Reeling

I just found out a friend of mine has multiple brain tumors that must be removed as soon as possible.

I'm reeling.

People are strong, I know.

We all do what we need to do in situations to move forward.

But that poor woman.  That poor family.  Those poor kids.

Life just seems to keep getting harder.  Don't you think?  Am I the only one who feels like the older I get, the harder things get?  

I think we all need a break.  

When the hell is recess.

Speaking Of . . .

I'm out of sorts with all sorts things on my mind . . .

I just sent my son upstairs for the rest of his life, or at least until supper, whichever comes first.  Judging by my current mood, it's a toss up which will occur first.  I tend to lose my appetite when I'm angry, which makes me wonder why I'm not down to 80 lbs by now.

Speaking of bodies . . .

From the "I Guess It Was Formica I Knocked On" file, I now am nursing a pinched nerve.  As soon as I published the last post (on getting on with my life and leaving the body stuff to my body), I started to feel the beginnings of a pinched nerve.  After a year of not feeling up to par, I have become a rather impatient patient.

Speaking of patience . . .

My house is a mess.  Why is it that when I am feeling well enough to clean it, the mess doesn't bother me, but the moment I am not up to cleaning it, it is my fervent wish to do so?

Speaking of laziness . . .

I have the chance to enroll my son, the one upstairs for the rest of his life, in a little 2-hour lesson in harvesting sap from maple trees (to make into syrup) this Sunday.  I have considered enrolling him, but am not sure he won't be mugging our two maples trees from now on.  So I am leaning against it, yet feeling like a lazy mother for doing so.

Speaking more about laziness . . . 

Remember the mudroom project?  Me neither . . . except when I try to find something or pass through the family room (which now holds all the things evacuated from said mudroom), or do laundry.

And . . .

Do you think McDonald's Filet-O-Fish really qualify as a legitimate Lenten Friday meal?  I don't.  The other equal in my household does.  I can only hold out so long.  This is going on my List (the List St. Peter checks at the pearly gates), I know it, and suspect it is my husband's plan for getting away from me sometime before the here'after.  

Speaking of real men . . .

Why haven't I ever seen a Robert Mitchum movie until now?  And why aren't there more men like that in Hollywood anymore?

Speaking of movie mysteries . . .

 

Why is Leonardo DiCaprio slated to play Frank Sinatra in the long-awaited Scorsese film when it is quite obvious to me that Jude Law would make a much better "Ole Blue Eyes?"  I guess this would go in the "If You Want Something Done Right" file.

Well, my husband has arrived home with a McDonald's bag the size of a shopping bag.  Guess it's time to call my son down . . .

I Begin Again.

Last year at this time, I was sitting in a paper gown, answering questions, feeling my heart pound, and holding my husband's hand.  My surgery was scheduled for 11:30. 

My surgery went smoothly and I woke up in the recovery room, dreaming of my childhood basset hound, and missing my left adrenal gland. 

It had to go.  It had grown a mass.  It was kind enough to make it a benign mass, but it was creating extremely elevated cortisol (stress hormone) levels and jeopardizing my health and longevity. 

It has been a long year.  The offending adrenal gland had been so over-producing for so long that my remaining adrenal gland had stopped working.  Well, much like an under-paid, under-appreciated employee who suddenly receives double duty, the under-utilized adrenal gland does not rush back to production.  It took months for the stubborn little gland to come back to life, and, while I took enough cortisol in pill form to stay alive, a cortisol deficit is quite debilitating.  For months I felt fluish and weak and exhausted and cold.  Then I improved to just weak and exhausted and cold.  By the time I improved to just exhausted and cold, I was quite grateful.  I am now almost back to normal, but a normal I have not known in years, for that over-active adrenal gland has marred my idea of normal.

I still feel cold almost every minute, and tired is always right behind me like a shadow.  But I am better.  And I am alive.  And, I am told, I am healthy. 

Now to get my head to believe it.

