Tag: healing

Lyme Light #atzchallenge

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Spring is taking hold here in the northeastern U. S., and our weather is slowly growing more temperate. In the springtime, I begin to see my neighbors again as people come out of their homes to enjoy the warm weather and bask in the sun’s bright rays.

However, spring also brings unwanted pests in the form of insects of all types, most notably, ticks. In these parts (as in most), ticks carry Lyme disease, as well as a whole host of other illness-inducing bacteria that most people have never even heard of.

I take some (albeit minimal) comfort in the fact that my cat is not currently going outside since his fall from the position of king of the food-chain (written here in my F-blog). His temporary status as an indoor cat will reduce the risk of ticks in the house. Before, I felt a need to vacuum him obsessively when he came indoors. With the frequency with which cats go in and out and in and out (and in and out…), my vacuum was in constant use. Keeping him in once the windows are open and the screen door is all that separates him from the outdoors will be increasingly difficult.

I have Lyme disease, a diagnosis that came after more than one bout with a “virus” that confined me to the couch for several days at a time—a roundabout way to say I was not immediately diagnosed. In fact, no one really knows how long I had the disease before I was diagnosed. That’s a funny thing about Lyme

The symptoms of Lyme mimic so many other diseases, it is important for everyone to know and recognize the signs and symptoms; if you are armed with knowledge, you will be prepared to advocate for yourself or for your loved ones. Lyme is a growing concern that is now found in 80+ countries around the world. Your ability to help yourself begins with awareness.

I was not in the woods. I don’t remember being bitten by a tick. In fact, I never saw a tick. I never had the telltale “bulls-eye” rash. The standard CDC recommended 28-day course of antibiotics did not make me better. Getting in to see a Lyme literate practitioner was a months-long process. Sadly, Lyme disease is a politically charged disease for which it is difficult to obtain proper, aggressive treatment. Below are some resources for education. If you know of other helpful resources, please share them in the comments.

Today’s Public Service Announcement has been brought to you by the letter L.

http://www.underourskin.com/#home-underourskin

https://www.lymedisease.org/lyme-basics/lyme-disease/about-lyme/

http://www.ilads.org/

Resolutions (2)

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It is January first, and I am feeling unmotivated. I want to set some goals for the year and work on the things that need fixing—to write more, to clean and organize, to focus on health and fitness, and to find ways to give back.

But today, I am unmotivated.

I want to write a blog post every day, though based on my past performance, I might focus on writing one post per week. This drop in expectation is not because I am unmotivated, but because I am a single parent to three children, and like many single parents, I maintain two jobs to cover expenses. And well… priorities.

I may be unmotivated, but today, I am realistic.

This is the year that I will sort through my clutter, clean, and purge. I realized at the end of this past year that if I tackle one small area per day/week/whatever, I will get through the trouble spots (eventually) and deactivate the clutter magnets in my house. At the rate of one small area per day (or week), my house will not be clean and clutter-free as quickly I might like. But little by little, the house will become uncluttered. My hope is that by January 1, 2017, I can blog about my success and how amazing it is to live in a house with a manageable amount of stuff. In the meantime, I can blog about the fun (okay, interesting…) stuff I uncover while de-cluttering!

Being realistic means that I will acknowledge my limitations.

Then there is the “taking care of me” resolution. I have two health goals for the immediate future. The most important is to sleep/rest more. Five hours of sleep a night is tough on a healthy body, but such limited sleep on a not-so-healthy body makes it nearly impossible to maintain normalcy. My second goal is to get back to regular exercise—walking regularly will be a step in the right direction. And baby steps are better than no steps. There are a lot of years between me and my most fit self, and I don’t expect to regain that level of fitness in the foreseeable future. But I do know that taking better care of me will allow me to take care of others. And that is important.

Which leads me to my final resolution…

… to actively look for and act on opportunities to give back. It’s not always easy to see beyond the chaos that follows me like a cloud and obscures my view of my surroundings. Paying attention to the people and opportunities around me will keep me grounded and present and will foster a greater sense of community connection.

These changes, I think they are doable. They are memorable—meaning I won’t forget them halfway through the month of January—because they are important. Of course, I set goals knowing they could always be derailed by more pressing issues.

What are your goals for the New Year?

Writing

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This post was written in response to the Writing 101, Day 1 prompt: I write because….

