Stormy Night

If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you'll never enjoy the sunshine.

Morris West (Australian author)

Most days I feel great and I live in the light of the joy of each day - except when I am momentarily ticked off with something, but that passes quickly.

Right now I am waiting for the storm.  At 0130 on the First of July I am waiting for the rain and the hail and the tempest.  I feel awful.  I am cramping and the spotting has started up again.  I can't sleep.  I don't feel like reading and I even debated opening up a bottle of wine until I remembered I didn't have one around.  That ticked me off even more.

There are too many bugs outside and the neighbours are celebrating somewhat loudly so my sitting on the porch quietly contemplating the cosmos just plain sucked.

I am grumpy and abrupt, thank goodness the house is asleep around me.  The peace I should feel is tinged with resentment.  I want to be asleep like everyone else.  I don't resent them, I am disgruntled with a bodily function.  Not the first time either.

Three weeks, no results.  How long does a uterine biopsy take?  Apparently not the less than two weeks I was given to expect.

And of course I am stewing about several other things too.  When you have a good steam going it's easy to feed it, it draws energy from the very synapses of your ganglia.  It's tough to fight your own brain's ability to sustain itself by making inferences and associations.  Even my own axions are against me tonight.

This will be a mostly pointless ramble, please stop reading.  I am not writing this for you.

Tonight I am being more selfish than usual.  I hope to get this out of my system.  I hope to fool my brain into thinking that all of the clouds have passed through my fingertips onto virtual paper.  This has worked before; I cling to the hope that it will work again.  Perhaps it will truly hinge on the Advil and hot tea, but I believe in playing all my cards when I need to.

Perhaps tonight self indulgent rambling will be my saviour.  I would throw in some sweary words and add a bit more of a diatribe, but I am well aware of how the printed word can come back and bite you in the ass and/or make you look like an ass and/or convince you that you need to be an ass to be interesting.  Since I have not lost all track of my sensibilites (perhaps I have the lack of wine to thank for that)  I think I will leave it to just writing a mundanly penned lament and move on.

So, at 0148 I will assume the ibuprofin has hit the bloodstream and the thunder has rolled away into the night...

What if you die?

"Yeah.  I've thought that, too."  (internal me)

Not the right answer to a question asked by a nine year old. 

Having anticipated this question -  not solely because I am a parenting genius but also because I have, as mentioned previously, thought it myself - I have speculated as how to answer it.  I had come up with several possibilities and scenarios.  In the end I went with explaining what the upcoming procedure is and what will happen.

Here it is, the explanation for a nine year old (and the seven year old eavesdropping from her room, invited to hear the answer but too scared to admit she wanted it):

The doctors are putting me to sleep because they can't just put that part of my body to sleep.  The dentist can put your mouth to sleep using a needle, so you don't feel all that rooting around that she does and get all upset and sore because of it.  The doctor can't put just part of my body to sleep, so she will make all of me take a nap instead, because then I won't get all upset and sore and talk too much and distract everybody.

Dr. Deeb will put a little camera on a wire up inside my vagina.  (Here I make my pointer finger snake around).  The doctors are going to peek around and have a look inside me in the special room for babies that we talked about before.  My uterus or womb, remember?   It's not working properly, the doctor wants to have a look at it and clean it off with some special tools.  Kind of like how the dentist cleans your teeth.  I would rather be asleep for that, it's less uncomfortable that way.

.......

"What if it looks bad?  Your womb?  What if it is still bleeding?  Remember all the blood you had down your legs, can they stop that from happening again?"

"If it is really bad the doctor will tell me, and then we will have it fixed.  It may get taken out, then I won't have to worry any more.  That won't happen right away though.  We will have a lot of time to figure it out.  The medecine I am taking now will stop any more bleeding.  That won't ever happen again."

"Okay.  Can I still worry?"

"Just a little.  I am a little worried, too.  But I do like taking naps."

(Laughter)

Please, please... let that have been the right thing to say. 

