Working Things Out

Five days from now I will get my 24th steroid lumbar epidural.
I received my first one in December, 2013.
I'm so tired of them.
Yet, without them, I am so tired and weak, slow and shaky.

It's not unusual when an epidural is closely approaching that I'll think, Maybe I won't need one this time. Maybe I'm doing well enough that I can function well enough without it, and just get neck shots instead of the epidural.

I was thinking that last night, as I sat on the chair in our bedroom, a straight back chair that we inherited from Mom after she died. Or maybe we got it before she died. Mom died in February, 2009. I like the chair. The back is made of thinly cut wood in a woven-type pattern; it's not wood slats. The chair has wooden arms. The seat is upholstered with a fabric printed with foliage of deep greens and blues and golden and burgundies. It'd probably be three shades lighter if I ever got it cleaned.

I sat, brushing my teeth with the electric toothbrush mulling over the next day, which is now today. What do I need to do tomorrow? Okay. I need to feed myself. I need to bathe. I need to dress. I need to do my stretches. I'd like to ride my indoor bike. And I have writing workshop tomorrow night.

Then, as I've done a multitude of times, I let out a half-sigh and a "hmmpf," simultaneously thinking, What normal person thinks like that? I need to feed myself? I need to bathe? I need to dress? These are things most people do without having to calculate the effort required to do them.

This isn't the first time I've been through that thought process. That maybe I won't need my epidural and then in an instant of clarity - in that moment as I struggle to put on socks or get dressed or put on a seatbelt or whatever - the reality hits me that this isn't "normal." But it is normal for me, until I get the temporary relief that the epidural provides.

How can I ever communicate how hard it is to live with the constant calculation of tasks that would be routine if I weren't challenged by this dis-ease?

Yet, I have progressed much from where I was, even a year ago.

As I titrate down on my daily prednisone this week, come Sunday or Monday, I'll know if I feel confident enough to get neck shots instead of the epidural. It's a scary thought to me. How well would I be able to function with just the neck shots and not the epidural?

I started reading James Comey's book this week, A Higher Loyalty. It wasn't on my reading list. It was on the shelf at the used bookstore. I forget what section of the bookstore. But a section that I was interested in, as I sat on the seat of my walker perusing titles. It was $7.00, a hardback. I bought it. I prefer hardbacks.

In the last line of the Introduction Comey writes, "How on earth did I end up here?"
I don't know how many times I've asked myself that same question over the past eight or so years.
It's a long damn answer.