In the middle

It’s pitch dark outside. It’s even quiet. Ben and Mark leave in the morning to fly out to Philadelphia for another surgery. I woke a while ago and sleep eludes me.

I haven’t felt particularly anxious about this surgery in the past week. Though, of course, it’s been on my mind. This is a routine one, a lengthening, just about 45 minutes of surgery for my boy. However, it is his tenth surgery and ten years since his first surgery, and isn’t that a milestone? It is our tenth surgery and I remember every one. I can’t say that we’re celebrating.

Ben is such a pro at this, though I imagine it’s hitting him right about now, too. I checked in with him repeatedly throughout the day yesterday: what did he want to do, did he want me for anything, how was he feeling. And he seemed mellow and fine, in that middle-ground way you can be when you say “I’m fine.” Right there in the middle, not terrible, not even bad, but definitely not great, or even good. Middle ground.

Ben is my middle child and as we go through this again and again and again I watch his older and younger brothers feel it again and again and again, too. A couple weeks ago, at dinner, the fact of Ben’s upcoming surgery was discussed (more as a scheduling point, than as the threatening and difficult event that it truly always is) and Toby suddenly wailed, “I  HATE  it that you have to have these surgeries! I  HATE  it because I can’t sleep and I feel terrible and I worry about you and I HATE that you have to have pain and our whole family has to go through this! Why does God make this happen to you?!” He was practically beating his breast in agony. Ben, who tends to react harshly and with impatience to anything Toby says these days first went to defensive mode. I could see the thought cross his face: “Hey, I’m the one having surgery. It’s not happening to you!” But then, as Toby ranted and raged, I saw the light dawn in his eyes and he took it in. When Toby finished, Ben said simply, “Thank you, Toby.”

Harry, the oldest brother, had tears in his eyes when he got mad at me the other day. “You didn’t tell me Dad and Ben were leaving Monday! You never tell me anything!” though, we seem to remember a few moments when it was mentioned, specifically, in his presence. But, that’s not really the point. I knew it was coming, I’ve known for a while now. Didn’t matter though. It snuck up on me, too. And Harry is the older brother, the protector, in a way. It hurts him when Ben leaves for surgeries. He suffers, too.

I’ve been dealing with my own pains these days. For the past few months I’ve had excruciating back pain which seems to have coincided with purchasing a new mattress. I’ve seen a number of health care professionals, I’ve changed mattresses, and suffice it to say we’re working on it. But, I continue to have pain and I continue to unpeel the layers of understanding around my life experience that is also contributing to this situation.

Is that vague enough for you?

I feel like I’m in the middle of it all. Ten surgeries with Ben, more to come. My own surgery last December. Ben has severe scoliosis and I’m having severe back pain. A decade of holding him and his experience in my heart and body and daily life. I’m not separate, it’s not resolved. Anger, fear, forgiveness, sadness, possibility, loss, abundance. It’s all there and I stand in the middle of it, trying to stay upright.

I’ve been wanting to write a post for weeks. I’ve been sitting at the computer trying to tell you where I am. The issue is that I’m so in the middle of it all that I can’t even begin to find my words. They swirl around and they’re just out of reach. So, I’ll leave you here in the middle tonight. In the middle of the night. In the middle of my heart.

weeds in the garden

I was almost going to talk about the weather. And how the unexpected warmth we're having makes me feel so guilty. A guilty pleasure to be so warm and dry in February.

I was almost going to talk about my unfinished knitting projects and how pointless warm wool shawls seem when the skies are clear blue and the breeze is so calming.

But, when I looked out over the rail of our deck, scanning our vegetable garden the other day, I decided I wanted to talk about weeds.

The garden is in complete disarray. A jungle. Thistles and grass and who-knows-what else. You can't even see the gopher piles for the weeds that have accumulated. It looks like such a huge job to address that, and frankly, I've avoided it completely for months.

Last summer our garden became a war zone. Us against the deer. The deer won. We ultimately gave up, 45 tomato plants down. Sometimes it's easier to admit defeat and shop at the farmers market than it is to feed the local deer population.

