Tag: sickness

Monday – Funday

Wow. There is nothing else that makes you appreciate your own health and vitality, than when it is taken away from you. I guess that’s the same for anything good in your life that is so dependable. It is easily taken for granted. I don’t know what current strains of viruses are going around right now, but this one around here decided to “take me to the party.” I still can’t hear out of my right ear, all that well, but I am feeling decidedly around the bend. Thank goodness.

Last night I had the most intense dream. (Based on the medical cocktail I’m on right now for my infections, this is probably not unusual.) In my dream, I was visiting this unusual place on a tall, dark black, steep cliff where I had the sense that I had been there previously. I looked up to see, far up on one side of the cliff, that there was an intriguing looking entrance with bright lights and a fire and what looked to be some sort of store or restaurant. It had a very over-the-top, Disney-ish, “assault to the senses” kind of look to it, and yet it was appealing and I had the feeling I had seen it before. It had a name over the entrance. The name was “Umbruch”. I don’t remember much more of the rest of the dream, but “Umbruch” stuck with me. I looked it up before writing the blog . It turns out that “Umbruch” is a German word for “to be in a state of flux, to be undergoing radical change, to be going through a period of upheaval.” (Langenscheidt dictionary)

This empty nest experience, for my husband and I, has definitely had its interruptions, fits and starts. The pandemic brought three of our kids home to live and to study, for a lot of 2020. In 2021, our son who has epilepsy was going through a tough year of regulating his medications, so he spent a lot of time home with us then. Our youngest child, our daughter, left for school in late summer of 2022, but in the meantime my mother-in-law was enduring a long, slow illness that ended in her death in December of 2022, so that was a major part of our focus. In 2023, our daughter came home from college for the summer and she lived with us. This 2024 summer is the first summer, that we have no children living with us since I was 25 years old, as our daughter is studying abroad. This is the first real taste of the “true empty nest.” We definitely have been experiencing “umbruch” for a while now, and I think my subconscious wanted to bring that to my attention. The exciting thing though, is that I did not feel frightened or worried, in my dream. I felt a mix of excitement, curiosity, and anticipation. I was on a steep cliff, yet I had a sense of reassurance that I had been to this place before and that it had ended up to be a great experience. I was excited to climb up to the entrance.

Forgive my indulgence in relaying my dream. I keep this blog mostly as a thought catalog for myself (although I am so grateful that it resonates with my readers!). I read something recently that every major stage in life can be painted as a sad, bitter end, or an exciting, intriguing new beginning. The fact is that every ending is also a new beginning. Umbruch sounds like a scary, challenging place to be, but it also sounds mysterious, energizing and eye-opening. I think that I am excited to explore what it has to offer.

And what I do know for sure is that it is great to be back to writing the blog! See you tomorrow.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1072. What is your favorite game beginning with the letter N? 

I’m Okay

Hi readers and friends. Judging from concerned texts which I have been receiving from some of my inner circle who are also Adulting-Second Half faithfuls, I felt the need to come to let you know that I am fine, and I hope to be back to my regular daily blogging by Monday, at the latest. Unfortunately, I came down with a doozy of a virus on Monday night and it has knocked me off of my feet. Throughout this past week, I have been miserable, fatigued, bummed, annoyed and mostly, extremely listless. I finally succumbed to going to the doctor on Friday who confirmed that my virus had turned into a mess of two ear infections and a sinus infection, and she swiftly put me on antibiotics and steroids. The medications are starting to kick in. I still don’t have a lot of energy, but I have pain relief and thankfully, my head no longer feels like it is going to explode.

My daughter left for her summer study abroad studies in London earlier this week, and so I suppose, in missing her and feeling the need to channel her, with my utter lack of energy, I firmly sat on my little brown couch, with little brown dog, and I mostly binge watched most of The Crown, all week long. (I may be one of the few women left on Earth, who has never seen The Crown before this week.) In doing so, my curiosity lead me to reading this book: Lady in Waiting: My Extraordinary Life in the Shadow of the Crown by Anne Glenconner. It is the true story of a member of the British aristocracy who served as a lady-in-waiting for Princess Margaret for 30 years, and she also was one of Queen Elizabeth’s attendants when the queen was coronated in 1953. It is an honest, candid, highly readable book which was written in 2020, when the author was in her eighties (The author is still writing books, now at the age of 91). I could not put the book down. I expected to be disgusted and off-put by her accounts, but instead I found her biography intriguing, fascinating and oddly, sometimes even relatable. No matter what our station in life is, we women all juggle what it means to be women in service not only to ourselves but also to our husbands/partners, families and communities, all while being strongly influenced, and sometimes limited, by societal expectations.

