vine/shuffle/jumping jack/hook

Dear Internet,
When I came up with ThePlan, part of the mind/body connection was to get in shape. I’ve been in shape on and off for years, but after being laid up for nearly 18 months from my surgery a few years ago, the in shape part has thrown me ever so far for a loop.
Doing ThePlan has been a massive struggle. I’ve started out strong, fall back, start out strong again, and fallen back again. I’ve made huge mistakes and have claimed some small victories, but it’s been hard to really gauge how I’m doing. I know the bipolar is a mess, even with the drugs it’s been so sporadic, I’ve often wondered if my best bet is to put myself into a psychiatric hospital. But then I’m not really sure what it will do for me outside of what I’m doing now, which is drugs and talk therapy. I am so desperate to have some kind of stability to get me moving forward that I’m willing to do just about anything to grab at it.
I do not want to be at the head space I was late in 2014. Never ever.
So many people are upset/angry/disappointed in me right now, that normally I would find myself begging for forgiveness. With some of them, I have. But the most important thing is to get my head and body into some semblance of stability so I don’t keep making the same mistakes over and over again.
Which is why I was at a 6AM kickboxing class this morning.
I have been walking the track at the local Y every morning this week, and meditating, even on the days when I felt like I could barely get out of bed. Yesterday morning was particularly bad as I felt like even doing my 8 laps around the inside track was going to do me in. Even having heart raising pop music to make it fun, wasn’t doing it for me. When I got home, my brain was on such fire, I planted my hands on the kitchen sink, huffing cold air via the open window to calm me down.
And like a switch, it’s off again and I start to feel better. I’m sure the Klonopin helped.
The issue with me is that for most of the time, I present as high functioning (as well as a medical curiosity). I’ve been able to accomplish a lot in my life that most bipolars cannot: I’ve finished school, not once but thrice. I’ve had long term relationships. I’ve held down jobs. I’m not on drugs and I’m not promiscuous (two massive bipolar traits).
But it’s a struggle. It’s all a struggle to do these things and stay on the golden path. I’m not sure where I get the strength to push myself forward, but it’s there and it’s real. I’ve grown up with having little or no support for this disease and the only person I could count on is myself. Even those who are close to me, who have given me support and understanding, can only do so much.
I have to continue to save myself. No one else can do this for me. At times, I’ve been wholly naive to think they could, but they can’t. I’m going to go forward and I’m going to fuck up again. But I have to recognize, really recognize, that I am human and I’m bound to make mistakes. The goal, then, is to catch myself during these mistakes and right them before they get out of hand.
Throw in my other conditions (borderline personality disorder, anxiety, ADHD), and I’ve got a delightful cocktail of fire happening in my brain.
TSTBEH recently finished my book and found it weird and insightful. Weird because he was there during that year in San Francisco, my love, and insightful because he was able to judge me then versus me now. Then I was careless, an asshole, out of control, and financially unstable. I’ve made extraordinary strides not to be that person and he did comment on that. I’m much more able discern when the crazy is coming and how to do some kind of self-care, even when it feels like I’ve fallen off the wagon. But there are a lot of patterns still being repeated, that I’m continually self-sabotaging my own happiness by believing that external things will make me happy (which, to be fair, I’ve discovered they actually do not). That I don’t allow myself to take pleasure in the small things or accomplishments (woo! I have three degrees! Who’d see that coming?).
I can do a lot of things.
Some have called this site nothing but navel gazing, which to be honest, it is. This site is a blessing and a curse. A blessing because it is my own form of talk therapy and a curse because it has all of memories from it all, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Most of all, it’s a crucial reminder of my own humanity.
I’m not asking anyone for forgiveness. I’m not asking anyone to stand by me, but what I am asking is that you understand. You understand that for me, daily existence is a struggle. That for what some of you seem like simple tasks, for me are sometimes monumental journeys.
But I can taste the joy. I’ve seen it and I’ve felt it, the closest I’ve come in a very long time, if ever. Working towards that joy, no matter what methods I use, is my new drug.
I hope to be addicted for a very long time.
xoxo,
Lisa