In some ways I enjoyed the farmers market more. The selection, the interactions with the farmers. The great coffee. Holding my husband's hand as we stroll the lanes. The bounty we bring home each time we go. I really love the summer farmers market. And it's definitely less back-breaking.

I've avoided dealing with our garden since July. But, this morning I decided it was time to pick some arugula for our salad. Arugula is a weed. I will admit I did pay for the arugula seeds at one point in the past, but now it is a weed just like the thistle plants that cover the beds and walkways. The difference is that I love to eat arugula and it doesn't hurt to touch it. You can even eat the flowers, or pick them and put them in an old vase on the counter. Arugula's spicy-peppery-woodsy taste is perfect with lemon and olive oil, maybe a little anchovy and garlic, too. Tastes like Italy to me.

I lived in Florence back in 1985-86 (with my mom and brother) and had an Italian boyfriend. His mama kept a little spade in his glove compartment so that if he was driving her around the countryside and she happened to see some delectable greens on the side of the road, she could easily pick them for their dinner.

"Ah, Mario! Ferma la macchina! Vedo la rucola laggiu`!" "Ah, Mario! Stop the car! I see some arugula over there!" (I'll admit Google Translate helped me with that. My Italian was probably never quite so good.)

My mom and I had never eaten such tasty greens before. The stuff we now refer to as "yuppy chow," the mixed baby greens we can get at just about any market, was unheard of in the States and we'd never had such spicy lettuce as arugula. I used to laugh at the bowl of weeds we were enjoying every night at dinner.

But in my garden this morning, as I braved the jungle of spikes and spiderwebs, I was pretty satisfied to gather something as nourishing as weeds in my basket. I picked some borage flowers too. They're the most beautiful periwinkle blue color, they have a light sweet-nutty flavor and, yes, borage is a weed as well. It's rampant in my garden. And I found a little rosemary hiding in a couple of old pots. It never even got planted properly, but it's surviving, none the less.

I was thinking about waxing rhapsodic about the Weeds we encounter in Life, the Weeds in My Life. How lovely it is to find the beauty in something as common as a lowly weed. One day, perhaps.

But for today I will leave it at arugula and borage and go whip up some lemon-garlic dressing.

31 days later

Some felted monster hats that I made in my required down time over the past month.

Hard to believe but today is one month since my surgery! An update is in order.

In short: Surgery was successful and I am daily feeling better and better.
In long: It wasn't quite the walk in the park the doctor and his team led me to (skeptically) believe I was in for. But, the surgery was successful and every day I feel a whole lot better.

I had a laproscopic hysterectomy and a mid-urethral sling implanted 4 weeks ago. It was out-patient surgery, and I was told that I would be up on my feet within hours, discharged by dinnertime, no "bed time" in the days afterward, back to normal in a week or so. The nurse even went so far as to say one of their patients took a five mile hike the day after surgery! Wow, it's no problem! And I quote (my surgeon): "Laproscopic surgery is difficult for me, not for you."

Yeah, right.

Recovery was just a more challenging and bumpier road than I'd been led to believe. First of all, I knew that I was a cheap date. In other words, a real lightweight when it comes to any substance such as narcotics or alcohol or...anesthesia. I had the HARDEST time really waking up from the surgery. It was at 11:30 am and they had expected me to leave the hospital by evening. Well, at some point it was clear that wasn't happening. I was feeling pretty awful and just was so groggy that I couldn't imagine going to the hotel near the hospital (we live about 2 hours away so I wasn't planning to go all the way home), but Dr. B let me decide.

Luckily, the hospital had room so an empty one with an extra bed was found, allowing Mark to spend the night in the bed right next to me. In the morning I was doing ok, but not GREAT, not ready to take a five mile hike, let alone a five minute hike, and was so glad I'd spent the night there. I spent the rest of the day trying to get my bladder to wake up, to no avail. Otherwise, I felt ok, so they discharged me WITH a catheter, we went to the hotel for the night. (Really nice hotel, but I felt too awful to appreciate it!)