I have spent so much time being sick, and then more time feeling sick, that now I don't seem to believe that I am no longer sick.  And so I apologize to all who are sick.  I know how lucky I am.  My condition was reversible.  It has been reversed, and I am all but totally recovered.  Now I just need to grab hold of life and live it again.  To begin again.  Without any grudges.

So here I go.  I am closing out the year of feeling unwell and monitoring every symptom.  Of not trusting my body.  Of focusing on its limitations and shortcomings.  I am going to trust my body now, enough to focus on living my life, and leave the day-to-day running of things to my body again which is healthy and is trustworthy and is strong.

I begin again.   

   

Thank you for listening.

From the "Whoops" File of Parenting

Ever get the feeling you can't do anything right on a given day? 

So I went in to wake my daughter this morning and found her hot-faced, extremely drowsy, and complaining of various aches and pains.  Suspecting the annual holiday ailment had come after all, if a bit late, I kept her home.  I felt so ahead of the game . . . avoiding the dreaded call from the school nurse, noting that I'd rolled the dice and lost. 

I oh-so efficiently tucked her back into bed and encouraged her to rest.  After about an hour more rest, she was right as rain.  So right, in fact, she was wrong.  A lot.  Today.  We won't get into all of her misdeeds today; though I can be spotted lamenting some of it over at Anna's blog (Chickens in the Basement) earlier this morning.  Suffice it to say, it bespoke of a child who was bored and should have been in school today.  Ooops.

Well, you may ask, what's so bad about that?  Better safe than sorry.  No harm done. 

But you would only know half the story.

The other half entails picking up my son from school.  I picked up a pleasant, happy little boy whose day was reportedly "pretty good."  We talked all the way home about the new pens his teacher had passed out to the class today -- the first time using pens in school . . . a leap from nine right over to at least fifteen years old by his measure!  By the time we got home and he got his jacket off, he was pale . . . prompting me to ask, "What's the matter?"  He admitted having had a bit of a headache all day.  (uh-oh)  And by the time he'd put his lunchbox away and washed his hands, his paleness had turned red-faced and weepy, reporting a "big headache now." 

So now the one who was home "sick" from school is disappointed that the one who did go to school today is too sick to play. 

Whoops. 

Clean Bathroom -- An End to the Suffering

Well, I got my first-floor bathroom completely scrubbed, disinfected, polished, and re-opened to the public.  I had closed the bathroom to all not-sick family members in an effort to contain the nasty stomach virus that wracked my daughter and my husband last week.  Thankfully, all the sick family members are well again . . . and worthy to share a bathroom.

No one is more relieved than my son. 

He wasn't sick this week, mind you.  He was one of the healthy ones.  Upon hearing the announcement that said bathroom had now been re-opened to the public, he sighed with relief, "Oh good!  It's been a hard week, Mommy." 

Yah, nevermind the ones who were throwing up and writhing in headache pain . . . my son had to actually go upstairs to use the bathroom.  Now that's suffering! 

Kids.

Counter Attack: The Sick Child

My daughter is sick. 

Well, that's it.  We've entered the sick zone and early this year.  Once someone in our family gets sick during the school year, it seems the entire family is on a merry-go-round of viruses and colds for the rest of the school year.  Someone either has it, is getting over it, or is coming down with it. 

Last year, it hit late and we missed all the holidays while we took turns being sick.  Perhaps I should be happy it has begun early; maybe, just maybe, we will have had everything by Christmas.

So how is the front hall coming, you may ask?  What front hall, I will answer.  I haven't entered the front hall unless it's to take my son -- the one still-functioning family member -- to school. 

Have I straighted the jackets and sorted through the shoes?  No, but I have gotten out extra blankets and everyone's favorite pajamas.

Have I washed the floor and put out the area rug for winter?  No, but I have washed the carpet next to my daughter's bed and all carpet between her bed and the bathroom.  uck.

Have I put the fall wreath on the door?  No, but I've pulled the chicken carcasses out of the freezer and made chicken soup.  Nothing says fall -- and sick -- like a house that smells like chicken soup. 

