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Thursday, January 07, 2016

Broke Back Mimzy

Tomorrow will be three weeks since my back surgery.  While I cannot believe how quickly those three weeks have swiftly passed by, I also feel like it is taking forever until I am completely healed.  I really hadn't had too much pain after the surgery.  It hurt getting in and out of bed, laying on my back (not possible for two weeks), and no matter how or where I sat, I couldn't get comfortable.  Silly me, I thought my two weeks of sick leave would be "relaxing" - just the time off I had been hoping for and needed.  It never occurred to me that I would be uncomfortable to sit, which meant I was too uncomfortable to read, color, crochet, or even write.

In typical "Schuyler" fashion (Schuyler is my maiden name and we are notorious for trying to do too much too quickly), I did too much too quickly.  I drove Emma to all of her appointments and lessons, squatted dozens of times each day, and a number of other similar tasks I shouldn't have been doing.  After walking around the gym yesterday, while Emma swam a few laps, I came home, sat one the couch, and immediately felt exhausted and sore.  Laying down on the couch, I closed my eyes and actually listened to what my body was saying.  It was hurting and I was ignoring it (Schuyler'd it again, as DH would say).  My back is still swollen where the 3-4 inch incision is healing, I am sore, I have a very slight bit of pain coming back.

As I laid on the couch, all four of my animals surrounded me; the three 4 paws on the couch with me and my tri-paw on the floor.  Ok, the two cats were actually laying ON me, but cats do whatever they want, right?  I truly believe that animals know when part of their pack is hurting, so I must really have been hurting.  Although I had not been using the prescription pain meds often since the surgery, I took one Percocet and one Valium.  Then, I proceeded to get feel loopy, tired, better, and a little sad.

When I woke up this morning, my body felt a little better, but my mood was not.  It is difficult to slow down.  It is difficult to refrain from bending over to pick up something DH or DD dropped and left on the floor.  It is difficult looking at the two full laundry baskets of clothes, wanting desperately to take them upstairs but knowing that I cannot.  It is difficult intentionally walking slowly, especially when DH used to refer to me as General Patton whenever we walked anywhere.  All of this has made me sad.  Weepy sad.  Like, I have been crying while looking at old pictures, tv commercials, and I was a sloppy sobby mess when I watched Jane Austen's Emma tonight.  Seriously?  I have read that book and watched multiple versions of the movie dozens of times....and I have never cried.

Today, a very sweet and extremely intelligent friend told me that I need to lower my expectations, slow down, and let my body heal.  She's been through the same surgery, so she knows first hand.  I know that soon enough, I will be driving back to the office every day, complaining about having to go there, but at least I will be able to (hopefully) walk quickly from the parking lot to my desk.  In the meantime, I will learn how to relax enough to watch movies, remember to stand up and walk around every 60 minutes, and I will try-try-TRY to convince myself that it really is OK to do absolutely nothing for a couple more weeks. 


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