The next morning we went back to the doctor's office, the catheter was removed and I was given orders to take a walk, have some lunch, drink a lot of water, walk some more, and when I had the urge come back to the office and pee. Wellllll...I walked over a mile that day. My wonderful husband just padded along beside me holding my hand. =) We went out to lunch (I wish I'd had nicer sweatpants ), to a book store, walked some more, to coffee, walked some more. Long story...it took hours, but eventually my bladder woke up. Sheesh!

I went home that night.

Since then I have steadily improved. I used mostly Advil and arnica montana for pain. Oh, and ice packs! The ice pack is your friend! Only used the Big Guns the first and second day. Makes me waaay too loopy. My pain rarely got beyond a 3 or 4 and that was only in the hospital. Since coming home I get sore on the incisions (still a bit these days, though less all the time). And as things moved around and adjusted inside, that caused some discomfort, but not much.

I found that healing from the mid-urethral sling was more uncomfortable than the hysterectomy. That felt like a splinter in my crotch for a while and YIKES! that was bad. But, now I can sneeze without the post-3-vaginal-deliveries piddle problem and THAT my friends, was worth every uncomfortable second.

Luckily I had the input of (virtual and actual) acquaintances (experienced in hysterectomies) and friends in the nursing profession. I was diligent about resting every day (naps the first week, laying down the second) and found that my exhaustion was greatest when people would come over to visit. I had no energy to talk or socialize the first week. Got a lot of knitting and crafting done, though! And watched a bunch more TV than I ever do. Friends brought over meals and that helped a bunch.

I was able to drive by a week post-op. (By able, I mean I felt comfortable enough to do so.)

The worst pain I had were leg cramps about a week after surgery. Not sure what they were about, but they were HORRIBLE! And lasted about 48 hours intermittently.

I am still finding that I am really tired in the afternoons after just one outing in the morning, so I'm watching that and trying not to schedule too much.

Otherwise I feel GREAT and look good too. I'm in great spirits as well, much MUCH better than I had anticipated. So overall, I feel like this was the right thing.

At my 2 week post op appointment my doctor said that my experience was UNUSUAL. They view me as a "sensitive" soul. Well, whatever. I yam what I yam. I think that to be feeling as good as I do today, one month post-op, is just fine and I'm glad I took good care of myself these past four weeks!

The Thread

Years ago, when I was a junior in college I became fascinated with the pregnant female shape. My sketchbook became swollen with images of round pregnant bellies with wings and murky fetus shapes. I obsessively created a series of etchings from these sketches and my professor, as I recall, was concerned. Was I pregnant? No, I think it was just my love affair with all things womb-full beginning.

I had completely forgotten about those prints until last week when they suddenly popped into my mind. I was driving home, thinking about my upcoming surgery, and so, as soon as I parked the van, I rushed into the house, unearthed my college portfolio and dug through the papers until I found them. There were more than I remembered and they were perfect.

 

Perfect because those images fit with a concept I’d been brewing for the past couple months.

On Monday I am having a hysterectomy. I was diagnosed with a large uterine fibroid and adenomyosis (fibrous growth within the uterine wall). After years of debilitating, heavy menstrual bleeding I am borderline anemic and nothing I’ve done non-invasively has been able to change that. After a lot of soul searching, a lot of interviewing of women who’d gone through the operation, and a lot of research I decided I needed to proceed. But I did so with a very heavy heart. Losing my womb felt very big. Very, very big.

I started to think about my uterus, the wonderful work it’s done (as evidenced by my three strapping young men), and my pregnancies. Those musings uncovered a thread that’s run through my adult life and those long forgotten etchings were like a link completing the circuit. When I found them I could feel the electricity sing.

The summer before my second year of college I was blessed to attend a birth, my very first one. My boyfriend’s sister-in-law was having a baby and the room was filled with friends and family (really, it was filled!). The only other birth I’d ever witnessed was my cat having kittens, which was wonderful in its own right, but this, this was different. I practically swooned (hospitals do that to me) and I had to leave the room. But I righted myself in time to see that little baby emerge from his mama and that experience changed my life.

