Burning limbs

 I found some very old pastel pads. Some of the pastels were not on good paper or just done with very cheap pastels so that they have not survived in good condition, but some later ones are not too bad and I have photographed a few to illustrate how different my style was back then.

I could not draw portraits, I used pastels mainly for art therapy to express my feelings. At this time I was being enveloped in sharp burning, stabbing, spreading pain allover my body and intense pins and needles that would not break despite shaking my legs or arms repeatedly. My veins would expand then collapse. I was desperately ill and disabled  and yet not recognised as such. I became unable to hold even a can of beans or cook or feed myself, I lost the ability to draw for 9 years as my hands became too weak to hold a pastel or coordinate any movement. My eyes blurred with double vision and I was in extreme pain..

This is a picture of the advancing pain as it grew ever up my arms and legs till it had completely taken me over. The purple represents my deepening faith and focus on spirituality to make sense of the never ending agony I was trapped in and had to try to cope with its burning fire in my body.