Then came..."So, no more babies can grow in you then?  How do they get there anyhow?  Sparks and electricity or is this the part where you need a daddy like with chickens?

Tomorrow child, tomorrow I will get to that part.

I need some time to think of scenarios and possible ways to answer this one.  I think this is the part where I need the Daddy, too.

"Waiting on the world to change"

What a useless thing to do.  Truly, since when did waiting for other people to make things happen become the best choice?


I am waiting, waiting for June the 8th, then I will be waiting again for the biopsy results that won't come fast enough unless they give them to me right after I come from under the anaesthetic.  


While I am waiting I move on, I get stuff done.  It may not be earth shattering, news making, award winning stuff, but I am trying to make "it" better in the ways that I am able to.


If you don't think you can make a difference, that is pathetic.  Every choice you make, every decision and purchase has the power to make a change.  Small things add up, it's the details that make life worth living so it stands to reason that these details have value and power.


Waiting is part of living, it is what you do in the inbetween that can matter.


...You don't have to do extraordinary things, just do ordinary things extraordinarily well."  John Rohn

The Elephant in the Womb

There really is no good way to share scary news, no good way to blunt the edge it all. 


I have a mass, well two actually, in my uterus.  They are most likely fibroids, benign, annoying and too large to remove the conventional way.  "Most likely" scares me.  Probably the two scariest words when it comes to tumors.  The scariest being only one word and too frightening for me right now.


I am "most likely" fine.  "Most likely" I will need a hysterectomy.  With the "at best" involving removing a significant part of my anatomy and the "at worst" involving a discussion of survival percentages the real meaning of fear has crept up my spine and settled firmly into the back of my brain.


There are too many qualifying quotations in this post.  Bad literary form.  Good form be damned, I am not trying to impress you with my fabulous wordsmithing, not this time. 


My wonderful husband is beside himself with worry, and strives desperately not to project it.  His sleepless nights and sad eyes are a mirror of my own.  We know we can't let this drag us down, we know that the odds are in our favour, we know I am "most likely" going to be fine.  It is so easy to think that that should be enough, and so hard to make it so.


In early June I will be schedule for a scope and a biopsy.  Sooner if I can get a cancellation. 


May is going to be about keeping myself together and planning for the worst, because I can do that.  I can hope for the best and plan for the worst, it is not just a cheesy proverb for us this month.  This month it is the thread tying us to our lives, keeping us from drifting off into a useless world of worry and speculation.   I am going to be fine, but if I am not, I refuse to make it harder for myself than it has to be.

Perspective Happens

So...

had big plans for March.  I really should know better by now.

On March 17th, for the second time in my life I found myself in a hospital emergency room wearing very little and feeling very scared.

How did they put it now, let's see if I can remember it correctly, severe vaginal hemorrhaging.   Yes, it's is even more uncomfortable to experience than it is to read about so you can stop cringing now.

I appear to be better now, I have test results upcoming and it would seem as if I am going to survive this relatively intact.  It seems as if removing a woman's uterus is considered unfashionable right now.  Although as I told the nurses in the emergency department, "I don't need anything it has to give me anymore, anyhow.  So if it has to go, out it goes!"

Seems like my hormones need some tweaking.

Anyhow, I missed out on needing a blood transfusion by a few points.  I can't give blood right now, "they" think I should hold onto what I have got until I know for sure I am not going to spring a leak again.

So for now I am going to be thankful for the fact that 911 works, that the blood was there if I needed it, and that my messy house still has me in it.

If you can donate blood, please do so.  I would have gone out and done so again (I have before) and will hope to soon.

April is about remembering to keep everything in perspective.

Forever is composed of nows. ~Emily Dickinson

This month I am working on living in the moment.  This for me means slowing down and enjoying what I am doing, or just concentrating on what I am doing.  I am not worrying about what may happen, with the exception, of course, in forecasting for safety purposes.  This March Break it has meant that I am not worrying about fun.