This Day in Lisa-Universe: 2014, 2003, 2001, 1999

into which the cosmos will collapse once again

Dear Internet,
In January, I found out I was soon going to be out of a job.
In February, I lost my beloved Wednesday.
In June, it was revealed I am co-defendant in a $1.25M defamation case.
In August, I separated from my husband.
The last 72 hours have been a corporeal version of bipolar. The cycling in this house, between the two of us, is so fast and furious, the sheer amount of  willpower to keep myself together has been exhausting.
Yet, this is the most lucid and clear I’ve felt in years.
The tl;dr is I will never see his joyful face in my Instagram feed. There is not a single picture, with perhaps the exception of our wedding photo four years ago, where he looks like he wants to be there.
The condensed version is I’ve struggling with leaving him for the last two years. Shortly after my 40th birthday, I had the arthritis ankle surgery. Several months later, I knew I was in such a bad place, I sought out help. I wanted to be sure that whatever feelings I had were because of the crazy, not because I was unhappy in the relationship. On paper, my relationship looked flawless.
During all of this, I would voice my concerns to him, tell him what was going on in my head. We would have these big sit down talks about the status of the relationship. I would continue to work on making me whole, he would do his bit.
But he never really did.
And since I am the Guinness world holder for navel gazing, I documented all of it here, so I know, I KNOW, I fought for my marriage and for him. But after two years, and not seeing myself or ourselves go forward, I knew I had to make a choice: Me or my marriage.
I choose me.
He’s angry right now and he’s lashing out at me, and I take it because I am not arguing, debating, or correcting his impressions. I’m a terrible person because he stuck through with the surgery and the crazy, why can’t I wait for him? He vilifies me in one breath and tells me I’m the love of his life in the other.
I’m selfish because I am not keeping to my vows. The same vows he ridiculed for years because as we all know, he only married me to give me health insurance.
There is more to this, ALWAYS more to this, but this is all that you need to know. For now. When the time comes, and it will, to examine with microscopic intensity the demise of my relationship, I will commit it all here.
As for me? Well. I have nothing left to lose anymore. I have lost everything. So, once the home is sold and the divorce is settled, I’m leaving Michigan. Hopefully for good this time. I always come back to lick my wounds here, but there is nothing left is this state for me anymore and hasn’t been for a very long time. Of those I’m leaving behind that I care about, I am sorry, but I cannot be here anymore.
I’m heading to the east coast, going to couch hop for a bit, and then find a place to settle.  Get myself a sunny apartment, and with my teddy bear in one hand and a pug leash in the other, start over.
xoxo,
Lisa

This day in Lisa-Universe: 2011, 2008, 2003

daily walk: welcome to my neighorhood

Dear Internet,
Last night we straight up went Bacchian on the forbidden deliciousness of pizza that we had delivered. As I was predictably feeling terrible this morning when I woke up at around 6AM, I decided there was no point to me laying wide awake in bed staring at the ceiling and I should get up and go do something.
That go do something turned into a brisk walk around my neighborhood.1
As I start to sort my daily schedule, one thing I wanted to make sure to happen, regardless of weather, was that I got up and walked a mile each day around my neighborhood.2 One, it would give me some exercise. Two, it would get me out of the house. Three, I could use this to loosely train for a competitive 5K walk. Four, it would help with the water retention happening in my ankle. Five, exercise helps with the crazy.
So really, there is no reason why I shouldn’t be doing this even if i it is the only thing I’m doing.
As I was walking this morning in the light drizzel, I thought it would be a great idea to get a picture of something that strikes my fancy that I see on my walk and post it as well as my distance and times. This will serve no purpose to really anyone but me, but what the fuck. Let’s see how much I can do this.
welcome
Distance: 1.32 miles
Walk time: 23:32 minutes
Pace: 16:56/mile
For a fat girl with sketchy ankles, I sure do walk fast. And this is my normal speed.
After I came home, I woke TheHusband up show me for the fourth time how to make a smoothie so I can do it on my own. Turned out much easier than I thought and despite the fact it looks like green slime, it is actually quite delicious.
Throbbing Manor Smoothie (base)

  • 8oz orange juice
  • 2 leaves + steams of a major green (I used chard this morning)
  • 1 heaping tsp of hemp protein
  • 1 heaping tsp of chia seeds
  • 1 1/2 cups of frozen fruit (we are currently using mixed fruit)

Add ingredients into blender of your choice in the order above, making sure at the very least the juice is  added first. Blend until thoroughly liquid and then pour into a glass and serve. Makes about 16oz of smoothie.
Variations: If OJ is not on hand, use about a cup or so of ice and swap out the frozen fruit for fresh. The recipe is flexible enough that you really just need liquid + green + fruit to get you going with protein powders added for extra nutrition.
xoxo,
Lisa
P.S. If I feel a bit — forced on excitement on this whole thing, I have found the more I fake being excited about something I dread, then discovering it is not akin to torture, I tend to be more open to continuing said thing. Rainbow sparkles unicorn poop for all.

