down, my knees buckled a couple times, but he caught me each time and helped me get my body straightened out before we would continue. I finally got back to my couch to sit down. He took my vitals and hung around a little longer than usual, just to be sure I recovered from the session. My oxygen levels were good, but my heart was a little fast.

At the end of week 6, my PT guy showed up and said, “Today, if you can do all your exercises AND climb the driveway on my own, I will graduate from PT, and he would stop visiting.” As I ran through all my exercises, I felt like a Jedi master. Nothing slowed me down. But as I finished the final exercise (climbing the stairs and coming back down) I was losing steam fast. I still had the steep climb up the driveway. I had some terrible thoughts, “I don’t think I can do it!” I was exhausted from the workout so far and I STILL had the most difficult task ahead of me! But we pushed on.

I think the driveway gained another 50 feet in distance as I looked up the hill. But I continued on my way. And before I knew it, I reached the top! In my brain I’m screaming “I GRADUATED!!!” But, Mr PT says, “Let’s do a lap.” I love this guy, but I hate this guy!” So, without missing a beat, we take a lap. It wasn’t fast, but I didn’t stop. When we got back to the driveway, I was proud of myself, but I still had to get down the hill, and my legs were shaky. I asked him to be ready, in case I had any difficulty, but I got down on my own. We went back inside and did some paperwork releasing me from PT.

We talked a long time about what I could expect. How to regain my fine motor skills, precautions to take until I was fully physically able to do everything normally, and other things like that. He added that he has never had a patient beat the timeline by such a wide margin. Like I said, “I tend to be a bit of an over-achiever.”

Since that time, I began doing more and more laps around the cul-de-sac. I was determined that when I could complete 15 laps without stopping, I would walk to the next cul-de-sac and back. It seemed 15 laps was about the same distance. Well, I was wrong. It was MUCH further to that cul-de-sac, but that wasn’t the biggest issue. The real issue is that the road is on a slope. I added a hill to my walk without thinking that all the way through. I took my phone so I could call Barbara to come and get me if I ran into trouble. But I completed my walk with some short stops along the way. Every day, I walked, trying to improve. I walked the same route until I could do it without any stops. Then I took a different road to increase my distance (and see some other sites). By the end of summer, I was walking a mile or 2 each day.

I have often wondered how people my age end up using walkers and canes. In my mind, I think I blamed THEM for not staying healthy. But I learned that LIFE is what causes those conditions. Of course, YOU can be the cause, but life can be hard and unpredictable. No one WANTS to lose their capabilities, but sometimes we just do. I say, “We fight to get it back, or at least gain back what we can!”

I have become very aware of how precious life is. I never considered how much some people struggle to live on a daily basis, until I was faced with that struggle. I was given a second chance at life, and I live each day in gratitude for that chance. I struggled not just physically, but philosophically on the meaning of life, “Why am I here?”, “What is my purpose?” Through that struggle, I have found new meaning to my life. I appreciate everything more. I no longer fear death. I think I understand who God wants me to be, and I plan to become that person. I have found my mission in life.

People want to feel sorry for me for all I’ve been through. I tell them “2020 was my best year ever!” Sure it was hard, nearly impossible, but I grew into the next chapter of my life, a life with REAL meaning. While I would never wish such a difficult challenge on anyone, I do hope they find the REAL meaning for their lives too.

Is Biden the Cause for High Gas Prices - My Thoughts

 

A friend asked me an interesting question:

Can you tell me what you think is the real cause for the increase in gas prices? I am hearing that it’s not due to Biden stopping the XL pipeline and that he never closed any other pipelines. Do you think that Biden and his new green deal goons convinced the oil companies to artificially increase prices in order to force people to buy EVs (electric vehicles)?

 Good question!

We have to start with the context.

First of all. Pre-COVID, we were not energy independent. With COVID, our demand dropped dramatically. As a matter of fact, we became “energy independent”, but ONLY because our demand dropped below our production. Before you research this and find out that our demand dropped by 12% but our production dropped by 18% and you want to argue with me, also consider that our exports dropped dramatically. I can't quote the percentage, but the amount offset the difference between supply and demand making us energy independent. Trump did not make us energy independent, COVID did.

