The Next Right Thing

I had a bit of a scare yesterday.

I had planned to drive my brother to an appointment with an ophthalmologist (eye surgeon; he has cataracts) so I went for the 2-hour trip to his place (out of province).  When I got to his house, I realized that he either wasn't there or he was unable to open the door for me. Some frantic calls later, I learned (thanks to a great RCMP officer) that he had been admitted to hospital in a neighboring city the previous day. He gave me the telephone number at the nurse's station of his unit and also his room number. I called and got an update - he was in the cardiac care unit but was stable. The relief I felt that he was alive and being cared for eclipsed the anxiety of what might lie ahead for him.

Photo "Footprints On The Beach Sand"
courtesy of foto76 at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Since I was already there and within an hour's drive of the hospital he was in, I decided to go to see him, which I did. Braving the open highway, and multiple exits to the city I was going to, was worth the extra stress of making the trip!  He was in good spirits and so glad to see me! He was hooked up to an intravenous tube with a couple of extra bags - nitro-glycerine and heparin - and to heart, blood pressure, and oxygen monitors.  It was comforting to see the numbers and the regular rhythm of his heartbeat on the screen.  We chatted for a while about this and that, and I decided that while I was in the building, I would go and see Mom, who has dementia.  I promised my brother that I'd come back and see him before I left the building to go home.

I had called Mom's unit so often, and hospitals are laid out in pretty much the same way on each floor, that it was easy to find her area after having been to his. When I got there, I found her in a common area with a few people. She was playing Skip-Bo, her favorite card game, and trouncing everyone while she was at it. She barely looked up when I came in, except to express surprise to see me - which is normal for her. As I chatted with one of the other visitors, I watched while her right hand repeatedly picked the brightly-colored cards out of her left and played them on the discard pile. She was still unbeatable. And when she won, she didn't show pleasure, only a slight disappointment that the activity was over. And then she forgot she had done it. It was like she was home, except that ... she wasn't.

Once one of the people left, and we herded Mom back into her room (reminding her three times to not forget her walker), I shared with the other visitors (honorary Bro and Sis) the news about my brother, while managing to keep Mom from cluing in to it.  That's easy these days because she doesn't hear well and only can focus on one person at a time: whoever is in front of her usually.  I got a chance to visit with all of them, though. As visits go, it was pretty good. :)

Later, honorary Bro and I went down to see my brother in the CCU while honorary Sis and Mom kept playing cards in her room. The events just flowed, like they'd been prepared for me in advance, and all I needed to do was walk into them and take my place. Seeing her didn't fill me with dread or sadness; she was still Mom. 

The whole day was - I was going to say easy, but that isn't the right word. I was just ... living in each moment as it came without wondering where the next one would lead. It was an odd experience, unlike any other, but it felt completely natural. I just did whatever came next. Naturally.

"Do the next right thing" is a slogan that I have known about for close to nine years. The beauty of it is that word "next" because it implies that there is always a next time, and a next, and a next. Yesterday was supremely stressful and there were a lot of ups and downs in it (including the harrowing drive to the hospital at high speed on fairly unfamiliar roads among unforgiving drivers in high winds that buffeted the little car I was driving). But each segment of the day - including the drive and all the components of it - was one more step in doing "the next right thing."  I have rarely been more aware that I was exactly where I should be and doing the very thing that I was meant to do in that moment. It was like those moments were being orchestrated, conducted by a Master Designer, to meet not only their needs, but my own in the process. 

The Road to Self-care

So okay, NOW I can talk about this on my blog. I had to make sure that everyone in my household was in the know and aware. And not overreacting. Because it's no super big deal.

So here goes: I am in the process of getting diagnosed with type 2 Diabetes (late onset, or what the old-timers used to call "shugar dye-a-BEET-us") I've been monitoring my blood sugars ever since this morning, so I can show my log book to the doctor on Thursday. He'll have the results of my second A1C (blood glucose, fasting) test, which he needs to confirm the diagnosis. He and I both expect it to be around the same as the last one, so yes, unofficially it's diabetes mellitus (the medical term.)