1. It took me longer to find my earbuds, sort out music/podcast options, sync everything together, change, put shoes on then it did to do the actual walk. Next time should be a lot faster getting ready.
2. I use the web version of Gmaps Pedometer/Miler Meter to map routes and then sync it with the iOS version and then use Walkmeter to track time/distance/pace. While both are free, I upgraded both to get the extra features. Since it’s cumbersome to use both, and MilerMeter has a shitty interface on iOS, I hope to get intimate with Walkmeter to use it’s full potential.

This Day in Lisa-Universe: 2011, 1999

shoes

Dear Internet,
It is nearly two years since my surgery and where I should be versus where I actually am are two wholly different things.
Whenever I get angry about the state of my feet, I seem to conveniently forget I was laid up for four months after surgery number one, on a wound vac for another two, then laid up again for another two months before finally being released from care nearly a year after the first surgery. Of course I’m not going to be where I think I should be at — nor would anyone else.
Logic and rational are not players in this game. When the world in my head is crashing, far easier to blame something you cannot control versus something you can.
In this case, the size of my feet.
This was much of my attitude this morning on my way to work. TheHusband had gifted me with a pair of fairly expensive ballet flats for the holidays, a pair similar to the brethren I purchased last summer. Instead of leather, however, the fabric was cloth so when I slid my feet into them the shoes had no stretch.
That is something I have to account for now post-surgery: my feet will be different sizes during the day and I need shoes to be flexible to fit that criteria. The company’s reputation for customer service was earned when a new pair in leather arrived on my doorstep, same size as the previously purchased pair, which I threw into my travel bag when I hopped a flight to San Francisco for a job interview in April.
During that trip, the new pair felt odd but I couldn’t put my finger on why the shoes felt weird. They went on easily enough but they didn’t fit right. I sized the new pair against their brethren and found the new pair was 1/2″ shorter than the pair I had been wearing for months. I contacted the company who sent me out another pair in the same size — maybe the first replacement was a mismatch? Nope. The now third pair of flats were matched up against my happily worn pair also had the same problem. Perhaps my original pair was the mismarked ones then? I sent the request in for another pair to exchange, this time for a size up which arrived the day of my birthday.
A size 12.
For some reason I’m recalling my first pair of adult shoes was purchased when I was 9 or 10, in a woman’s size 10. I have always not been tall, so size 10s at a young age made sense to me. I wore 10s for most of my early teenage years and into my 20s when the 10s stopped fitting — weight gain, arthritis, life — moved me into 11s. A few years ago when trying to size running shoes, the sales person tried to convince me I needed 12s not 11s and I laughed in her face. I don’t care WHAT your scale says, I wear 11s and then proceeded to stomp out the store in due form.
Because I apparently cannot have fat feet.
Feet change and they grow (and shrink!); they are not consistent no matter how much we want them to be. The part of our body that we abuse the most, we treat with so little respect. This is not a treatise to feet, but maybe it should be.
I tried on the 12s, which fit like a glove out of the box. I attempted to get over myself on the shoe size prejudice. A size meant nothing if they fit well and were comfortable and this was true of the new pair. My right foot, now an 11.5w thanks to the surgeries felt great. The left foot? 10.5b felt a little loose. I can make this work, I thought. I added on a pair of secret lady socks to keep my feet in place (leather!) and went about my merry little way.
Except yes, my feet do change. By the time I was leaving work nine hours later, my right foot had ballooned (as it tends to do after a day where I’m on my feet a lot) and was snug in its shoe. The left shoe, however, flapped off my foot like an evil clown smiling to children as I walked.
I angrily walked to my car, feeling as if my frustration of my life was based solely on this pair of ill-fitting shoes. Why couldn’t I own a nice pair of shoes that fit?  How was the first pair I purchased a perfect fit but its brethren were horrible matches? Why was everything so complicated? Why were people such assholes? Why can’t we have nice things?
Why am I so angry over a pair of shoes?
xoxo,
Lisa

This Day in Lisa-Universe:

Collectioun of Cunnynge Curioustes: February 2, 2013

Johann Georg Hainz's Cabinet of Curiosities, circa 1666. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Johann Georg Hainz’s Cabinet of Curiosities, circa 1666. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