Coming here to the blog, for the first time since Tuesday morning, despite being utterly played out, has made me realize how much I’ve missed writing it, and feeling a connection with you, my readers. I missed you! Thank you for the well wishes and concern. I pride myself on my robust immune system and I am not used to being “kept down” this long, but I believe that the body has a wisdom of its own and I am willing to succumb to this wisdom and healing that only true rest and surrender has to offer.

Good night, friends. I am headed to bed. I will be back “in form” by Monday. <3

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:

1217. Are you being true to yourself?

Soul Sunday

As you may have guessed, the complications with our youngest son’s epilepsy continues. We spent the last three days at the hospital, thus I have not been writing my daily blog. We are all okay. Our son is back home with us now. (just where a college junior wants to be – back home with Mom and Dad – ha!) This frustrating and mysterious experience of finding just the right drug for stopping epileptic seizures is really beyond a tricky thing. What works for one person, destroys another person. What once worked for years for a person with epilepsy, all of the sudden stops working, with no sensible explanation nor apology.

Thank you for your love and for your prayers. I feel them. I was praying and I was sobbing in the hospital chapel this morning, and then all of the sudden I was washed over with the most calming, beautiful sense of peace. This feeling was lovely and comforting and overwhelmingly awesome, all at the same time. I felt everyone’s presence besides my own, alone in the quiet, solemn chapel. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. As you can imagine, I have prayed since the day that my son was diagnosed with epilepsy, for this disorder in him, to be healed forevermore. I have tried bargaining with God. I have tried doing good and charitable deeds to be “worthy” of his healing, despite my strong belief in God’s non-judgmental grace. Honestly, I have tried Jedi mind tricks. I am embarrassed by some of the avenues which I have desperately explored, to make this nightmare go away for my son, and for our family. My angel box is filled with little pieces of paper with the same prayer, “Please heal my baby.” Some of these papers are now aged and faded. I have been praying for this miracle, for seven years, since we first got my son’s epilepsy diagnosis. Still, for reasons that I don’t comprehend, my son’s stubborn affliction remains. But yet, at the same time, I remind myself that I have never really questioned why I have been remarkably blessed in so many other aspects of my life. I never question why my family has excellent health coverage which pays for emergency drugs that halts our son’s seizures while they are happening. Many people with epilepsy do not have access to these cutting edge drugs and providers. Without insurance, these drugs cost $1300 per single use. I know how privileged I am. When your heart is exposed to such worry and anxiety and fears about your own child’s well-being, you can’t help but realize how many other parents are going through their own personal agony, dealing with their own children’s afflictions, and on top of all of this pain and fear, they have money worries, and lack of resources to provide their children with the best care available. Many people are experiencing this heartache alone. I have a loving husband whose strong arms I rest in, every night, who shares my pain and yet comforts me with his deep, knowing stares. I have family and friends who support us, and lift us up, with their love and their concern. When my heart bleeds for my son and our family, the bleeding continues to pour out, for all of us parents who are hurting for our children, who sadly, we do not have the power to heal by ourselves. That’s not how mothering (parenting) is supposed to work. I am supposed to be able to kiss every boo-boo away, with a sense of power and ease and nonchalance. I hate every single one of our hospital stays, because every door that I pass as I walk on to our room, holds a room full of pain and fear and yet also a desperate hope, for a family that feels helpless, fearful, dejected and pained. I know their pain intimately, and I wish that I could stop it for every one of us. I wish that I could stop the bleed for all of us, but my heart’s tourniquet is overwhelmed.

Trying to catch my breath and to restore my sense of sanity, I was walking on the medical campus of the renowned hospital where I spent my time this weekend, and there, I spied an incredibly beautiful, old, and glorious tree, reaching out and shading the playground provided for hospitalized children – those young ones, who are still well enough to still go outside and play. I looked at her – the wise and stable tree. I touched her beautiful, cragged bark, knowing that I was touching a vital and living being, older and wiser, than I will ever be. I thought to myself, “There is a poem growing here, perfect for a Soul Sunday on the blog.” And I started to search my mind for the poem. And then I suddenly realized that I didn’t need words for the poem. The splendid, formidable, rooted tree was the poem, just in her being. Her fortitude and her vitality shades and protects her precious fragile charges. She does what she can do, and she takes her job seriously. She stays rooted and strong, and she continues to grow, in order to provide for her charges, with what she has to give. She does what she can, and knows that this enough. Other forces, higher than her tallest, reaching branches, will take care of the rest of what needs to be done. And in the meantime, the tree just does what she can, providing some oxygen to breathe, and some shade and some protection, for those who seek comfort under her solid canopy of restless leaves.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.