Post-COVID, our energy demand has increased and our production has not increased at the same rate to where we are no longer energy independent.

Second point of context, prices are mainly set by supply and demand, BUT it is also set on “perception of value”. When scarcity is “perceived”, prices go up. For example, when a main pipeline had to be shutdown because of a computer issue (whether it was a hack, virus, or glitch) the price shot up long before any effect of the shutdown could be felt in reality. The truth be told, the pipelines get shutdown all the time for different reasons, but because they are never publicized, they have no effect on the price. Fear drove the price up, not any actual supply issues.

Third point of context, oil production (oil fields) takes approximately 5.5 years to first production (from start) and 17 years to reach peak production.

 

With some of the context in place, we can look at why prices have gone up.

 

I would say that Biden is NOT to blame for prices from the supply/demand side of things. Shutting down the XL pipeline did not change the supply at all. The pipeline is not even built yet. He shutdown the building of it. Second, the oil the pipeline was transporting, once refined, was not to be sold here in the US anyway. It was destined for other countries. We still receive the oil by other transports, but we burn more fuel getting it to the refineries. He did attempt to shut down a primary active pipeline (I think in Michigan), but it was fought and Biden lost.

From the “perception” angle, Biden gets a lot of blame. His messaging on “killing the fossil fuel industry” has driven prices up. Not just the messaging, but because of circumstances on the global political environment. His original messaging drove prices up some. But with the threat of war looming early on, prices continued to climb. This “perception” could have been denounced if he had allowed growth in oil production. More drilling, more permits, etc. As I stated earlier, 5.5 years to reach first production, but the “perception” of this move would abate the “perception” caused by the talk of war. Demand was increasing which will naturally cause an increase in prices, but the perception of tremendous supply issues due to the war could have been quelled, but were not, driving prices up far more rapidly.

Biden is not responsible for world prices increasing, but the world prices did not shoot up until the war was becoming real.

With the war now full on, and Putin threatening to pull oil supplies from the rest of the world, this is driving prices up further. The world does look to the US to protect them in these type of situations, but Biden’s messaging is so poor that confidence in the US’s ability to provide such protection is non-existent. Anther “perception” driving prices up.

Now saying all that, Biden in indeed responsible for FUTURE price increases. By not allowing development of new sources of oil and gas, as our demand continues to grow, our supply will not change. The difference between our supply and demand will continue to get wider causing increases in prices.

At every turn, Biden refuses to allow our ability to produce more oil and gas to manifest. Even Elon Musk acknowledges that we need more oil production due to the world economic/environmental situation.

I am all about renewable energy, but I am smart enough to know we are nowhere near ready for a major transition. Once the infrastructure is in place, perhaps we can begin moving in that direction, but we’re not even close at this point.

I plan to own an EV soon, but I also recognize some of the shortfalls we currently face. I will also own a gasoline powered vehicle at least as long as these shortfalls exist. Only 1% of vehicles on the road are EVs, so setting goals of no gasoline powered vehicles being built by 2030 is ridiculous, in my opinion. While it might be an honorable goal, California has had rolling blackouts due to energy demands just for air conditioning. If their infrastructure cannot support the current conditions, how would they support the added load of EV charging?

Biden needs to show the world that we are not just sitting back. If he would go full on at new oil production, pipeline building, etc., the “perception” price increases would go away and only the supply/demand increases would drive the price. But in the future, the prices would come back down as new oil production starts making a difference in the supply.

COVID Vaccine Skeptics - My Thoughts

 

There are many “vaccine skeptics” out there. I see people on Facebook trying to shame them into getting the vaccine. Telling them they don’t follow the science, they don’t care about other people, they simply want to kill Grandma.