I write because I grew up in a small town where fitting in was not my forte. I was artistic and academic, borderline hyperactive (before that was a diagnosis) and just about the opposite of athletic. I created “treasures” from items that were tossed aside, and I was overflowing with sass. The combination was one that didn’t work well for a kid navigating the waters of small town school life. At first, the fact that I didn’t fit in mattered to me. But after a while—and too many reminders that my sharp edges and rounded corners didn’t match everyone else’s—I accepted my lot in life.

I write because in kindergarten, a light went on when I learned to squeeze meaning from the squiggly lines that formed words on a page. A door was opened to new adventures and new worlds where I could easily lose myself. The public library and local bookstore became my refuge, and I hid behind the mask of a voracious reader.

I write because sometimes, when I felt lost and alone, reading was not enough. I would take out a notebook, usually in the late hours of the day when dusk turned to darkness. At first, I wrote fiction and poetry, depending on my mood. I would craft stories, churning out page after page, simply to see how much I could write and to watch the page curl under the weight of my words.

I write because as I ventured from adolescence into adulthood, my ideas and my identity were fluid and changing. I wrote my feelings and my dreams into stories as I worked to make sense of the world and my place within it. I wrote stories of realistic fiction with characters who might have been my friends.

I write because when I divorced, I needed a way to pull myself out of the all-consuming black hole that is emotional abuse. Suddenly, I was the character, and the world was my own. There were many soul-searching journal entries. Many nights of listening to the rain outside my window while my thoughts and my words spilled onto the page.

I write because once I freed myself from the abuse and regained my confidence, not writing was no longer an option. Through my journey, I had evolved into a writer. I had discovered a home in creative non-fiction. I discovered that writing my story helps me to live a better life.

I write because I never did find the place where I fit in. But fitting in is over-rated. Writing is a journey that fits perfectly with who I am.

3D Printers

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We have been sick at our house for what seems like forever. The normal winter viruses hit hard on the first day of spring, and they haven’t stopped.

C has spent the spring struggling with bronchitis, pneumonia, bronchitis, etc. It’s a nasty cycle, and with the number of viruses that have gotten him, it just keeps cycling. The rest of us have been cycling in and out, so there are generally two of us sick at any given time. Enough already.

Meanwhile, W has spent the spring talking about 3D printers. He wants one. Badly. He also has enough money saved up to buy one. The kid doesn’t even have a job, but somehow, he has collected enough money in his bank account to pay for a 3D printer. A friend of his has the one he wants, so he knows how it prints pretty well.

Every chance he gets, he talks about 3D printers. At dinner: “If I had a 3D printer….” At breakfast: “Do you know what I could do with a 3D printer?” After school: “I could print you one… if I had a 3D printer.” While I’m cooking: “So, I was reading about 3D printers….”

After awhile, I just go with it. Whatever comes out, I fly. “So, this 3D printer I want…” he starts in for the gazillionth time.

“Did you know you could make body parts with a 3D printer?” I respond, without missing a beat. “You can print heart valves and ears. They are even using them to make affordable prosthetic limbs. You could go into business. I’ll bet you could make a lot of money!”

He looked at me, speechless for just a split second. I had stopped him in his tracks. He shook his head. “Not with the one I’m getting.” He paused to breathe, as he does when he is trying to shift the direction of the conversation.

“Really…” I jumped in before he had time to start his new direction. “If you could figure that out, it would be great. Think about all the people you could help!”

“Mom. Stop.” A bit of frustration was evident in his tone. “Those printers cost thousands of dollars. Mine won’t do that.”

“I KNOW!!” I said, an idea taking shape in my head. “You could print a new set of lungs for your brother!! Clearly, he could use them.” I pointed to the coughing, hacking, wheezing (and laughing) C across the table.

“Well…” said W, looking at me and smiling broadly. “If it means I get my 3D printer…. I can figure it out!”

Crying

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The other day, my cats were bad. VERY bad. In the midst of a scuttle, they tipped over a kitchen chair, the chair fell into my oven, and the exterior glass of the door shattered. Glass skittered from one end of my tiny kitchen to the other, littering the entire floor. It was a mess. And it was not funny. At all.

