Ongoing conversation...

Standing in the bathroom on the mat right outside the tub. Breathing in. Breathing out. My hand grasps the steel bar attached to the brown ceramic tile shower-bathtub wall.  I await energy, after the task of bathing, so I can walk down the hall to the bedroom.

Thoughts stream in between and through the breaths...

If people just knew how fucking hard it is to function. How much effort it takes to do the simplest of tasks. Everything is just so damn hard.

My mind pauses.

Surgery did me in. It's the most traumatic event I've lived.. 

Pause.

Or is it? 

What is the most traumatic thing I've lived? 

Another pause.

Teen years. Jimson weed? Feeling I was crazy due to psychedelics? Becoming withdrawn? Dale hitting me? 

Adult years. All those asthma attacks? Contaminated albuterol? Suicidal ideations?  Sinus surgery after sinus surgery? Dad's quadriplegia? Mom's bipolar?  The Way? Knapp's attempted character assassination?

Images rolled like a movie, frame after frame.

I don't think any of those top last year's surgery. It was horrible. That kind of surgery is traumatic on an able body. It's trauma times ten on a nerve-damaged body. 

My next thought was the nerve damage when it was at its worst from Spring, 2013, through  June, 2015.

My mind halted.

No. It wasn't the surgery. Or the Jimson weed. Or the asthma. It wasn't all the other surgeries. It wasn't The Way. It wasn't Knapp.

It was my nerve damage at its worst. Limbs losing function - legs and feet and arms and hands. Heavy. Deadened. Barely able to rise. It was terrifying. Just terrifying. I kept trying to fake it 'til I would make it. But  I had no control over it. I could not will my limbs to work, and I was I doing all I could. It was  just terrifying. I lived in constant survival mode.

I never want to live that again. Never. And even though I still live with weakness and fatigue, I no longer live in terror. Never, never, never again. I hope I don't eat those words. 

Images. Feelings. Re-memberings.

I'll not mention some other thoughts - things that haven't happened to me, and I hope never do. Things I know others have endured causing my experiences to pale in comparison.

Pause.

So what is the most joyful time of my life? The birth of my children? Shouldn't that be when I felt the most joy? I wish I could say it was, but pregnancy and childbirth were so hard on me. I don't recall feeling joy. I recall feeling totally wiped out.

In 2015 when my limbs were coming back to life - every cell within me vibrated. It was like my limbs were having orgasms. Maybe they were. It was like a rebirth, a resurrection. Tears would stream down my cheeks as I again felt life in muscles. 

But still, that doesn't top the joy of my children. And holding them as infants against my chest. Our bodies' rhythms one.  

~*~

The thoughts above are a continual conversation in my head. I do the best I can to stay hopeful and grateful for all the good in life. And I have an abundance of good. But recently my hope is waning. May be a subject for a different post.

My limbs began to slowly come to life after I started taking Charlotte's Web hemp extract in June, 2015. They still are not whole, and may never be. But the terror is gone. I'm still recovering from surgery last August. It zapped me; fatigue is almost constant. And I'm still recovering from a fall off my bike two weeks ago.

~*~

Son left yesterday after visiting NC family and friends for a couple weeks. He and a couple friends are headed to Sweden for a month to backpack Kungsleden (The King's Trail) and some side trails. They'll be hiking north to south, from Abisko to Hemavan. I  now  have Abisko added to my iPhone's weather app.

Daughter, grand-dog Yerba, and I went to Grayson Highlands yesterday. I made the one-mile hike to the bench where I rested while Daughter and Yerba hiked further up the trail.

As I rested, I heard the longhorns bellowing in the distance. I chuckled to myself wondering if Daughter and Yerba had sighted the cows and steers. I haven't seen them in years, but I've heard them.

When the two arrived back at the bench about 45 minutes later, Daughter said, "Boy did we have an adrenaline rush."

Yerba had taken an interest in a calf, the calf being small enough to maybe befriend. Momma cow didn't like that idea. Momma cow had horns. Momma cow made a warning charge at Yerba. Thankfully it was only a warning charge, and it was heeded.

Momma longhorn.