Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Going with the Flow

It's been a tough week. Let's be honest: it's been a tough few months. In addition to dealing with a sick husband and a wicked cold, I ended up in the emergency room last week. It turns out that because they had to place the new wires for my ICD in the same vein as my old, capped off wires, there's a bit of a blood flow problem. There's far less space for the blood to move. When gravity isn't on my side and I'm not completely vertical, I get a tremendous pressure on my head and neck. It's a sensation I can only liken to my neck being squeezed... highly uncomfortable. It makes leaning over to put the kids in car seats, tie shoes, or make beds take so much longer because I have to keep standing up to make the blood move. Sleeping is uncomfortable as well. The hope is that as my body adapts to the wires, this will all go away in about two to three months.

To say that my health issues are starting to get to me is and understatement. I was bitching and moaning about my frustrations with my health on facebook. My status read,"Kristie would like-- someday soon-- to feel healthy. It's been since Nov 12 that I've been 100%. Since then: 3 icd shocks, two surgeries, recovery, scratched cornea, slow blood flow in veins around the leads of my ICD, and now this nasty cold resulting in stuffy nose, fever, cough and chills.... I'm over it!" The next day my status read, "Frustrated that I am not the mommy my kids know and love and haven't been since Nov... And I have at least two more months until my neck issue clears up and I can bend down or raise my pulse without feeling like my head will explode."

One of my wise friends wrote back and suggested I use this as an opportunity to practice patience. Intellectually, I realize she speaks the truth. I get it. Patience, however, has never been a strength of mine. I sat there reading her words and it was as if I was reading Greek. Patience? What's that? How does one go about having patience?

The answer was discovered within. The more my heart rate rises and strains to make that blood move, the more pressure I feel as the blood tries to work around the wires. The exertion my heart puts forth in trying to force the process only makes the situation that much more painful. It exhausts my energy and drains my resources. hmmm... sounds familiar. Just as the blood in me must slow down endure these new obstacles, so do I. I'm thinking I might have to take a lesson from my blood and learn to go with the flow.

1 comment:

  1. thanks so much for this....although our circumstances are different, the need to "go with the flow" and just BE seem to be a common theme. thanks for your words this a.m. xoxo

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