I was in the kitchen when it happened. Had I been just a foot or two closer, I could have intercepted the chair. Instead, I watched the shattered glass cascade to the floor in disbelief. It was Friday, and I would clearly be living with an oven missing its front for a few days, at the very least. After calling to order a replacement part, I posted a picture on Facebook because really, who would think cats could do such a thing?

It wasn’t long before the four-year-old neighbor girl came to my door, sent by her parents, who were in the yard nearby. “I came to see if you’re okay,” she said in her little voice, a shy smile on her face.

“I am,” I assured her. “Do you wanna come in and see what my cats did?” She nodded. “I have to pick you up because there’s glass all over my floor.” I opened the door and lifted her into my arms. I gingerly tiptoed through the broken glass so she could see over the kitchen table.

Her eyes grew large as she stared at the mess, contemplating how cats could do such a horrible thing. Finally, she turned to me and studied my face. “Why are you not crying?” she asked, unable to contain her child curiosity.

Hmm. To tell you the truth, crying had occurred to me only as a briefly passing emotion. Until she suggested it. And once she had suggested it, I found it to be quite a valid suggestion. Perhaps as adults, we don’t allow ourselves to cry nearly as much as we should. After all, if I had cried in this situation, she certainly wouldn’t have questioned it. So crying was now a thought that was floating around in my head.

But there was another thought that was more urgent, tugging on a tiny corner of my brain, threatening to tear a hole unless I faced it, head on. My cats had made a huge mess of my kitchen and caused destruction that I would not have believed possible had I not been standing three feet away when it happened. I was home only because it was a holiday on my work calendar. My children were still at school.

Had I not been home that day, I would have walked in to this mess. (No one would have cleaned it up, but that’s a story for another day). I would have seen the glass scattered from wall to wall. I would have noticed the gaping hole on the front of my oven. And I would have blamed the boys.

When you have two nearly grown boys who feel the need to constantly slam each other around, why would you believe such destruction was the result of a tussle between two ten pound cats? The boys would have argued with me, explained that they had found this mess, that something must have happened while they were at school. I would not have given them the benefit of the doubt. After all, who would believe such a thing?

And so I have this newfound awareness that perhaps I am too quick to judge. I am too quick to point fingers. I am not open-minded enough to listen to slightly far-fetched stories. Perhaps every situation demands that I listen, that I understand, and that I give others the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps there are circumstances that I might not be willing to consider before jumping to conclusions.

So the question remains: why am I not crying? I’m not sure, but now that I have processed all that came of this incident, maybe I will. And I will definitely leave that option open for the next time….

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Hoops and weapons

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It has been snowing nearly invisible snow all day. This morning, at a time when the snow was briefly visible, my daughter had a minor panic. She had just bundled herself up to step out into the cold, hoisted her school back-pack onto her back, and she paused. She slumped and expelled the air from her lungs.

“I have a whole list of things I was supposed to bring in by today!” she informed me. “I need them for a project.” Her tone teetered on the edge of whine. It’s the end of the semester. Finals loom next week, and the teachers have been piling on the projects. We have more schoolwork, anxiety, and drama than any sane household can handle.

“Do you need the stuff today?” I nervously glanced at the clock, anticipating the imminent arrival of the school bus. “Can you get it together tonight?”

“I’m the leader of the group. I have to have it. Can I text you a list from the bus, and you can bring it in?” She gave me a hopeful look. Her brother was disappearing out the door for the bus.

“I’ll try. Will I be able to find everything?”

“I’ll tell you where it is when I text. Thank you!” she shouted as she ducked out the door, though I hadn’t promised anything. The door shut loudly, blocking the cold and the sounds of her feet shuffling down the rough concrete of our front steps.

It wasn’t long before the text came. A play sword, a rubber knife, a white sheet. Clearly, a project for English—The Odyssey—the white sheet for a toga and the weapons for the dangers of the journey. However, the rubber knife looked somewhat real, and from a distance, it could be mistaken for a real weapon. While I had intended to send the items in with my oldest when I dropped him off, I made a mental note to go in to the office to ask about it. These days, one can never be too careful.

When we arrived at the high school, I held up the bag and pointed to my son. “He has to take this to his sister, but there is a rubber knife in here. I thought I should check to make sure it’s okay.” I pulled out the knife and held it up for the secretary to see.

