It’s November 2021, a year that, in the words of Marshall from How I Met Your Mother, has been a “nasty schoolyard bully of a year” that also won’t seem to stop punching me in the face. But it’s November, and it’s Thanksgiving, and I’d rather contextualize this year in things that I’m grateful for rather than things I’d like to punch the year back for.

I’m grateful for a sister-in-law with a gluten intolerance. Weird, probably would be more acceptable to be grateful for a SIL who is a great addition to our family and who, like a champ, brought one kid with her and made another one while she was with us, and who provides both her perspective and support not just to my brother but to all of us, but I’m a weird person, so I’m gonna focus on the gluten thing. Because this year, I found out I have celiac disease, and it was a pretty crushing blow. Until you find yourself with a major dietary restriction, I don’t think I can accurately describe how much something like that changes the shape of your life. In my family, immediate and extended, we haven’t dealt much with allergies or dietary needs. Celiac disease in particular is one of the more difficult ones, because of how pervasive it is; gluten lurks most often in wheat, but also in a bundle of other ingredients and names that until you start looking for it, you don’t realize how much of it you’re ingesting. Everything from cereal (fun fact, Rice Krispies? Not gluten free. They contain barley malt for flavor, which has gluten) to ice cream (many ice creams use wheat or wheat-based products as thickener) to shredded cheese (wheat as an anti-caking agent) to facewash (I don’t even know, dude) suddenly had to be inspected for gluten, and will be for the rest of my life. Luckily, thanks to my SIL, I already was starting to notice it, and to try gluten-free alternatives. She was empathetic when my diagnosis came back, and was an invaluable resource for gluten-free living tips and tricks while I got my feet back underneath me. She even listened to me whine about the things I missed, and commiserated about the things she also missed, and there’s no more solid bond of sisterhood than the one forged through mutual complaining. I’m very grateful for her and to her for the support she’s given me through this, and I never could have made it without her and her insight.

I’m grateful for my job. To put this into clearest perspective, my job and I fit together like peanut butter and shrimp: if you’re starving, you take what’s available and make the best of it. And the best I can say about my job is that they are very accommodating about the fun new reel of gastrointestinal problems I’ve been dealing with this year, from my surgery to my diet adjustments to the never-ending unpredictable bathroom trips that still run my life. My job is how I was able to get the Covid vaccine so quickly when they became available earlier this year, and my job allows me to keep on top of my bills AND the cool new slang the kids are all into these days (people still dab, right? Poggers). I know there’s a better fit for me that will allow me to accomplish more, but for what it is, my job has been far kinder to me than other employers might have otherwise been.

I’m grateful for my niblings. I work with kids all day, go in tired and come home exhausted, so you’d think that coming home to two more kids would be an issue, but it really, really isn’t. They will have moved out by the time this blog post goes up, but I have cherished the year and a half they’ve been with us. My niece is growing into her spunky bright personality, and my nephew is starting to take notice of things around him and giggle about it, and between the two of them, it’s been much easier to talk myself out of dark mental corners. Plus, there’s a nephew in another state I haven’t even met yet, courtesy of one of my former college roommates, and there’s no way I’m going anywhere without meeting him first. Even with the messes, the crying, and the tantrums, it’s been such a joy to have them so close for these early months of their lives, and I only hope my niblings vaguely remember me and think half as fondly of me as I did and do of the aunts and uncles I lived with as a very young child, too.

I’m grateful for friends who continue to listen. It’s been months of me griping about the strange and disgusting ways my body is betraying me this year, and the only reason why I haven’t bottled it up and snapped is because my friends are still willing, somehow, to bend sympathetic ears my way and offer suggestions when I’ve stress-Googled myself into believing I have three more diseases on top of what I already have and need to ingest live spiders to make them go away (I’m dramatizing, but only just). Complaining is no big deal for me, but actually asking for help or needing someone to listen to me vent some of the pressure in my head before I explode is much harder. It’s very hard to take up more space and time in other people’s lives than I feel I deserve. I normally don’t even tell the people I live with about my day unless I’m asked first, because I don’t want to bother anyone. So having online chat servers with dear friends I don’t get to see very much has been a godsend, because even if no one responds, I still got to tell SOMEONE what was going on, and in doing so, work through my problem on my own, which is mostly what I needed anyway. But having the verbalized love and support of people who care about me and whom I also care about has meant a lot in these isolated Covid years. And having permission to spread out a little and take up a little more space in their lives, even if just over the internet, has meant everything.

I’m grateful for hot showers, for liquid stitches, for comfortable couches. I’m grateful for storage units and squeaky car problems that sound like one very expensive thing and turn out to be another non-expensive thing. I’m grateful for face masks and for scarves and for my weird insistence that I keep trying tea until I eventually found something that works for me. I’m grateful for blankets that were gifts from friends and hoarded away within close reach. I’m grateful for loved ones who ask “how’ve you been?” and are patient when I decide to answer honestly rather than politely. I’m grateful for remote ways of keeping in touch with people, for remote doctor’s appointments, for remote D&D games. I’m grateful for long-awaited TV programs and surprise second season announcements. I’m grateful for music, for some Disney movies, for baby gates, and for the drawing app on my iPad. I’m grateful for companies that put out exceptional gluten-free alternatives (Oreos, you’ve outdone yourselves, now bring me more flavors), and companies that change their recipes to make their products gluten-free (candy cane Kisses foreverrrrr). I’m especially grateful for the Covid-19 vaccine and how it protected me and my family when I got exposed and by all odds should have caught it. (If you’re reading this and still dragging your feet about getting vaccinated, here’s my personal testimonial: this thing is a miracle and saves lives. Get vaccinated. Stay masked. Protect your loved ones. Do your part.)

Yeah, I’m not gonna sugarcoat it: this year has sucked a lot for me. It’s been hard and made me feel worthless and weak and ashamed, and has been teaching me humility and reliance on others in ways I was very stubborn about learning how to do before. Making a list of the things I’m grateful for doesn’t make the things I’m upset about or struggling with go away. But even for a minute, it does put the bad bits into perspective. So I’m grateful for that, too.