I believe they SHOULD be skeptical! We have been lied to time and time again over this pandemic. Dr. Fauci told us masks were useless last March. His reasoning was that he didn’t want to cause a run on the masks as 1^st line workers needed them more. Whatever his reason, HE LIED! He has admitted as much. He lied about how many people needed to be vaccinated in order to obtain herd immunity. Why? He didn’t think the American people were ready to hear the truth.

Let’s move on to the Governors. How many are denying science in order to retain power over everyone’s life? New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and California to name a few. Cuomo of New York is being investigated for lying about the number of nursing home deaths. Simply lie after lie after lie.

Social media companies silencing doctors who disagree with the conclusions of the CDC, the WHO, etc. They presented their own data, which BTW, was solid. But their conclusions did not agree with the CDC or WHO, or Fauci, and they were silenced. Later, their conclusion were suddenly declared to be accurate, but they remained silenced. So just one more reason to not trust “the powers that be”.

The mainstream media trying to twist every single story about COVID into a way to show how much they hate Trump. Instead of telling the truth, they needed to FIRST show how Trump made it bad. While I was laying in the hospital, CNN was on the TV. I remember that the announcers were forced to say that Trump was correct to implement the travel ban. Watching them struggle to actually say the words, “Trump was right” was comical. That statement was quickly followed up with “but what has he done since”. The constant reporting by the MSM provided so much misinformation that you couldn’t help but feel lied to.

Then on Facebook and Twitter, people screaming that those of us who are skeptical are horrible people, we deserve to die, we are what’s wrong with this country, and on and on.

Biden, Fauci, the CDC are telling us that after getting vaccinated, we must still double mask, socially distance, keep our economy shut down. If vaccines work, why can’t we return to some sort of “normal”? We’ve known for quite some time that children do not spread the virus, but still schools remain closed. All of these things go against the science. Fauci concludes each of his claims of spreading or catching the virus with "the chance of this happening are very small, but..."

So why are there not MORE vaccine skeptics?

A recent study showed that conservative skeptics would be willing to get the vaccine, IF they could stop wearing masks and stop social distancing. The science says we CAN, but we are still being lied to. So they aren't getting vaccinated any time soon. The study also showed that liberal skeptics would get vaccinated if they got paid to do so (like in West Virginia). Not sure what to make of that.

I was a “vaccine skeptic”. I had COVID last April, nearly dying, but still skeptical over getting the vaccine. But this past Wednesday, I got my first shot. 

What happened? Why did I change my mind? Because I found doctors on YouTube who were willing to TELL THE TRUTH! They not only TOLD the truth, they cited the studies and the data to prove they were telling the truth. I lost my skepticism because they were completely open about everything. They state when they don’t know something, or if the data has not yet shown something. Instead of treating us like children that are too stupid or naïve to understand the truth, they simply provided the data and suggest what that means to them. THEN let those listening decide for themselves. Of course, I passed all this by my family physician, who agreed.

My conclusion is simply for the government, the medical establishment, news media, and social media platforms to allow us to hear the truth. THEN allow people to use their own judgement. The truth allowed me to decide to get vaccinated. How is it that telling the truth never occurred to any of those who we rely on for the truth?

 Apparently, they have such a low opinion of us "common folk" that we wouldn't know what to do with it. This is where the term "elite", used as an insult, against our elected officials and people we SHOULD be able to trust, comes from.

You want people to get vaccinated? Tell the truth and watch what happens!

Here’s a few pieces of science that the fear mongers are denying:

Children do not spread the virus, so schools could easily be opened back up.

Once vaccinated, the chances of catching the virus is virtually zero.

Once vaccinated, the chances of spreading the virus is virtually zero.

The 6 feet social distance rule was never based on science. Studies show that 6 feet or 60 feet provide the exact same safety.

Masking outside has never made a difference. We knew this way back in the beginning.

Cancel Culture - My thoughts

Tonight, I got to thinking about “cancel culture”, and how harmful and destructive this movement is. It is a cancer within our society. Our country was based on the idea that everyone has a right to their own ideas and exercise of their rights as human beings. You don’t have to like my ideas, but I have a right to have them. "Cancel culture" promotes the idea that you must "pay" for having offensive ideas, whether you act on them or not. Just stating them is enough to require punishment.

