I feel quite well. I do. I have no pain. The Dermabond has fallen off and my incisions are healing quite nicely. I am able to move without discomfort or limitations…but I don’t.
This could very well be the sort of feeling that makes me overdo everything, but the wisdom (what little I have of it) garnered over years of living and doing stupid things prevents me from going Wonder Woman on this recovery process. I am well aware, by the way, that -whatever illusions I might have harbored while in my youth and up to my ears in “clean the house, raise the kids, go to school, go to work”- I am not, nor have I ever been Wonder Woman.
I am woman. Hear me roar. Or, rather, I’m not yet roaring but not whimpering either. You might say I’m growling…
It’s a low growl. It’s the sort of low growl that says “hey, I’m here…” not the sort of growl that indicates I have any intention of getting louder.
I read a lot. I google things. I tinker with recipes. I let J set the pace, and then I ask him to revise it. He gives in. I plan long-term projects. I plan the garden. I read some more. I haven’t mastered the art of the intentional nap, but I have dozed while sitting in bed a few times. I pet the dog and let her nuzzle me gently. I wait for Dada to get home from work to do things I know he’d be worried if I did in his absence.
I’m healing. I’m being patient. This, aside from the fact that I’m getting better, is a massive step forward. J is being patient. J is being independent where before he would have expected me to help him…just because.
Doing this while taking into account that J has his ups and downs (don’t we all?) has been interesting. He needs help bathing (again…that tricky middle-ear that might cause him to lose his balance); he still gets frustrated and impatient. I am still, in spite of my reduced ability to be 100% functional, his primary caregiver. There is a lot of negotiation taking place, but we’re both being patient with each other, and with ourselves. For a person with Autism and a woman who’s just had her uterus removed, that’s no mean feat.
It’s all going to be OK.
It’s going to take time, but OK is out there in a not-too-distant spot ahead of us…
