Quotes of the day (Thanks Charlie and Tad):
"Fear is the highest fence." ~ Dudley Nichols
"Drugs are not always necessary. Belief in recovery always is." ~ Norman Cousins
Over the course of the past couple of days, I have been dealing with a terrible migraine headache. Not surprising since I took on a lot this past week with attending a conference. I was in a lot of pain last night, and did not land up going to bed until 3:30am. We all woke up around the same time this morning, and Mattie decided to help me cook breakfast. While he was scrambling eggs on the counter next to me, I was stuffing his mouth with pancakes. So he ate like a champ this morning including pancakes, eggs, cheese, and milk. For Mattie this was an enormous amount of food. Mattie has always enjoyed being my assistant in the kitchen, and I always welcome his help when he wants to participate. Mattie even sat with us at the table as we ate breakfast. While eating we discussed the plan for the day. Mattie knew that I was going to visit Ann's parents today. I think it is very important for Mattie to understand the world beyond himself, that others out there need our help, love, and understanding. Ann's dad had surgery this week and post hospitalization was transferred to a rehabilitation facility. On as side note, last night we were all laughing at my party about the fact that our readers not only know about my family's life, but you also know a lot about Ann's life, family, and travel plans. This is clearly not intentional, but our worlds are very intertwined and it is hard to report about my day without sharing some information about Ann's world as well.
Mattie and Peter had plans today to continue painting the deck, and planting more flowers. One thing has become very clear to me, Mattie feels comfortable going to three places on a consistent basis and these are, the Lego Store, Home Depot, and Georgetown Hospital. It is my hope with time, our world will expand, because this does breed a certain amount of isolation. As we head into Monday, Anna e-mailed me to let me know she can't meet with Mattie tomorrow for physical therapy. So this should make for a very long Monday at home with Mattie. I never thought I would say this, but going to the hospital, breaks up our days. What a commentary about our lives!
While Peter and Mattie were busy together, and I really think Mattie is going to miss Peter when he goes back to work on Monday, I headed out to spend time with Ann's parents. I had the opportunity to help them eat lunch and we had some time to chat about Sully's (Ann's dad) surgery and his move to this new facility. I also had the opportunity to experience Sully and Mary reunited today after being separated for six days while Sully was in the hospital. Remember they have been married 50 years! Clearly each of them is worried about the other, but despite having their own medical issues, it was beautiful to see them express their feelings for each other. In fact, when I got there they were holding each other's hands. Maybe I am a sentimentalist, which I freely admit, but this connection caught my attention immediately. As Sully and Mary were talking today, I felt as if all three of us were saying the same thing.... we miss our old life, and how things used to be. This is actually a feeling that transcends generations. Maybe it this concept is universal in nature.... the longing, ache, or loss of one's life or how one thought life was going to turn out. Needless to say, my visits with Mary and Sully are always meaningful and they are so appreciative of my time. Which is an even greater lesson in life. Giving an hour or two doesn't take much, but for the recipient, it can make the difference between depression, anxiety, or sadness. The human connection and presence in and of itself is very therapeutic, healing, and restorative.
After I left Mary and Sully, I went grocery shopping, and my list of chores for the day began. While driving in the car, a song on the radio came on entitled, "I want my life back." Based on everything I reflected on today, and over the past 12 months, this song took me by surprise. Because those FIVE very simple words capture my inner most feelings. I WANT MY LIFE BACK!
For the first time in months, I truly cooked a dinner tonight. It was my hope that Mattie would actually eat, which he did not, but at least I am trying or attempting to bring back some semblance of order back into our family eating experience. After dinner, Mattie crawled over to me, and basically told me not to move. He and Peter went into the kitchen and pulled out of the refrigerator a birthday cake and sang happy birthday to me. Thank you Linda, Mattie's childlife specialist, for giving Mattie this wonderful cake to help me celebrate my birthday. Linda is always thinking! Mattie was very excited and he helped me blow out the candle. Needless to say, you can only imagine what I wished for!After this special cake moment, I took on the chore of laundry, which in my building is quite a chore, since I land up doing laundry on a completely different floor. Tonight there was such competition for machines, I literally had to walk to another building. Lovely!
As I write tonight's blog, Peter and Mattie are outside taking a stroll and looking for the space shuttle and space station which are docked together and according to the Washington Post, it would be possible to see them tonight. I hear the venture was unsuccessful, not surprising with our cloud layer and city lights.
I end tonight's posting with a message from my friend, Charlie. Charlie wrote, "Vicki, I am glad you had a nice birthday celebration on Saturday even if you did not get to go out to lunch as you wanted to. I was quite impressed with the pictures of Mattie painting the deck, I had to look twice before I realized he was painting with his feet. I am sure that foot painting qualifies as physical therapy; the picture reminds me of the one of Mattie painting on the mirror during physical therapy. I can imagine how difficult letting go of the hospital supplies must be; perhaps it gives you a feeling of control or that as long as you are prepared, the cancer will not return. Although this is tough to do, the presenters we heard at the conference would probably say that the cancer will or will not return regardless of what you do with the supplies. In the case that it doesn't, you've spent much energy worrying about what did not happen and missed a chance to enjoy the freedom from the disease. In the event that it does (and we all pray that it does not), you may have less time to enjoy away from the hospital and so it is even more critical to push yourself past this mindset. I am sure that you will do what you can when you feel ready to do so; no one can make that decision for someone else. Saturday night's party sounds like it was lots of fun; it was wonderful of Ellen to host and make a great meal and of course I am sure you enjoyed the chocolate fountain (thanks Ann). I hope you have many more of these good days to share in the future."
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