Then we'll talk about treatment (probably pills) and he'll probably refer me to a nutritionist. I've already made adjustments in timing, portion control and content of my meals and snacks. (Been doing a LOT of reading at the Canadian Diabetes Association site and at the Mayo Clinic site).

People are going to ask me if I'm okay - that's natural. The truth is, I haven't been okay.  The last 8 months has been simply awful: no energy, lots of fatigue, thirsty all the time, and ravenously hungry ... really irritable before meals and falling asleep while studying - and elsewhere. I just thought it was stress. Well, it WAS stress in a way, because prolonged, intense stress can raise blood sugar - but there are also other contributing factors, of which I have three: a family history (my dad's mother), a personal history of gestational diabetes, and morbid obesity. I get it that people will be worried about me and wonder what this means for my health.

 

Photo "Bowl Of Muesli For Breakfast With Fruits"
courtesy of Serge Bertasius at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

 

But for the most part, for me, the diagnosis of diabetes comes as a huge relief.  Finally, there's an explanation for how I've been feeling. Finally, I know what to do about it AND I am motivated to do so.  And best of all, my entire nuclear family is on board with getting more active and eating better (in fact, they are looking forward to it!) - talk about moral support! 

 

Having diabetes forces me to look after myself, not to skip meals, not to snack on empty calories, and not to sit in my chair and think of excuses why I should stay there.  Wow.  Not to lose weight (although if that happens - bonus!) but to keep my sugars under control so that I don't end up with heart disease and kidney problems.  

 

I even heard my husband say to me last week (echoing my own secret thoughts), "You know, honey, maybe this is a blessing in disguise."  It surprises me to say that I think he is right!  I can say that I have been scouring diabetes websites, looking at food lists, poring over supermarket flyers, thinking about meal planning, and getting my head around being more active and just making that part of my every-day routine.  

 

I have spent the last seven years trying to take care of my emotional self, and I have been growing in that respect more and more; now, it is time to take care of my physical self. I'm on the road again. Hopefully the skies will be sunny and the breeze warm.

The Scar

I have a large, V-shaped scar under my left kneecap. 

I got it when I was two years old. I was out playing in our yard, a giggling, squirming bundle of blonde curls and mischief, and my brother - then 8 years old - was trying to catch me. 

He saw me headed toward the back of the house, where our parents kept a big steel drum for storing "hard garbage." There, they would put those huge apple-juice cans and other things like glass bottles that Mom couldn't use for canning. It was a dangerous place - strewn with things that had been tossed but didn't quite reach the tall steel drum - about three and a half feet tall. 

He called out to me, warning me not to go back there. I squealed and ran toward the forbidden territory; everything was a game. He ran after me - trying to reach me in time.

Just before he did - I fell.

Something broke my fall - but I wouldn't recommend it. There was an old vinegar jug made of glass that hadn't quite landed in the bin and had broken on the ground. Sharp shards and razor-sharp edges were everywhere. 

I landed on my knee, directly on a piece of that jug, on a portion of sharp glass that was sticking straight up from the bottom edge of the jug. 

I won't go into the gory details, but I ended up nearly becoming a permanent cripple that day. The glass very narrowly missed slicing my patellar tendon and doing damage to the inside of the joint. Amid several people holding a screaming child down, in that small two-year-old's knee were placed eighteen stitches: five internal and thirteen external. I was ordered to keep my leg straight and the rest of my family were recruited to enforce that order - until it healed. 

"Knee Replacement Surgery" photo
courtesy of olovedog
at www.freedigitalphotos.net

When the stitches came out, the doctor tested my knee joint to see if there had been any permanent damage to the tendons and ligaments. He breathed a sigh of relief when all was normal. 

I don't remember a thing about that incident. Matter of fact, I don't remember much of anything specific about my life before I was six years old, but that is a whole different story. 