So, see, just when I thought my biggest problem was a dirty, messy house, I grow wiser.  Yes, my house was a mess, but my kids were playing and happy.  I may have been overwhelmed by so much to do, but my husband still wanted to take me out for lunch. 

Hopefully, my daughter will feel better soon and my son will not get this nasty virus.  Hopefully, my husband will feel better and I will not get this nasty virus. 

In the meantime, I will dispense juice and crackers, I will make chicken soup, I will change bedding and take temperatures, and I will speak soothing words.  If the house gets a little cleaner here and there, when I have time, so much the better.  If not, I will be happy when my daughter is feeling better and my husband, too. 

Better a happy, healthy, messy house than a quiet, clean, neat, sick one . . . my house is a home, afterall, not a hospital ward.

Knitting, Napping, and Modeling

I'm feeling better today, but still have a ways to go.  With appointments and other commitments every day beginning tomorrow, I decided to really rest up today and spent the day pretty much doing nothing.

Well, the brood got fed and off to school and work.  The non-school goers also got fed and tended to.  Then it was pretty much saltines, pills, fluids, knitting, and America's Next Top Model.  I think I watched the entire 2005 season, in between naps. 

And I'm on the last bit of a fun little scarf I'm knitting which, for some reason, seems to be taking forever.  Once it's finished, I'll show you.

I also learned various modeling proverbs such as "one's neck can never look too long," "you smile with your eyes, not your mouth," and "there is such a thing as being too pretty."  Sadly, I've never come across these proverbs in my own life. 

Oh well.

Today I can breathe, and I'll bet tomorrow I will lose the sweats.  Life is good . . . even with a short neck that's never been accused of being too pretty.

A Letter to My Doctor

Health care, and its shortcomings, are all over the news these days.  Like everything else, there is room for impovement in the health care industry.  But today, I am very happy with the health care I received and thought I must say it.

I couldn't sleep last night.  The minute I laid down, it felt like my lungs began shrinking in until I couldn't breathe.  I moved downstairs to the reclining chair, maybe sitting up would work better.  Still couldn't sleep.  My husband was nice enough to sleep on the couch downstairs with me (I think he feels bad about the jimmie jar).  I wheezed and coughed and worried my way through the night.

When I called my doctor's office this morning and described my symptoms, they had me come right over.  Thirty minutes later, I walked into a packed waiting room.  I felt guilty as I sat down in the last chair -- I would have tried not to sit near anyone.  I settled in for a long wait because I knew they would we working me into what was clearly a busy schedule.

They called me back within 5 minutes.

My doctor was in to see me within 2 minutes.  He listened, he poked, he prodded, and he wrote out a bunch of prescriptions.  It seems I have severe broncitis . . . this is what I get for ignoring a cough for most of the summer.  He gently patted me on the arm and told me I'd be feeling better very soon and that he'd see me again in two weeks. 

I thanked him for working me into such a hectic morning.  He explained that, actually, he didn't have any patients scheduled for the morning.  It is his paperwork morning.  (Any policy wonks out there, take note:  paperwork morning.  Hmmm) 

My doctor wasn't seeing patients this morning.  The patients in the waiting room were there to see other doctors.  He had taken me this morning out of the kindness of his heart.  He could have had me see one of the other doctors there, and they could have made me wait forever since I was not scheduled. 

When I went to fill my three prescriptions on the way home, they had them ready.  My doctor had ordered them online.  A line formed behind me in the time it took the pharmacist to explain the complicated regimen and schedule for all these medications.  She took her time, and I walked out of there clear on everything -- quite a feat seeing how foggy-headed I was from no sleep, no air, and too many over-the-counter meds. 

I got home and did exactly what my doctor and the pharmacist told me to do.  Eight hours later, I am markedly better.  Still miserable, but better.

Perhaps the health care industry has improvements to make.  But for this patient, this day, things couldn't have gone better.  I hope we don't get so caught up in politics that we become jaded to the valuable health care we do receive.  I not only received care today, I received care. 

So I thank my doctor, tonight and always, for that.