i can cry if i want to

i cried alot. that is def an understatement. the doctors said i had less control over my emotions, but the truth of the matter was that there was nothing to be happy about. i hated when people told me to stop crying because it wasnt like i wanted to cry. i knew crying wasnt a good look for me and they had no idea how shitty i was feeling. you would cry too if it happened to youuuu. for 13 days in the icu, there was no laughter only tears. but then on the 14th day, something magical happened. i laughed. there was no smile yet because i couldnt move the muscles of my mouth and there was no voice because my vocal cords werent working yet, but if you listened closely there was laughter. it was my birthday and ankur and laju said something crazy. and then it happened again, when bobbak, neil, and subie told me they had first gone to the wrong hospital, and then again when leah and jen gave me a singing balloon. and the laughter continued-whether it was my dads poor jokes, my brothers funny lines, my inside jokes with baldeep, my old memories with rajul or the ridculous things nisha would say that leave me laughing for hours, days, and weeks after. when you feel like crying all the time it feels really good to laugh. really good. now i even have a smile to accompany my laugh, not a symmetric smile but a smile nonetheless. i even had a sound to my laugh, not a very pretty sound, but at least it was something. i learned to laugh at myself too which made this awful situation a little better. like when leah made fun of my old wheelchair or when baldeep coined a term for how my family transfers me, the"bachu toss" (bachu is his nickname for me), they made the things i was most embarrassed about seem funny. they always treated me like they used to which was so refreshing. i also loved watching comedies like friends because for those 23 minutes, i could just get lost in ross's awkwardness and phoebes craziness, get some genuine, free laughs and forget my situation. nowadays, iprobably laugh just as much as i cry, which is still pretty bad, but hey its an improvement. i love laughing because for that one little second, that one fleeting moment, i could escape my reality.