“Oh!” She studied the item and scowled. “I don’t know,” she said, and I bent the “blade” with my fingertip so she could see it was not real. She deferred to another secretary, who went off to check.

Meanwhile, the assistant principal came out of his office. I held up the knife for his scrutiny. “Is this okay for a student to have?” I asked, again bending the blade.

He looked at it. “Is it for a project?” he asked, and I nodded. “Hmm…” he tipped his head and pursed his lips as he inspected the knife. He shook his head ever so slightly, and I could see him conjuring images of all the ways a student could get in trouble with this completely harmless “weapon.”

“Tell you what,” I said, intercepting his thought process. “I’ll leave it with you. When she needs it, she can come and get it.” I smiled a hopeful smile.

“Perfect!” he responded, and he took charge of the knife.

It was only as I was leaving the school that I realized how deeply our school culture has changed in recent years. Change is for the better sometimes, but not always.

Injuries and Imagination

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At sixteen, my son has experienced a work related injury. Of course, you might have to use your imagination to call tripping up the stairs on one’s oversized teenage feet a “work-related injury.” In this case, he was carrying a heavy container, which he proceeded to drop on his hand, thereby causing the injury.

When he first texted me from work, “I am injured. They are sending me home at 2. Please be here at 2,” I panicked, and immediately lost my appetite for the bagel chips on which I was munching.

I texted back, “Injured?” I received no reply. It was 1:15. My overactive imagination went to work. I conjured images of blood, burns, compound fractures, a concussion. My head held bloody pictures from horror movies and my worst nightmares. I felt sick to my stomach, and the partially digested bagel chips rose in my throat.

I took a deep breath. No, I convinced myself. If he were badly injured, they would send him home right away. I calmed my beating heart with a few more deep breaths, and I swallowed hard to send the lump of bagel chips back toward my stomach.

The minutes ticked by slowly, loudly, as I played and re-played the mommy panic in my head; I calmed myself, but quickly started the panic cycle over again.

When I finally arrived in the parking lot of his work, I texted. “Do I need to come in?”

“No,” came the reply. “I’ll be right out.” More long moments before the door opened and he emerged. His hand was wrapped in a towel; a plastic bag of ice resting on top dripped as he approached. His finger was covered in a band-aid that needed changing. He was walking, talking, and held the slightest hint of an embarrassed smile in his eyes.

I let out a breath and realized I had been holding it in since he texted me. My boy was in one piece. One. A walking, talking whole.

He got in the car, looked at me, and I didn’t even ask before he started in on his story. He tripped going up the stairs, dropped a heavy box on his hand, and the rest, as they say, is history. He told the supervisor he would stay, but she sent him home. He sustained a nasty bruise and some swelling, but he had full range of motion; as long as no one touched his hand, he was fine. I was more than happy to monitor the swelling and pain.

The following morning—the Monday after Christmas vacation—I woke him for school. I asked him how it felt, to find out if his hand hurt excessively, or if it had stiffened up overnight. If it had, I figured we would have it checked out. His response was the classic teenage response.

“It hurts, Mom. I think I’ll have to take another the week off from school….” Ha! That settles it: he’s fine!

Pieces

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Sometimes, when my children tell me stories, I can hear the broken pieces rattling around inside of them. The pieces are jagged and sharp like broken glass, threatening to poke through the surface and rip through tender flesh. I let the children talk, telling me the stories through which their hurts, their sadness, their disappointments are revealed. At times, the disappointment is minor, like a missed role in a play or a snubbing by a not-close friend.

Other times, the hurt is much deeper—a wound that continually gets ripped open despite their best efforts to keep in closed and let it heal. Maybe “someone” is coercing them to do something they don’t want to do, or their events once again don’t fit into “someone’s” schedule. Years later, and the story remains the same.

So I listen. I let them know they always have my ear—whether they want it or not—and they talk. I listen below the surface, paying special attention to what is not right, what is not good. The act of talking wears on the broken parts like the tide works a piece of glass—wearing, smoothing, dulling. In time, the broken pieces become worn and opaque, like beach glass, dotting the path of their journey, touchstones of strength and growth. But for now, I will pay attention. I will notice the unspoken undertones of their stories, and I will support them through listening, questioning, and being present. I will offer them an outlet for their thoughts, like a rock tumbler churning and working the moments of their lives. It is something we all need. Someone to listen. And to be present.