Are they having fun?  Will I have fun?  What can we do for fun?  Becoming stressed over fun is, to my mind, heavily ironic.


Earlier this March break my child and the neighbour's son spent two hours in the front yard fishing in a puddle.  In the end they were mud covered, exhausted and thoroughly pleased with themselves.  I could hear them laughing from inside the house.


Yesterday we visited a friend's family's mini-maple sugar bush to help collect the sap, strain it and pour it in the evaporator.  In the end we were mud covered, exhausted and thoroughly pleased with ourselves.  We had French toast for dinner.


I will admit that I would love to be on a beach, or someplace new an exciting, but I am not.  I am enjoying the moments that I have. 


This does not mean that we are not planning things to do, or even more serious things like monitoring my ongoing health matters.  Living in the moment means that I pay attention.  I think about what I am doing; what I am saying.  I think about how I am doing it. 


As with all of my endeavours this year so far, it's not done perfectly.  I am trying to do the best that I can.  I don't always get there, but the road is sure interesting.




We can easily manage if we will only take, each day, the burden appointed to it.  But the load will be too heavy for us if we carry yesterday's burden over again today, and then add the burden of the morrow before we are required to bear it.  ~John Newton

"Balance is no harder, after all..."

I grew up in a family where it wasn't good to say what you wanted to say.  I learned early on that saying what other people wanted to hear was much more rewarding in the short term.  My mistake was having it take until I was out of university to figure out that it wasn't as rewarding as it seemed.  Not for me, anyway.   The freedom to be yourself, to really realize that you can sustain or drown yourself at will, is profound.  It takes time with this knowledge to then begin to grow a "self". 

I am still working on my "self."  I am sure it is a lifelong project.  There are critical periods of development for physical skills; I am guessing that there may be for more delicate skills as well, but this "self" building does not seem to be one of them.  If it was then the world would be a much sadder place, I suspect.

My childhood was not shockingly abusive, or filled with the kind of heart wrenching moments that make mini-series and TV specials "spicy."  It was just, well, it was hard to define.  Hard for me to define, I suppose.  I would say it was defeating, and I'd know what I meant but I am am uncertain that anyone else would.  I was loved and I knew I was loved.  The love that was there was distracted, blunted...defeated.  Yes, defeated works well as a description.  I will just leave it at that.

The process of this developing sense of "self" has been evident in my children for a good long while now.  This emergence has me in awe.  I see them make choices, express themselves, wonder and question and I am in love.  In love with them and in love with the burgeoning suspicion that I am better at this parenting thing that I think possible. 

This blog is so random and unfocused.  So far, I am okay with that.  I should be, I put it out there for all to see.  With time I hope that I can somehow find a way to thread my thoughts together.  I write to allow myself to be less critical, which I why I edit these blog entries as little as possible, I don't want to over think this as I do so many other things. 

Cohesiveness comes later, for now I am still learning to balance.

I Think I Can, I Think I Can

So far this using my resources is going well, not great but marginally better than okay and definately better than not at all.

I have discovered that I can do the things I set out to do, and that I am really the only obstacle in my way.  This is mainly true because I believe it is best to keep my goals in the realm of possibility, at least for now.  I am not trying to reach to "exceed my grasp."  I am trying to grasp what I reach for. 

In Februrary I decided to focus on forgiveness and helpfulness.  I went out of my way to do favours for people.  I gave sage advice to young people who actually wanted to listen.  I did my utmost to view life from the eyes of the other person.  I did this because I chose to.  I selected February because of the awfully commercial faux holiday Saint Valentine's Day.  If you actually love and care about people, premade schmaltzy cards, overpriced flowers, slave labour driven chocolate and one single day to stuff it all in, while being a retaillers dream, doesn't acually do it for me. 