So what is “cancel culture”? Dictionary.com defines it this way: “Cancel culture refers to the popular practice of withdrawing support for (canceling) public figures and companies after they have done or said something considered objectionable or offensive. Cancel culture is generally discussed as being performed on social media in the form of group shaming.”

Three famous examples would be Chik-fil-a, Mario Lopez, and most recently GOYA Foods. What were their offenses? The founder of Chik-fil-a made statements that “marriage was ONLY between a man and a woman.” Mario Lopez said you can’t let a child at 3 years of age determine if they are transgender or not. Finally, the CEO of GOYA Foods made positive statements about Trump for the job he’s done as president.

Does the “cancelling” work? Mario Lopez was attacked on every social media platform and his entire career was in jeopardy. He ended up back-pedaling and apologizing for his statement. So they DID win this one. We have seen many famous people lose their jobs, or no longer be able to get jobs through being “cancelled”. Many boycotts formed against businesses have taken those businesses into bankruptcy, and/or closing their doors completely. Many businesses would rather make an “insincere” apology than shutdown.

While boycotts (a favorite tactic of “cancel culture”) can be an effective way to promote change, in my opinion, “cancel culture” goes way too far. They use these tactics to shutdown IDEAS, rather than any actual actions that the “offending” business may be taking. For example, a company that uses “sweat shops” or “child labor” to manufacture cheap products probably deserves to be boycotted. Their actions are directly harmful to and violate their worker’s human rights. But in "cancel culture", the businesses are made to suffer because their owner or a higher ranking leader made a personal statement, or supported an organization with their personal funds, that supports ideas which are "offensive".

Are there any unintended consequences to "cancelling" a business? Well, if a business has to close its doors, all employees suffer the loss of a job. A boycott has been called for against GOYA Foods. They donated 270,000 meals to New York City during the COVID-19 pandemic. If the boycott is effective, such generosity could be lost and many people could go hungry in the future, along with job losses of employees.

So is there any hope in “fighting” all the bullying that "cancel culture" is doing? There may be an actual answer to this dilemma. We have seen it in action, but perhaps never formally thought about it. When the boycott was called for against Chik-fil-a, many abandoned Chik-fil-a. BUT many supporters of Chik-fil-a bought MORE of their products. Sales actually went UP 12%. So if someone organizes such movements to “cancel” the “cancel culture”, we already have proof that it works. 

For GOYA, it’s still too early to tell. But, as the boycott started trending on social media, a counter attack was launched, called a “buy-cott”, with the idea that everyone who supports GOYA, or at least feel the boycott was uncalled for (whether they agree with the CEO's statements about Trump or not), buy $10 of their product and donate it to their local food pantries. At the same time, a GOFUNDME was launched to raise $100,000 to buy GOYA products to donate to food pantries.

Rather than let the bullies win, we simply push back by supporting those being bullied. If those being bullied do BETTER, the “cancel culture” mob may become wise to the fact that they are HELPING those they try to “cancel”, instead of hurting them.

Elizabeth Warren Says, "Banning Men From Competing in Women’s Sports is ‘Cruel’" - My Thoughts

When has it gone too far? I got to thinking about transgenders and women's sports. I dug through a lot of information concerning the "Equality Act", "Title IX", Title VII", etc. I only wanted to look at women's sports as all the rest is very complicated.

I was considering why so many think there is not a problem with transgender women competing against biological women. I think the big mistake people make when this topic is discussed is stating the "obvious" reasons, assuming EVERYONE "knows" that they are obvious, without looking at WHY they are obvious. For most people, these things are obvious because that is what they have known their entire lives. It doesn't mean they are correct, it means that is what they were taught. So in this case, is "obvious" also "correct"?