The miracle of birth…a baby grows inside the mother…the baby emerges from the mother…this had never occurred to me before. Not like that. Not really. And that vision of it, that realization, was mind-blowing to this young woman.

I always knew I wanted to have kids and I looked forward to my first pregnancy. What surprised me was how ferociously I loved being pregnant. My pregnancy with Harry was perhaps the best physical time of my life. I got big and round immediately because I tend towards that pregnant shape naturally, and being able to let it all hang out was like taking a warm bath in my body all the time. I was meant to be this pregnant shape.

I took prenatal aerobics classes two or three times a week. I loved being in that room dancing around with other pregnant women. My limbs thinned out and my belly grew larger. I was HUGE by the end.

Throughout that pregnancy I was loving life so much that I considered the possibility of being a surrogate mother for infertile couples as a possible career! I did not want to live un-pregnant. As my due date approached I mourned the end of my pregnancy.

Having my baby, of course, changed that. Who has time to mourn the end of pregnancy when the outcome is as delicious as my adorable baby? (A baby who, by the way, just turned 18 last week!) I don’t remember thinking much about being a surrogate mother once he arrived. And my subsequent pregnancies with Ben and Toby were if not miserable, certainly never as easy and comfortable and enjoyable as that first time.

I started to help my friends during their labors. I quickly realized that I came into my essential self when I was guiding a friend through the relaxing, visualizing, breathing and pushing that happens at a birth. That feeling culminated when I coached my sister Mara through her labor 11 years ago. She was such a goddess and we got into the most incredible groove, forehead to forehead, nose to nose, breathing together, groaning together, holding each other till my beautiful niece was born. It was another life changing event. I was more present for her than the midwife in some ways. It was just us in that room (at least it felt that way) and I was her guide and protector.

Over the years I have begun to craft an idea that one day, I will do this. I mean, I will do this. Be a doula, be there to carry a mother through her labor and beyond. Last year, when Chanel asked me to be present at her second child’s birth (via C-section), to hold her hand and be her support, I leapt at the chance. It’s a long story, which you can read here, here, here, here and here, but suffice it to say that while helping her, my memory was recharged: I want to do this. I want to guide women in mothering, in birthing, in breastfeeding. This is my calling.

The experience with Chanel confirmed that when I grow up I want to be a doula (birth coach) or lactation consultant. I plan to wait until the boys are old enough to be self-sufficient for a period of time (the days I could potentially be away with long labors and new moms). Being a doula is bigger than just the birth experience, they often work with families before, during and after the birth, with preparing, with laboring, with nursing, and caring for the child and the mama. Just thinking of this makes me excited to move forward with it. But I need a bit more patience. Toby is only 10 and not ready for me to take on this other responsibility.

Hearing from the gynecologist that I needed a hysterectomy was a shock. Talking to many women who had had the surgery was a shock. “You don’t need it any more.” “Uteruses are for growing babies and then cancer.” At my pre-op appointment the surgeon actually used the word “amputate” (I know, surgeons, right?). I feel like my connection to that part of me is so different, so filled with appreciation and gratitude. It is that thread that runs through my adult life and goes to the deepest places of who I am.

I took a walk with my friend Madeleine the other day. We walked along the beach talking about transitions from one period to another in life, about moving through and beyond periods that define you in order to find new definitions. We talked about the sorrows and the joys that come with each new chapter. I drew my earth-woman-fertile-mother figure in the sand and let the waves caress her. I blessed myself, my core woman mother self. I have come to this realization: The earth mother in me is not going away, the core of woman- and motherhood that rests energetically in my womb will remain in me.

Tomorrow morning I will stem the out-flow of my own vitality. Though I will enter the hospital womb-full and leave womb-less, I will not be losing my self. I will be entering my next stage and it is a beautiful stage, that of wise crone woman, guide and caregiver, and the thread will remain. Think of me when you can and send me your healing blessings. Thanks.

feeling blessed

I participated in an Interfaith Thanksgiving service at my synagogue tonight. I was part of the planning committee and was asked to play my guitar and sing and to speak on the topic of gratitude for the blessings in our lives. Following is what I wrote and read. I'm dedicating it to my friend Svetlana.