I do know that I have had a scar from it ever since. As I grew, it did too. 

That's an interesting concept. 

Your scars grow at the same rate that you do. They show up bigger than they were when you were younger. However, keep in mind that they cover the same percentage of your body that they did when they first happened. And while some scars do fade - some don't. The deeper the original injury was, the more permanent the mark (and possibly the crater) it leaves behind. And some injuries (and even some surgeries) will cause degeneration to happen more quickly than normal (hence, early-onset osteoarthritis or degenerative disc disease), while others will leave no residual effects.

I have a theory that emotional injuries work the same way. 

The depth, extent, and frequency of emotional injury will determine the degree and the severity of any lasting effects from those injuries. And ... it will also determine the length of time it takes to heal from those hurts. 

Or to find a way to cope with what can't be changed. 

Having been emotionally damaged by various experiences, and having healed from many of them, I have a few pointers to give someone who is dealing with the after-effects of deep emotional scars. 

• Healing takes time. The deeper, the more intentional, and the more systematic the hurt, the longer it will take to recover from it.
• Emotions are NOT BAD. If you feel bad because something bad happened to you, that is a NORMAL response. It's supposed to feel that way. If you feel angry because you were wronged, that's normal too! Anger is a normal response to injustice!
• Pain is sometimes necessary in order to diagnose ... and to heal. Pain lets you know what area needs work. Seek to know the reasons for your pain, not just to be delivered from it. The former leads to healing; the latter to addiction and dysfunction.
• Healing happens best from the inside out. If something only scabs over on the outside, it will only be a matter of time before someone or something hits you in that place again - and it will hurt. A LOT. Healing from the inside first will allow the outside to take care of itself, and for the healing to be permanent.
• Talk about your feelings with someone you trust. Pray, talk through your feelings, get it out of you and don't hide from it.
• If you can manage it at all, keep a healing journal. Write about how you feel. Be honest with yourself at all times. The ultimate goal is to get better from the hurts of the past, to make restoration to those whom you have hurt as a result, and to free yourself from the killer known as resentment.
  
• Finally, to do all this, GET HELP. It's okay to ask for help from someone who is trustworthy and will not break (or who will even joke that they have the power to break) your confidentiality. Move past the shame and go see a counselor, attend a 12-step group, or talk to your pastor or spiritual advisor. Agree to accept his or her counsel and do not settle for activities that will only modify external behaviors or satisfy some desire for revenge.

One more thing about emotional scars. Like physical ones, they are what's left over after the hurt has healed. Emotional scars can be quite noticeable even after you have dealt with the root cause and it's no longer hurting you, but the presence of the scar doesn't mean that you haven't healed. It just means that you survived. 

Don't be ashamed of your scars; they can open conversations and give people hope, and help them to heal from their wounds too. That's the way it was designed to work.

Making it Right

I love to watch Mike Holmes work ... and teach. He's a Canadian general contractor who started his foray into show business with a home renovation show called "Holmes on Homes" - then "Holmes Inspection" and now "Holmes Makes it Right." His motto has always been, "Make it Right." His dad taught him that if you do something right the first time in home construction, you'll never have to do it again - and his shows are all about folks who are suffering from some contractors' decisions NOT to make it right the first time: to cut corners, to take shortcuts, to slap things together. So, Mike comes in and (pun of puns) makes it right. Most of the time, he makes it better than expected.

He never expected to have the success he has had. Yet every day, he receives hundreds of emails from people who have had a raw deal from the "bad and the ugly" - respectively described by him as the ones who mean well but don't know enough, and the ones that are out to bilk the home-owner. 

"Doctor In Surgery" courtesy of taoty at
www.freedigitalimages.net

I was thinking of Mike today because my daughter injured her knee (dislocated patella) on November 30, 2012. After seeing a doctor who referred her to an orthopedic surgeon, and after conservative treatment for 2 months via physiotherapy, an MRI revealed what we suspected from day one: torn ligaments beneath the patella and chronic ligament laxity. What that means is surgery - and soon.