So let's ask the question, "WHY do we have women's sports in the first place?" The actual answer is "biology". Women who want to play sports are at a disadvantage based on biology. Men tend to be physically larger, have more muscle mass, and some skeletal differences, along with a few other characteristics. These differences have always existed in order for the human race to survive. But BECAUSE they exist, men have a clear advantage when it comes to sports. So to create a fair and equitable playing field, men and women do not compete with one another in the area of sports.

Enter transgenders...

When a man identifies AS a woman, it does not reverse any of the biological factors that have always provided his advantages in sports. This is ONLY true once he has entered puberty. Prior to puberty, boys and girls are virtually identical in physique. But once puberty starts, boys and girls quickly move to being different. The argument is often made that treating prepubescent males with hormone therapy/surgery would keep them from taking on those masculine characteristics that give them the sports advantage. But let's think about that. Would providing such treatment not fall into "child abuse"?

We already have a famous case of a mother and father fighting in court over the gender identity of their son. The child wanted to be a girl and the mother was fully supportive while the father was not. The issue that was being fought was over whether or not the mother could "force" the father to dress their son as a girl, use his new name, start hormone therapy, etc. During the fight between parents, the child outgrew his "wanting to be a girl" phase and now wanted to go back to being a boy. IMO, making permanent, life altering changes to a child who has not reached an age of reason is child abuse. Let the child reach an age where they truly can make their own decision, and then let them do what they want.
So back to the topic, since post-pubescent transgender women have already gained the "male advantage", does allowing them to compete against biological women not destroy the very reason for having separate sports divisions?
Those who believe transgender women should be able to compete with biological women are now stating the case of a biological female athlete who DID beat a transgender woman in a race. My mind goes straight to: "She was obviously not good as a male athlete, and is STILL not a good female athlete." However judgmental that may sound, the data shows how much of an advantage men really do have over women in sports, and one outcome of a race does not change the facts seen since the beginning of sports.

Why would a girl ever aspire to compete in a sport when they know there is no chance for them to ever dominate that sport due to competition against transgenders who use their male advantages? Women who compete are dedicated and work extremely hard to achieve greatness. Why would we allow that to be taken away from them?

Capitalism - The Open Discussion

Many people rail against “the evils of capitalism”, but I find their complaints to be against "crony capitalism", not "true capitalism". I would like to challenge those ideas and PROVE that capitalism truly is moral and all outcomes are positive provided you participate in the system (i.e. if you don’t work, you don’t eat).

The biggest complaint I see is that capitalism breeds greed, always ends in monopolies, and the wealthy prey on the poor. My premise has always been that none of those things can happen without the helping hand of the government. 

I believe the following:

1) ALL monopolies have had a hand from government to become a monopoly, with only one exception. 

2) Greed (as the sole motivation) cannot survive in a capitalistic economy. 

3) Because the consumer always has the upper hand, the wealthy are at their mercy, not the other way around. 

In other words, if we remove government intervention from the economy, unbridled capitalism will fix the problems that arise within it.

So here is the premise we will be working with:

Government has only 2 functions.

    1) provide national security, both internal and external (i.e. police/military)

    2) protect the rights of its citizens, meaning it will prevent anyone from trampling on someone else’s rights as a citizen. "Rights" is defined as those things outlined in the Constitution.

All other functions of society operate within capitalism.

It is IMPORTANT to keep the above premise in mind for the discussion. We have been trained to think that the government is there to provide EVERYTHING for us, so we may tend to keep assigning responsibilities to it. I want to go back to the roots of limited government and see where we end up.

So tell me about your position on capitalism. Where do you have an issue with it. What is wrong with it. What is right about it? Why doesn't it work, etc.

Author's note - I am aware that I may regret this challenge based on the time required to answer any questions or statements made, but I think it is important that this sort of dialog occur. We need to block out what the media, politicians, and special interest groups are feeding us and just discuss (with an open mind) what capitalism truly is. I will welcome ALL comments and questions, provided it is done in a respectful manner. I will delete all vulgar/slanderous/hateful comments. I hope for this to be a learning experience for all who participate, including myself. I do not have any formal education in economics. All my knowledge (and ideas) come from my pursuit of entrepreneurship and reading of many leading economists.