During the Renaissance, cabinet of curiosities came into fashion as a collection of objects that would often defy classification. As a precursor to the modern museum, the cabinet referred to room(s), not actual furniture, of things that piqued the owners interest and would be collected and displayed in an aesthetically pleasing manner. Collectioun of Cunnynge Curioustes is my 21st century interpretation of that idea.
Dear Internet,
This past week, I had surgery to fix a permanent “squirrelly suture” that was a result from my surgery last summer. Since Tuesday, I’ve been spending most of my days in a lovely drugged haze, in which I have just enough attention to watch a lot of vaguely bad TV in between my gentle snores. The recovery is, fingers crossed, planned to not be as exacting as last summers. I go back to the ortho docs on February 18th for follow up, with hopes to go back to work on February 19th. I’m zero weight baring, so the knee scooter is back. But I spend my days in bed, foot elevated, zoning in and out depending on when I’ve taken the drugs. Shortly after I came home from the surgery, Kristin and I had to write up a proposal for conference submission and it was the hardest thing I could ever do, because  I could not concentrate long enough to cobble two sentences together. Somehow we managed to get the proposal together, but the sheer amount of will it took to write that proposal told me I was not cognizant enough to do anything serious this week. Give me a few days, and I’ll have more of a proper update for you.
Watching
Hyperdrive
I plowed through the entire series in one day. Quick, short, and dripping in sci-fi cultural references, it’s great fun!
Red Dwarf
Beloved cult classic, I started on season one this week and mixed it up with Hyperdrive.
Fringe
Another show I missed when it first aired, so playing catch up via Amazon Instant Video.
Also watching: Spartacus, The Americans, Archer, and Project Runway.
Links

  • Downton Abbey as envisioned as a SNES game
  • For sale: a Hemingway story, never written
  • William Shakespeare gave the English language over 2000 words, here are 20 of them.

 
x0x0,
Lisa

Need vs Want

Dear Internet,
When I came home from work today, I found myself bemused in my driveway when I realized I had not thought of or worked on my NaNoWriMo story at all today. Now that I’m getting back to working five days a week instead of three, I’m still working on a schedule to make everything fit. I’ve also taken on a part-time gig for a committee work I’m involved with at MPOW, which I have to also get cracking on as well this weekend.
Balance.
Our plans for the evening was to head to a concert, which we ended up bailing on as TheHusband wasn’t feeling well and I was feeling tired. My body seems more delicate then I remember it ever being, which seems exacerbated by the complications of my recovery from my arthritis surgery in June. If you’re not following me on across the usual haunts, the tl;dr version is this:

June 28th, I had arthritis surgery on my right ankle to remove nearly 20 years of bone chip/spurs from my original accident in 1995. I was planning on being down for the count for a few weeks, but I was bed bound for nearly 2.5 months and out of work for nearly three months. The number of times I left the house, nay went downstairs, during July and August can be counted on one hand, with some left over. My recovery has been so slow1 they have installed a wound vac, which I wear 24/7 and I have to charge up nightly.

While I was eating my dinner tonight of rather bland canned soup, I was flipping through several back issues of The Writer and Writer’s Digest. As I read quips, advice, and interviews, the one thing that kept popping up in my brain was the idea of need vs want in genre writing. I want to write thought provoking but not necessarily heavy stories while I need to write the dark and spooky stuff to work out all of my monsters. I mused that when constructing characters, I try so desperately to keep bits of me out of them, the darker bits, for reasons only known to my subconscious self. My heart tells me I’m not ready to go down that road right now, that writing the fluffier pieces will help get me off the ground. The fluffier pieces may be good, but the darker pieces is what will create my mythos.
I’m keeping those monsters at bay, until the time when I can properly pull them out slowly, one by one, into the daylight to acclimate them to this outer world. Then perhaps they won’t seem so scary.
ttfn,
Lisa

1. The first question I hear is, “Are you diabetic?” so I’ll just cut you off at the chase and tell you that no, I’m not diabetic. Yes, I do get checked on a regular basis. No, I do not have poor circulation. No, I am not a smoker and have not been one for a very long time. No, they do not know why it is taking me so long to heal. Yes, I’m getting checked by the doctors on a bi-monthly basis.

