Andy

Perplexed

My health prevents me from doing a lot of things. Working, dating, exercising, driving - the list goes on. It's turning out that one of the biggest losses is my ability to make phone calls and hold phone conversations. I was never a big phone person per se, but now I have a hard time even picking it up to get a call started. It's kind of hard to explain really, since most people would think of making a call as second nature and easy to do. I suppose the best way to describe it is to imagine you have to learn how to play basketball in the middle of a marathon. It's a one or the other scenario for me in this way. Either I fight through the many physical and mental obstacles my health puts before me, or I fight the difficulty with phone conversations. Thankfully I can handle email and instant messenger conversations with relative ease, so I'm not totally cut off from the world.

Over the years I have done my utmost to maintain a close network of friends at the cost of my health on many occasions, but I increasingly hear from them less and less. I'm at the age where my circle of friends is getting married and finding stable work, so I understand that I may not see them as often as I would like. I feel that my lack of phone capabilities gets in the way as well, but my friends all know I have a hard time with phone calls.

Over the past year or so, however, I find that my emails go unanswered more and more frequently despite this, and frankly, it hurts. My friends all know about my health and that I do email far more easily than I handle the phone, so I feel like they should have the courtesy to answer messages I send in that medium even if it isn't their primary means of communication. 90% of the people I know check their email at work or otherwise have daily access, so unless I'm missing something, that's not a valid excuse. Am I wrong to be bothered by this?