My sons and I enjoy playing a storytelling game when we’re in the car on long drives. It’s called Fortunately/Unfortunately. You take turns going around the group, each person adding a sentence to the tale. It goes something like this:

First person: There once was a kid who had to walk to the library.

Next person: Fortunately, he lived only a block away…

Next person: Unfortunately, it was an extremely long block…

Next person: Fortunately, he only had one book to return that day…

Next person: Unfortunately, it was a huge book with about 1,000,000 pages…

You can see how it goes. Fortunately/Unfortunately. Your fortune can turn on a dime. This game reminds me of a wonderful Zen story, you can find it in this book, Zen Shorts. It’s the same idea, a tragedy befalls a farmer, and his neighbors say “Such bad luck!” and his response is, “Maybe.” Then, something good happens because of it and his neighbors say, “Such good luck!” and his response is, “Maybe.” As you find out in the story, your perspective can definitely change your experience of life.

It was raining the other night when I was thinking about perspective while I tried to fall asleep. It was raining, and it was a particularly cold night, and our heater had not been working in over two weeks, and winter was coming on. My nose was cold. The temperature in our house was 54 degrees!

I rolled over and grumped at my husband. I grumped and wished to be warm and complained and felt oh so sorry for me. Me and my cold nose in my house with no heat.

It’s easy to get negative. It's easy to look around and notice what’s wrong in your life. We all have something to complain about. Aches and pains, someone suffering whom we love, the heater’s broken again, the internet’s too slow. And then there’s the world with all of its aches and pains and suffering.

Very recently I made a discovery that if I shift my focus, if I take a different perspective, I can release myself from some of the burdens I carry around. I suppose it’s one of those lessons I need to learn over and over again. It’s not earth-shattering, it’s very simple.

I decided to say to myself: This is your life. Be in it, be in it right now.

I don’t say: Enjoy it. I don’t say: Count your blessings. I don’t say: It’s not so bad or It could be worse. There’s no judgment. I say: This is your life. This is it. Your life isn’t yesterday and it isn’t tomorrow. It’s happening now and you need to be present for this moment.

Six years ago my family was hit by a tidal wave of what some might call misfortune, but what I would call Life. My father-in-law passed away very suddenly, a month later we had to move into the house my husband was building earlier than expected, and a month after that we found out our 8 year old middle son needed immediate brain surgery. That would have been enough, enough to keep most people busy. But then the recovery didn’t go well, there were complications and infections, spinal fluid leaks, several more surgeries and ultimately, 40 nights in the hospital, mostly in the pediatric ICU.

Months later I’d look back at that extraordinary experience, the days and nights in the hospital, the four surgeries, the months away from my other children, and I would find myself feeling very blessed. It was odd really. My lovely little boy had gone through something truly excruciating (we all had) and I felt wrapped in golden light. Throughout that grueling time we had been surrounded by friends and family. People we loved and people we barely knew had come to hold us, to be with us, to give us food, to give us a break, to tell us their stories and to tell us we were in their thoughts and prayers. I felt such gratitude for being held in that way. I had never felt quite so blessed before in my life.

You might wonder how we got through that difficult time and all I can tell you is you do what needs to be done. If ever there was a time in my life I needed to be present, that was it. Of course, I did worry about the future, especially for my son, but my focus got incredibly tight: Be in your life right now, right this instant. Don’t look away.

The day after we had finally returned home I sat in our loveseat in our not-quite-finished new house with my two younger sons on either side of me. Ben, my middle son, was 8 and Toby, my baby was 5. We sat there, right next to each other, with a big pile of books and I read to them for hours. We were all so relieved, so content, so good just being there together on the couch with our books and our bodies snuggled up next to each other. I remember thinking: This is all I need.

So the other night, when I rolled over and grumped at my husband about my cold nose in my house with no heat, I could have gone on. But, I stopped myself. I told myself: This is your life. Be in it, be in it right now. I changed my perspective and my focus. Electric blanket, wool socks, roof over my head, loving husband, happy kids. Blessings one and all.