Thruster, Mover, Inciter

Dear Internet,
It’s a beautiful afternoon here at Throbbing Manor and I plan on taking full advantage of it before the cold eventually sets in. Since I’ve spent most of the summer, okay all of the summer, cooped up in the house, the desire to be outside sometimes borders on desperation.
TheHusband and I got into one of our many fake fights this morning because I’ve not been after the doctor’s and physical therapist’s rules to the letter. When he pointed out this was the exact same behavior as my mother1, I decided if there was any good time to change it would be now. I’ve been monitoring my behaviors all summer to figure out routines which would not only work on my days off from the library, but also I could easily modify as I move from working part to full time.
The big time suck, of course, is social networking. You cannot just login and read Twitter/Facebook/Tumblr or whatever your vice is and get off (figuratively and literally) in a short amount of time. There is some stickiness to this wicket as many of my friends are only on X network and often, that may be the ONLY way to communicate with them. Social networking is also part of what I do for the library, so I need to be up to date with what is happening in those worlds, so it’s a lot harder to just kiss off social networks or even specific services.
Ultimately, I think the real motivation of what’s keeping me on these networks is I want people to read what I write. I want my words to connect, resonate, laugh, and perhaps give others courage (or fear depending on what it is I’m writing about) so that at the very least, we do not always feel so damned alone. I find it hugely interesting with all of these tools to connect us, so many of those that I’m acquainted with often still feel like they are all alone. This may not happen all the time, sure, but even I have found while I may have over 300 friends on Facebook, but when TheHusband had seizures in the spring of 2011 and I rushed him to the hospital, I had no one to call locally for comfort. I not only want to be big in Japan, but I want a more locally fulfilled life.
With that being said, I received a lot of outpouring of support across the networks as of late over this morning’s entry and others. While I may not have responded to all of those who have written, I did want to publicly let everyone who has reached out to me to let them know how much I appreciate and adore everything you have said and given me.
This space, here, is my safe space. While I am grateful for those who have reached out to me and tell me they are there for me, please understand if I do not immediately take you up on your offer. I use this space to work out what I’m feeling, but attempting to express those thoughts does not always work vocally or in an area I cannot control. Each piece takes me hours to write so to vomit emotionally on a person is lot more complex then it is here. Also understand that I have a difficult time discussing my feelings with TheHusband and I live with him.
With that all being said, I still encourage people to comment, whether via the comment option at the bottom of the posts, via email, or on any of the social networks I am. I want to know that you’re alive and listening.
By the by, Wedensday the Pug and I were chased out of the backyard this afternoon by an indignant squirrel who kept yelling at us, for over a half an hour, from the tree tops. At first I thought it was several squirrels fighting, only when I looked up in the trees, I saw one squirrel running up and down the branches, squawking, but no other squirrels were (that I could see) in the vicinity. The squirrel made a point to jump lower and lower, keeping its gaze on the dog which is when I figured the squirrel must of thought Wednesday was intruding and it wanted to protect its space. Fair enough. I took Wednesday in and as soon as we were in the garage, the squawking immediately stopped. My office looks out onto the back area and I have yet to hear a single peep for the rest of the afternoon.
There is a metaphor in there somewhere, I just know it.
TTFN,
Lisa

1. He was commenting on how mother has been hospitalized and then placed in a physical rehabilitation center for nearly four months each time, two years in a row. Both of these incidents stemmed from her own negligence of her body, meaning that as someone who is a brittle brittle brittle, has congestive heart failure, and severe arthritis to the point that she’s had joint replacement surgery, she takes terrible care of her health. The doctor’s have told her repeatedly that all of this could be circumvented if she stopped eating like crap, exercised, and was more proactive.