Today she got her surgery date: April 4th (perhaps sooner if there's a cancellation), and a pre-surgery clinic scheduled for March 21st. 

The surgeon will be shortening those three stretched ligaments under the kneecap. However, he will also be doing some structural changes while he's in there. He is going to change the focal point of her knee by removing a tendon at one end and re-attaching it to the top of the shin-bone , because the knee has always been in a valgus presentation. In layman's terms, she's knock-kneed - always has been. Once that minor deformity is corrected, it will make it less likely for her to re-dislocate that knee.

After the surgery, and more physiotherapy, if the other knee is posing a problem with the new stance, he'll schedule surgery on the other knee and shift the focal point to match. 

It's quite possibly a long haul for her over the next little while, with time for healing and rebuilding muscle strength. However, the doctor is "making it right" ... and sometimes, that takes time.

Starting with the right foundation is crucial to ending up with a strong house... and starting with the right stance will not only keep her from re-injuring her knee, it will teach her to walk straight, and might even gain her an inch or two in height. It will also reduce her back problems. 

She may quail at the thought of the infirmity that lies ahead. We'll be here for her while she's going through it, confident that she'll end up an even better "her" than she thought possible.

As in construction, so in life - whether bum knees or a tired soul.

Taking care while caretaking

I'm a recovering codependent. 

It is an effort for me to let people make their own mistakes without trying to rush in and fix things, or to fix the people. When I put on my "Fix-it" cap, people either become more dependent on me (which breeds resentment on both sides) or they immediately beome defensive and angry. 

Usually. 

However, there are times when the "caretaking" skills come in handy - like when someone I love is literally unable to care for himself or herself. 

Like this weekend. My eldest fell on a patch of black ice while trying to get into the family vehicle. In that fall, she twisted her left knee so much so that the patella (kneecap) shifted around to the outside - and she had to shift it back until it "clicked" into place (shuddddder.) 

We finally (that is, after over 24 hours of arguing) convinced her that she needed to have it seen. Her dad took her to an emergency room in a hospital which is an hour's drive away - one that is known for shorter wait times. She was seen very quickly, X-rayed to exclude the possibility of a bone chip or cracked patella, had a huge knee-brace put on her leg to keep it straight - and referred to an extremely good orthopedic surgeon here in our community. The wait time to see him is usually 2 to 3 months. He called this morning and wants to meet her at our local hospital a week from tomorrow. (This gives the swelling time to go down so an MRI can get a better picture, quite likely). 

Oh ... did I forget to mention that she RE-injured the knee trying to get back into the house (5 stairs up to the top of the deck plus a lu-lu of a doorstep to get into the house) with the knee brace on? Once again, she had to click the patella back in place. In the rain. Sitting on a wet deck. The whole thing was a nightmare for all concerned - especially her.

A hand-held shower: simple solution to mobility problems

Anyway... today I called my boss and told her that I'd be taking some time off today to look after my daughter and arrange ways for her to look after herself in the day-to-day. 

If I need to, I'll take leave without pay to look after her, but I hope it doesn't come to that. 

Her dad is running unexpected errands today - getting items we never thought we'd need: a hand-held shower head, other assorted household items, a wheelchair rental, materials to build a ramp from the top of the deck to the driveway - and I'm looking at ways to get her access to the things she normally uses in the run of a day, so that she can function from day to day without help.

And herein is the greatest difference between the way I would have handled this four years ago and the way I'm approaching it now. I'm actually actively seeking ways for her to be independent. Before, I would have lapped this up and wanted more. Yes, in a way I am enjoying the opportunity to look after her hand and foot. However, I know that this is a danger zone for me - so I need to ask myself, even now, if this (whatever it is) is something I NEED to do or if I should let her try to figure it out on her own. 

Sometimes it's appropriate for me to offer my help; after that, though, it's more appropriate to make a way for her to do things for herself. 

It's a learning process. And I'm learning.