Some Things I Have Learned This Week

1. I am really, really bad at "taking it easy." I thought I was taking it easy after surgery, I mean I didn't get out of bed until Sunday and even then my big accomplishment was walking at a rate of .5 mph 10 houses down the street and back. It wiped me out. I am now being forced to "take it easy" by staying in bed all week thanks to a followup appointment on Monday where I was basically told to pretend I had the surgery Monday and to stay in bed and stay doped up. I hate it. I feel trapped in my home and my body.
2. I hate my downstairs. Downstairs has it all--the refrigerator, the bigger TV, the shower, the ability to make myself tea. Except being downstairs yesterday had me walking around (hobbled, hunched over "walking") to get myself tea, and waffles. Not good bed rest. Downstairs means the dog is in my face and wanting to get on the futon. Downstairs means laying on the futon, which is basically a glorified dog bed, an ass-licking station, an allergy nightmare, and not set up for good back support/tv watching/sleeping. Bryce did cover the thing with flannel sheets to mask its disgustingness, but it doesn't work. Downstairs I can see all the rugs that need vacuuming that I physically can't do and I would rather Bryce spend time with me rather than do right now. I can see my gardens that need watering. I can see all the shit that I am supposed to be able to do but can't. And I try too hard to move downstairs. Yesterday I was set up downstairs but after my superfriend came over to visit and saw how much I loathed that setup she set me back up upstairs. Ahhhhh.
3. I can't concentrate while drugged. Just say NO to drugs! I totally get it. Because while I am thoroughly enjoying the lack of sharp physical pain, and the total numbing of my emotional state of being so that I can concentrate on physical recovery, I feel incredibly stoopid. Not stupid, stoopid. I have difficulty reading. I have difficulty spelling and typing, which is a travesty for me since I pride myself on both those things. Writing this blog is taking me days and I keep deleting it and starting over. I have to do a boatload of school preparation, as I am supposed to be at school right now. I can't concentrate on any of it. The drugs make me sleepy but then I can't concentrate on falling asleep anough to get there. Today was the first day in a while that I actually slept most of the morning and last night I fell asleep quickly. I didn't think sleeping required concentration. I was wrong.
4. Percoset makes me itchy. Not a biggie, but as the day goes on and there is more narcotic in me, my skin gets itchier and itchier. I look like the people you don't make eye contact with on the subway. It's not a true allergy because there's no rash, but I wish maybe I could skip this annoying side effect.
5. I am bad at asking for help. I tend to have passive aggressive tendencies. I will do all the work without complaining so that then I can complain later that I had to do all the work. (Sorry Bryce, this is my secret! It's out of the bag! You can thank the percoset for this revelation!) I like to do things all on my own, sometimes to my detriment. I have gotten better at asking for help over time, as I have realized that I can't do it all myself. But I get resentful, sometimes, having to ask for help. Like somehow people should know what I need and magically provide it. Sometimes I think it is common sense. But it is not. I have been hinting and had several people immediately take the hints, friends and family (thank you, said friends and family, you know who you are). I need to feel connected right now. I need phone calls and visits and to feel like I am not an icky representation of loss that needs to be swept under the couch with the other ugly dustbunnies. I need to not feel like an inconvenience to people's otherwise happy lives. When you have suffered a traumatic event, and you are recovering, and that recovery is taking a really long time, it is helpful to receive phone calls and visits and offers of help not just on the day it happens. If six days have gone by and you are still housebound and there are people that you haven't heard from at all since the day of your surgery, you start to feel forgotten. And terribly, terribly lonely. It can be a horrible feeling to feel that you need to remind people that you are still there. I don't think that being busy is a good excuse unless you have been kidnapped and are busy sorting coca leaves in Columbia under gunpoint. A call or even a thoughtful text "I am thinking of you" takes 2 minutes at most. On a side and related note, after a trauma you don't always want to talk only about the traumatic event, there is more to you than that. Maybe you need to talk about a book or a movie or those ridiculous Kardashians instead. This balance in how people relate to you and how you relate to people is by far the most difficult thing about this whole situation. As of right now, at least.
6. I may never be the same after this. I realized that when you are infertile, things change. So many (SO MANY) people who have gone before me on this journey and have their families now through one path or another have told me...you may become a parent but you never stop being infertile. It is part of who you are. These experiences, these losses and traumas and revelations, they shape you are. You are still the same person, you just don't have the luxury of the carefree anymore. I am not out of this yet and I do not take anything for granted. I appreciate everything. But I also see through the bullshit. Life is not fair. Some things are important, and some things are not. Some people will understand you, and some will not. I feel like I still have a goofy side, a sense of humor that helps me through tough times. I just also feel like a part of me is necrotic. Like I have dark edges that have been burned away and won't grow back. That is part of me too, and while it is not fun and happy-go-lucky, it is something that has to be accepted. Because to not accept my scars is to not accept me. You can't have just the cotton candy parts and call it good.
7. I have a lot of people to thank who have supported me on this journey. This is an ongoing thanks, it seemed kind of final and eulogy-like when I just typed it but that's not what I mean. There are a lot of people who don't know me that well who have been very supportive. I have a love-hate relationship with facebook. I think that it encourages people to have superficial relationships and feel like an effort has been made when it hasn't, not by human standards. However, facebook has allowed me to share with others for better or worse, and it has allowed me to connect with people I didn't truly know before who are excellent cheerleaders. It has allowed me to connect with people I do know who are going through similar struggles privately. It has given a forum to connect with masses of family and friends quickly and to feel a lot of love. Something as small and quick as a facebook comment or note can really make my day--make me feel loved and thought of and cared about. I also have an email support group that has been tremendously helpful, full of women who have all been or are on this same shitty path. They have been lifesavers when I needed to talk to others who actually know firsthand what this feels like. It has been so helpful to not feel like an anomaly. And my friends and family who have stuck with me through all of this, I thank you. I thank you for sending me elephants and owls in the mail, for calls, for texts when young children made calls impossible. For flowers and cards and visits. For calling me from work to make sure that I'm ok and coming home from work to make me lunch and get me pain pills. For loving me when it is so, so hard and not just when it is easy.