Those who fight alone, good warrior

Dear Internet,
I’ve been remiss in keeping you up to date on what has been going on with me these last few weeks, primarily with the outcome of my surgery. When we last spoke, I was six weeks into to my lay up. A week later, the doctor gave me the all clear to walk, perchance to drive when I could, and also I was freed to work. Physical therapy to immediately start. There are conditions, of course, the main one that I am to be kept sedentary at all times and to ice my ankle as much as possible. Thus, if I drive, the ankle gets iced after driving. If I walk, I need to take my cane with me. If I work, I have to be always sitting which means no teaching. That later is huge as teaching is a huge part of what I do. I’m on restricted work hours in order to ramp up to going back full time and I often find that driving the short distance, walking to my office, working for a few hours and then back home is always exhausting to me.
While everything professionally is neat and tidy, emotionally I’m still a giant mess. Frustration, and rage, rue most of my days. I drive for long periods, I’m laid up for days. Trips to the grocery store have to be split into multiple trips because I cannot physically handle doing it all in one go. I walked up and down three flights of stairs the other day without pain but my ankle was swollen to the size of grapefruit and I had to ice it for two days straight.
Thursday marked ten weeks since the surgery and I’m nowhere where I physically thought I would be. I asked my physical therapist about training for a 5K or even a walk-a-thon and she laughed at me. Genuinely laughed. Next spring if I’m lucky. Next fall if I’m not.
It’s interesting to me when people comment on my lack of full mobility in that they always comment as if it is an age thing; that my slowness to heal is because I’m getting older. I’m always feel like I’m on the defense about this, because no, I healed slow last time this happened, over 18 years ago. I have brittle bones. I smoked for ages. The surgery was much more intense then they thought. There is a myriad of things as to why I’m not training for Dancing With the Stars right now.
I’m always, always sensitive about my age. I succumbed a few weeks ago and bought bottle dye (forgive me divine hairdresser!) as I could not afford my regular appointment since I was off all summer. My hair was a jumble of colors, over seven hues and shades from greys, reds, browns, blondes, and whatever else lurked under its depths. I do not look my age, sure, but once the dye was applied and rinsed, I effectively created a facade to hold against time temporarily all over again. The nurses at the surgery center kept arguing with me that my band with my age was a typo – I could not have possibly been born in 1972. Moisturize, moisturize, moisturize. (It is as if I am Cassandra!)
But I digress.
My body’s slow progression is temporary, I know this. A year from now I will be mainly free from pain, will be running, biking, and walking with the best of them and this will all be a distant memory. I know. I choose to do this to myself. There was no accident, no repair, there was only the choice of continue living in great pain or get better.
I choose to get better.
TTFN,
Lisa

The Hours (6 Weeks and Counting)

Dear Internet,
Thursday marked the six-week anniversary of my lay up (lay in?).
When TheHusband and I started discussing what exactly the surgery was going to entail, I genuinely thought I would be laid up for 2 weeks of bed rest and than have a walking boot for another 4-6 weeks, then physical therapy as prescribed. I thought I would be back to work by mid-July.
At the two-week follow-up, 30+ staples were removed (20 on the interior incision, 10 on the exterior incision, and 6 on the fascia incision. I went from this to this (go Hammers!). I was told to remain 0% weight baring and due to the nature of my job, was off of work for the another five weeks.
Three weeks after plaster cast was placed, I started getting a lot of irritation inside the cast, against the incision. With two weeks more left before I could go back for the next followup, the irritation may not be able to wait, so I called and was immediately seen. When they took the cast off, which due to how ticklish I am had me laughing like a loon, this is what greeted us. The MA said that we caught the pending infection in time, for if I had waited, things could have been a lot worse.
Because they were planning on putting me in the walking cast in the appointment two weeks out, it was decided that I would get the walking cast now instead of another plaster case, on the condition that I would remain 0% weight bearing. They would also load me up on antibiotics to stave off any infection cooties. As I was to continue to be 0% weight bearing, work would still continue to be out of the question. The advantage this time around was that instead of having a plaster case that weighed 5 lbs, I would be wrapping my ankle in dry dressing twice a day and wear the walking cast boot. My foot and lower half of my leg could have freedom, but I could not shave my leg. If you look closely in some of the more recent pictures, you could see the inches long hair on the top of my feet. I could now wash my foot in the shower, instead of wrapping the leg in a garbage bag as I was doing before and I could put lotion on my toes to ward off the dehydration that was occurring from lack of moisture.
So six weeks of near complete bed rest; the number of times I’ve left the house can be counted on one hand and the number of times I’ve gone down the stairs wouldn’t be that much more. I started the convalescence before the beginning of one of the hottest summers on records and for every small break we’ve gotten in the heat, I’ve cracked the windows open and gulped the fresh air like a person long deprived.
We found that any small movement could and would disrupt the healing process, like sitting upright in a chair longer then a few hours or wearing the walking boot, which fitted while the leg was swollen and caused undue pressure. I’ve spent much of my time in bed, my leg propped at varying degrees, all my electronics spread around me, a TV in front of me, and pretended I was some modern version of Rear Window. This has been Wednesday’s position for almost the entire time.
I had set up loads of plans to keep myself occupied while I was laid up: Watch a TV series I haven’t seen (or haven’t seen in forever) and write about each episode, finish my cross-stitching (I got a total of two letters added), do some knitting, work on research for a writing project, catch up on professional interests; the list was endless.
And I’ve done almost none of that.
[to be continued]
ttfn,
Lisa