The Fast Getaway

For the last two weeks, I've done nuthin' but mourn the loss of the movement I'd gained with the Botox working and I do mean NOTHING. I haven't written, haven't shopped, barely cooked besides nuke 'em meals, or done absolutely anything but front seat issues that pop up.

I hear you, "But Jo, I've read your blog almost everyday and you say you haven't written." Nope not even written. I did a fast getaway.The beauty of the scheduler. I've slept and read more, and just vegetated. Movement of my right arm causes the spasms and spastcity to increase thus pain levels. My right ankle has regressed to the point of me considering using my wheelchair full time.

I dreamed of an out of body experience where I left this body and mind behind, and I could do everything again. Instead of being trapped in a body that couldn't do much. There was comfort in those fast getaways and I chose to stay in them. Everyone needs a break sometimes, but where can you actually getaway to if you have to take your body with you? Yep, I'm talking about a major depressive state.

Well, to make a drag on story short, I'm over it now. My mind is still a bit foggy, but I'm attributing it to the increase of medications I'm taking to combat the pain I'm in. AND so I begin again. It's time to get off the pity pot and fight FOR me and not AGAINST me.

Diane from The Pink House on the Corner blog went through a similar state a couple of weeks ago from the caregiver side. But unlike her I'm the stroke survivor and the caregiver for my husband. Wohoo! The double helpings for me. Everyone just loves double helpings, don't they? I

mean it could always be worse ------>

That's the beauty of living a glass half full kind of life. Even so, there are limits to my positive attitude. At times like this is when friends and family come into play as my lifesavers. A few days here and there are fine, but not anything longer.  They spring into action unbidden.

I've touched a lot of lives in my professional capacity as a minister and just being me. In my life, The picture of the five scoops are the "reap what you sow" kind of things in relationships I've developed over the years.

For example I received the news that my attorney was pulling out of a possible legal action because he felt it was a case he couldn't win. While talking to him my call waiting was constantly buzzing which I ignored. I was in a more depressed state than I was in before. I was actually crying in disappointment and anger. This didn't help my aphasia or relieve the concern of my husband seeing me such a state. In fact it constricted my throat where I was having a really hard time breathing let alone speaking. Ya gotta love paralysis after a stroke. It is just so much fun being me.

After I calmed down, explained to my husband what was going on, and looked at my phone to see who was insistently calling when I was speaking to my, now former, lawyer. It was my daughter, Jennifer. I called her back to make sure nothing was terribly wrong because she's coming down to visit over Mother's Day weekend with my youngest grandson and granddaughter.

Nothing was wrong. She had a story to tell me. A couple of weeks ago for my birthday. She came to visit during the week for several days. She took with her all my blankets to wash in her new fangled, high efficiency washer with a steam cycle. While she was here she did the mortal combat maneuver with the spider population in my house. Think back to my Creepy Crawlies excerpt. Remember I can't look up and get the cobwebs and keep my balance. She's deathly afraid of spiders, but loves her momma more.

The story unfolds...She put a load of blankets into the machine and goes to unload them from her washer. And what does find after going through the hot cycle, bleach, and steam...a spider. He's not dead but crawling, albeit drunkenly, out of her washer. Alive! She said, "Mom, I didn't have the heart to kill it. I got a cup and a spoon, and put it outside in my garden."

She had me rolling with laughter which broke my depressive state. This time I was crying and my throat was constricting with merriment. Now I fully expect to get these depressive states again, but I know my family and friends will snap me back if I can't break the cycle myself.