This month's resources are time and attitude.  I can't say I have knocked it out of the park so far, but I could call it a double and be fair.  My choices are still working for me, I am working for them, if I wasn't already one being I would call it symbiotic.  Making the decision to spend my resources was easy.  Rediscovering that this kind of currency resupplies itself the faster it is spent is something of a Valentine's gift to myself.

I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

...Leap Further

 

 

I realize that I am stalling.  Sofar I am okay with that.  I ask your patience.  I have yet not risked myself by delving into some deeply personal topic.   I find I am not ready to leap further.  This blog itself represents a major step for me.  I am a true introvert; so comfortable with that part of myself and my nature that I feel very little need to step out into the light and show the inside out.  Those of you who read this and actually have a connection with the me who is may not even have realized that this internal divergence is there.  It isn't like I have an alter-ego or anything, it's not that interesting or diabolical.  I am a private person, I keep a lot in and when I let it out I know I seem too solemn, too intense.  I think this outlet will help.  This tipping over into a pool of  anonymity where I could be just about anyone may help to kick my self out into the light so I don't take it all so seriously.  But before I let myself go too far forward, it seems that I must "Go back a little..."

 

Baby it's cold outside

Listening to the nails pop and the siding snap kept me up for a while last night.  Mostly I was thinking about how fortunate we are to have a snug house and a safe place to sleep at night.  The world is a crazy place.

Sixty million for six years to play baseball.
Over twenty people missing because a cruise ship captain was careless.
Starvation ignored (again) in Africa.

I do my best for my family most of the time.  Sometimes I am lazy and just coast along.  I am not proud of that but it is true.  I think that in this way I am probably no different than most people.  I want to believe that this apathy is curable.  I want to believe I can root it out of myself, and hope that my quiet attempt to do so will have a positive impact on the world.  I am going to try to use my knowledge to better myself.  I hope this will also help me to make the world a bit more just.

To that end I am using what I know about the cocoa industry to look into ways to stop supporting the slavery and abuse of those who labour to produce a treat that is delicious but also not necessary.  Chocolate.  I am going to do my best to give it up and only consume fair trade chocolate products.  Having done very little research into it's availabilty and forms, I think I am setting myself up for a true test of my determination and willpower.  It's one thing to say you are going to do something, and it's another to say it with an informed mind.  Likely I am setting myself up for a frustrating ride. 

Laziness should not be reason why something is not done.  This is my attempt to help eliminate the fact that, in my case, it often is.

My New Blog

Normal Matters Not

Okay, so I am not sold on the title of this blog yet. I didn't want to sit around trying to come up with something pithy, and have that lack of pithyness hold me back from actually trying to write the damn thing, so I rushed it and ended up with that. Perhaps, like turning forty, it will grow on me.

I made a New Year's Resolution. Usually my only one is to not make any because I don't like setting myself up for failure at a time of the year that is supposed to be all festive and fun and full of promise. I figure I should just do my best at all times and blame myself if I fail. I did, as I mentioned earlier, turn forty this year (okay, okay last year, I lie) and perhaps that newfound comfort with aging has wizened me to the value of promising yourself something. I resolved to make better use of my resources, such as they are and what there is of them.

I have an internet connection. I used to be good at this writing thing, so here I am...hopefully for your sake since you are reading this I get better at it as I go on. I hope to make use of this blog to ask questions of myself and the world in general. To challenge myself to think and to share these thoughts (this is where you think "Lord, help me!") The goal I have for myself is to learn to think things through better, to become better able to express myself and to have more fun and be more social. Oh yes, there is another resolution tucked into that sentence...be more myself than I am now.

Back to the title...

I come from a family that is fractured. Mental illness has claimed a good percentage of my immediate family and it isn't the kind of crazy they make comedies about. I am blessed, I am not afflicted. I live in fear that my blood legacy will be to pass this damnable burden on my children. I don't like to talk about it, any of it, yet it is part of me and who I am. I believe that nobody should try to generally define what "Normal" is. Normal is something everyone must define for themselves.

Hey, it didn't take long, turns out I like this unintentionally Yoda like title after all!