Toxic People - My Thoughts

NOTE - Let me preface this piece by saying that I am NOT a Trump supporter. I think he would be far more effective if he stayed off social media and just stuck to doing his job. I state this because what you read in the following could easily make me "appear" to be one of his supporters. The subject matter circles around him. Now on to my thoughts...

I made a decision a few weeks ago to remove toxic people from my life. Toxic people are those who have nothing but negative things to say, people whose minds are so closed that it was often painful to have a discussion with them, people who put their own thoughts out there but refuse to listen to any opposing ideas, etc. What I found was that I removed NO ONE because I kept making excuses for their behavior and language. I WANTED to see the best in them.

So then the "kids from Covington" video happened. In case you don't know, there was a group of Catholic school boys who travelled from Covington, Kentucky to Washington D.C. to participate in the "March for Life". It is a protest against legalized abortion. Some of the boys were wearing MAGA hats (Make America Great Again), Donald Trump's signature statement. The video showed one of the boys, in particular, "confronting" a Native American Vietnam veteran, essentially mocking him and blocking him from leaving. This man also talked to reporters telling them how he "feared for his life" as he was surrounded by these "beasts".

Many of my Facebook friends condemned the boys and spewed their normal anti-Trump comments. No one got unfriended because I know where they stand on Trump. BUT, the next event was when the truth about the situation came out. A "full length" video (1 hour 45 minutes) appeared and showed that the boys not only DID NOT confront the man, but the man approached them as they were being harrassed by 4 black Israelites. The Black Israelites are a black supremacist group. When the Native American man got up in the face of the one boy who was the target of all the following hate, the boy never raised a hand, never moved, but simply stood still and smiled (some say "smirked", but that is a matter of opinion).

Some of my friends retracted their original statements, and I applaud them for that. But some others could not admit being wrong and doubled down. They found something, anything they could, to not have to admit that a Trump supporter might have one redeeming quality. I read things about how the boy was "disrespectful" to a tribal elder which is far worse than being disrespectful to other adults. His "smirk" brought back memories of "bullies" and "privileged white boys" they grew up with. To be fair some of the teenagers acted like teenagers (oh the horror!), so of course that also makes them a target for hate because they should have handled this with a much more "mature" attitude.

This showed me who these so called "friends" really are. I can no longer make excuses for them. I can no longer find a glimmer of hope that they are not actually toxic, where before, I would justify them with "that is just how they are". It is painful to think that all my discussions with them, when I thought they were actually hearing what I was saying, never added some sort of value to their lives. 

My friendship does not require and depend on you agreeing with me, but it does require that you hear me when I speak. I consider every conversation a precious gem that enhances my life in some way. Whether it be that we agree and find more commonality than we had before, maybe we disagree and it shows me a larger picture than I had considered, or even if it showed some ignorance on either of our sides, but we walk away as more informed or better people for having considered each other's ideas. But when you have so much HATE in your heart (toward Trump in this case) that you cannot hear the truth and accept it, then you have declared, loud and clear, "I AM A TOXIC PERSON!"

What hurts (and surprised me) the most, is that it was more than just one or two people. It hurts that I have been living under the idea that no one can truly be toxic. That there is always hope to somehow help them become a better person. I fooled myself into thinking that I would not be dragged down by them, but I could actually lift them up. And it hurts that I NEED to cut them out of my life. Apparently, our discussions were not discussions at all, they were shouting matches and my "friends" were wearing ear plugs. I am not just speaking about Facebook, but also face to face. I will continue to pray for them, but I cannot expose myself to their toxicity.

So my eyes are now wide open. I will see toxicity for what it really is. This past weekend, I was at a convention, and I heard a speaker say that traditional friendships are built on having a common past. That maybe the best friendships are actually built on having a common future. We hang on to friends because we somehow connect through past associations. But if your path is taking you to a dark place, somewhere that I don't want to go, I may need to let you go and find someone with a common destination who will help me get there. I prefer that you come with me, but YOU will have to choose that for yourself.