Is false hope better than no hope at all?

It depends on what you classify as false hope to begin with. I can only speak for myself so here goes.

I would like to hope that when I die I will be reunited with my boyfriend who passed away almost 6 years ago now. I don’t believe in resurrection but I believe in some sort of spirit realm. Some may say this is false hope but the existence of spirits or that of a spirit realm can’t be proven beyond reasonable doubt one way or the other so I don’t see this hope as false. I am not using this hope to delude myself. I have fully accepted that he has passed and no longer of this world and that there’s nothing I can do to change that (as much as I may want to).

I know a lot of people struggle with bereavement, I know I have but I think as long as you are not using this kind of hope to live in a make believe world where the one you loved didn’t actually die and not accepting that they are gone then I think this kind of hope is ok.

I have done things since Steven’s death that would make you think I have lost my mind (and at times I have wondered that myself) but I am (more than) fully aware that he is gone and can never come back to this world again and that all the things I have done (getting tattoos etc) will never change that but it makes life without him a little more bearable so I continue to do them in order to stay sane and nothing else.

The type of hope I see as false is this. I was born with Cerebral Palsy and use a wheelchair and sticks to get about. It would be plain stupid for me to hope that I could wake up one day and suddenly be able to walk unaided (although I did when I was younger but, what child didn’t have ridiculous hopes and dreams? That’s what being a child is all about but that’s opening another can of worms so I’ll leave that there). There is also no cure for it so the only sensible thing I can hope for is that I live my life to the best I can with what I’ve got and hope that I can stay as mobile as possible for as long as possible.

I live in my own flat with minimal support from carers and although I feel glad to be able to be that independent there’s always part of me that wishes I didn’t need help to get up and showered in the mornings and such like but I know that I will always need that little bit extra help than most so there is no point in me hoping otherwise because a time where I need no help at all will never come. Let’s face it; it’s not just disabled people that need help in life. Everybody needs some degree of help so to hope to be completely independent in my eyes is just a waste of time and energy.

There are things concerning my life with my disability that are worth hoping. Public’s perception of disabled people is not great but it is changing (albeit slowly) and I hope that one day that people will just treat us like everyone else and see us no different from themselves and that as disabled people we will have access to the services and equipment we need without having to fight for it.

Like I say things are changing so hoping that they continue to change is a hope worth having. This is maybe a bit off topic but there are so many things in my life that I have accomplished that I never thought possible (or may not have been a possibility in the past). Had I been born before I was I would never have been able to be educated in the mainstream system. As it stands I came out of school with the “normal” amount of Standard Grades, went on and did stuff in college (both daytime and evening courses) and it’s only really now at 26 years old that I’m beginning to get a better idea of what I want to do with my life. I would like to get my writing published or at least look into doing more with my writing than just putting it online and giving it to whoever inspired it (not that I don’t enjoy that. I just feel that if I was able to get some of it in print it would be such an accomplishment). I can only write when inspired (or depressed but that’s another can of worms) so I’d love to be able to do more with photography when I wasn’t writing. Although you could say I already do that. We have this “Almost Famous” metal festival every year in my home town for high school rock and metal bands to showcase and I go there as photographer. I would like to do more with that though. Just realised I’m rambling.

I guess what I was trying to say in among all that was that I am glad to have been born when I was as I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to do most of the things I have and I would imagine that some people who dreamt/hoped to do these things may have at one point thought that it was pointless to hope as it would never happen. It’s even happened in my lifetime. I was born 6 and a half weeks premature and that is probably the reason for my disability now but I see babies being born more prematurely than me now and because of more advanced medical technology some of these babies have absolutely nothing wrong with them.

To avoid this turning into a novel I think I’d better try and tie things up. I guess what I am trying to say is that hope is needed in life. Without hope there’s sometimes not much point to things. I don’t know if there is false hope as such. I have given you some examples of both realistic hope and false hope for myself but I think something that may be an example of false for me may not be for someone else. I think what is realistically achievable is subject to the person who is hoping or dreaming it.

As for is false hope better than no hope then I would be inclined to say yes but only if the person in question is fully or at least partially aware of what is achievable and worth hoping for and what is false hope and they know that believing it wont actually help make it a reality but in fact just make life that bit more bearable (like in the case of me hoping to be with Steven again once I die). Otherwise there is no point wasting time with false hope.

There was a time after I lost Steven when I did lose my mind and lost touch with what was real and what wasn’t. I wanted to wake up and find out that it had all been a sadistic joke and that Steven was still alive (especially with the post mortem coming back non conclusive and Steven being a healthy 17 year old apart from his own disability). Once again I am drifting off.

I am back in reality now though and the delusions I had whilst ill are gone so I hope that what I have written here gets you thinking as much as the interview I heard you mention wanting to look into hope and false hope in it inspired me to think and write this and that you weren’t bored by the end of it MAS! Yes I do think about and analyse everything and second guess myself way too much for my own good. Probably why I am at least half mad! Ok I’ll stop now or it really will become a novel