slimjiminy said:
View attachment 111812I'm being invited up to a remote cabin in August again with a few other guys. I have mixed feelings because I barely pulled off the secrecy last time (which is hard to do without a door on the outhouse, for example). My wife is encouraging me to go anyway and just own it if it comes up. I do want to go, so I might. But that level of openness with former coworkers represents a big step for me..
@slimjiminy I missed out on just shy of a FULL YEAR of my life, HIDING! I failed to fish in the bass club tournaments where I was the President and Treasurer (*no one wanted to be Treasurer, so I kept that position as I had held it for over a decade anyway*) and I missed an entire season. I missed out on one of my ALL TIME favorite yearly events to boot! We had a 3 day, 2 night "event" on Lake Ontario on Catfish Creek, just south of Pulaski, NY, in the town of Mexico. This was a 2 day event on NY's "fish for free" weekend as otherwise many of the club members wouldn't go as an out of state fishing license for 3 days in NY costs far more than an entire year in Pa. I LOVED EVERY SECOND of these tournaments and did alright in them. The next year I DID GO and despite my headache so bad that I was throwing up off and on the entire first day, I won the 1st day, the guy who I was a rider with took 2nd. His name is Steve, and he's the downright BEST bass tournament fisherman I've ever had the honor to fish with for an entire season. I let my club normal club partner have use of my boat that entire season*** as I was in no condition to be "captain" so I arranged to fish with Steve as he had a BIG bass boat that I could easily lie down in/on when I needed to. The 2nd day haunts me as I was once again barely able to stand. I can NOT fish sitting! Anyway, I was on track to win both days but in my double vision state when I was culling out what was supposed to be a 13" smallmouth for a 21" PIG, I accidentally let an 18" one go! That cost me the victory that day, knocked me down to 4th place and out of the money by 1 ounce! I did win lunker though with that 21" 5.4lb behemoth. All year I was neck and neck with Steve. This is a guy who has won around $100k in his life, fishing mostly "local" tournaments. His career prevents him from being down south where the REAL MONEY is in bass fishing, but I suspect he'd do pretty good. He didn't have any high end electronics on his boat and we'd go to at least 1 new lake/year and he'd ALWAYS seemingly instinctively know where to go and only once did he not win that tourney though he did take 2nd and win lunker (biggest (weight) bass of the day) and man did I learn a LOT from him. He was a customer of mine forever and that's how I got him to join our private club. Well, at the end of the year Steve won over me by 3 ounces. He wanted to give me the award as he saw the big bass I accidentally culled as I couldn't see straight but I asked him to look at the weight total for the year and tell me what it said. it said he won. I had my best ever year fishing with him and even turned him onto my favorite place, the Susquehanna River. The ONLY tournament I insisted I have my boat back for was the river as I had 2 different outboards I used to be able to switch out in about an hour, by myself with no equipment as I could easily lift (and hold) the outboard up long enough to get a couple of bolts in. One is a 50HP prop outboards, the other a jet. Well, on the Susquehanna, you NEED a jet unless it's running high. We DOMINATED that day with me edging Steve by just under a pound and our total weights combined eclipsed the combined weight of 14 competitors out of the other 20 ! Only 5 limits were caught that day though we were culling within the 1st 90 minutes of the 8 hour event. Limit is 5, culling means you're weeding out smaller bass for bigger ones.
Not only did I mis out on all of that, I took a year off of coaching football and wrestling, yet still had to be there every single day as my son played and wrestled. I did wind up "assisting" with football but not in the same manner as I normally would. Wrestling I more or less hid in a corner. I did NOTHING for 11 months when I finally decided I was NOT going to allow something as minor as me peeing myself to prevent me from living my life!
IF you don't go on this trip, trust me, you're going to regret it for the rest of your life. Before too long, people are going to learn of your issues one way or the other. In 20 years, like me, you'll most likely be so used to them that it's second nature and you rarely think about this as an issue and all of your family and close friends will know of it anyway...AS WELL AS every medical professional you're under the care of.
A good friend of mine is who got me to see the light. He asked me if I would be as embarrassed and secretive if I had cancer, a brain tumor etc. That got me to realize that yes, I did have more issues than most, BUT U-IC was the only one that caused me zero pain (aside from being a pain in the ass at times LOL) and of all of the things affecting my life, that was by far the least significant. Thee are people out there in much more serious situations, medically speaking, who'd give everything they have to switch places with you. Life is life and it's not easy and is far more complex than any of us will ever fully grasp.
My advice is to LIVE! You don't get to go around the board again! this isn't Monopoly. It's Chess. When the game ends, the game ends. You HAVE TO savor every single minute you have as you never know when your last minute is going to arrive.
Like I said, if you'd like to talk, PM me.
CptKirk
I'm being invited up to a remote cabin in August again with a few other guys. I have mixed feelings because I barely pulled off the secrecy last time (which is hard to do without a door on the outhouse, for example). My wife is encouraging me to go anyway and just own it if it comes up. I do want to go, so I might. But that level of openness with former coworkers represents a big step for me..
