(no subject)
Oh, this is very good. I took a second ride on the new bike this afternoon, and while it winded me and made me feel slightly like a limp dishrag for fifteen minutes or so after I got in, half an hour later I'm just fine. No, scratch that -- my head is clear, I have energy, and I feel like doing things. (So naturally, I'm sitting on the bed with my laptop, poking at LiveJournal. Yes, I am smart.)
This may not seem like a big thing, but what a lot of you may not know (or remember) is that I was fairly seriously disabled a few years ago. When I was in my early twenties, I had some sort of neurological meltdown. Pain, limited mobility, exhaustion, loss of sensation in my hands and feet, balance and coordination problems, cognitive dysfunction, the whole nine yards. Some of my doctors thought it was multiple sclerosis, others shrugged and said it might be fibromyalgia, others thought there was nothing wrong with me that a nice high dose of tricyclic antidepressants couldn't cure. I didn't have insurance, I didn't have much money, and I never did get a definitive diagnosis; the only things that really helped were rest, avoiding stress, and liberal doses of painkillers. You really don't want to know how much ibuprofen I used to go through in a day, trust me.
Leaving my ex-husband took care of a lot of the stress, and I got a little better, enough that I was able to work part-time again. Amy probably saved my sanity and quite possibly my life in the first few years we were together; they were hard years, but her father is a paraplegic, and she never once acted as if there was anything out of the ordinary in helping me walk or pushing me around in a wheelchair or waiting while I struggled to remember the word for the thing you hold over your head when it rains. I kept getting gradually better over time, although I was still walking with a cane occasionally until about two years ago.
When we moved last summer, I got rid of my wheelchair. I hadn't used it in over a year at that point, and it didn't seem likely that I would need it again. It was a bit scary, taking that leap of faith after thinking of myself as disabled for seven years. As time went on, I kept getting better; I started walking more, took yoga classes, and gradually kept recovering.
So buying a bike was a big thing for me. The last time I rode a bike regularly, I was 18 or 19, and even then, it was a struggle for me; riding more than a few blocks often left me exhausted and slightly sick. Walking I knew I could do, because it's nearly impossible to live here without being able to comfortably walk long distances, but walking is relatively light exercise; it doesn't make me break a sweat or get my heartrate up unless I'm running for a bus or walking in the hills near our apartment.
Yesterday, I rode for half an hour, about a mile, with frequent stops. I came home, barely able to climb the stairs, and collapsed -- but I was fine half an hour later. Today, I rode for another half an hour, about two miles this time with only two stops, and I was winded and tired at the end -- and fine half an hour later.
A few years ago, I thought I'd never be able to do that. A few months ago, I wasn't sure if I could. Today, I know I can.
I don't really know why I'm better. I don't take my health for granted anymore, and a part of me still worries that I'll relapse someday. If I do, I'm tremendously better equipped to face it now; I have insurance, we have enough savings that it won't be a serious issue if I can't work for a while, and medical technology has progressed a lot in the last ten years. I'll cross that bridge if and when I ever come to it again, and I hope I never will. For now, though, I'm healthy and strong and relatively clear-headed, and that's enough, more than enough.
I was reading through the the Velveteen Rabbi's Haggadah (which, incidentally, is very beautiful and life-affirming, and now I want to host a proper seder one of these years) this morning, and the Dayenu section leapt out at me. I'm too tired to sum it up now, so instead, I'm going to quote a small portion of it:
"Dayenu means to celebrate each step toward freedom as if it were enough, then to start out on the next step. It means that if we reject each step because it is not the whole liberation, we will never be able to achieve the whole liberation. It means to sing each verse as if it were the whole song-and then sing the next verse."
I'm rambling now, and I have work to be done and email to answer, and I should probably go shower and start thinking about dinner. But I wanted to write about this, now, while it's fresh in my mind and I'm still amazed and grateful.
This may not seem like a big thing, but what a lot of you may not know (or remember) is that I was fairly seriously disabled a few years ago. When I was in my early twenties, I had some sort of neurological meltdown. Pain, limited mobility, exhaustion, loss of sensation in my hands and feet, balance and coordination problems, cognitive dysfunction, the whole nine yards. Some of my doctors thought it was multiple sclerosis, others shrugged and said it might be fibromyalgia, others thought there was nothing wrong with me that a nice high dose of tricyclic antidepressants couldn't cure. I didn't have insurance, I didn't have much money, and I never did get a definitive diagnosis; the only things that really helped were rest, avoiding stress, and liberal doses of painkillers. You really don't want to know how much ibuprofen I used to go through in a day, trust me.
Leaving my ex-husband took care of a lot of the stress, and I got a little better, enough that I was able to work part-time again. Amy probably saved my sanity and quite possibly my life in the first few years we were together; they were hard years, but her father is a paraplegic, and she never once acted as if there was anything out of the ordinary in helping me walk or pushing me around in a wheelchair or waiting while I struggled to remember the word for the thing you hold over your head when it rains. I kept getting gradually better over time, although I was still walking with a cane occasionally until about two years ago.
When we moved last summer, I got rid of my wheelchair. I hadn't used it in over a year at that point, and it didn't seem likely that I would need it again. It was a bit scary, taking that leap of faith after thinking of myself as disabled for seven years. As time went on, I kept getting better; I started walking more, took yoga classes, and gradually kept recovering.
So buying a bike was a big thing for me. The last time I rode a bike regularly, I was 18 or 19, and even then, it was a struggle for me; riding more than a few blocks often left me exhausted and slightly sick. Walking I knew I could do, because it's nearly impossible to live here without being able to comfortably walk long distances, but walking is relatively light exercise; it doesn't make me break a sweat or get my heartrate up unless I'm running for a bus or walking in the hills near our apartment.
Yesterday, I rode for half an hour, about a mile, with frequent stops. I came home, barely able to climb the stairs, and collapsed -- but I was fine half an hour later. Today, I rode for another half an hour, about two miles this time with only two stops, and I was winded and tired at the end -- and fine half an hour later.
A few years ago, I thought I'd never be able to do that. A few months ago, I wasn't sure if I could. Today, I know I can.
I don't really know why I'm better. I don't take my health for granted anymore, and a part of me still worries that I'll relapse someday. If I do, I'm tremendously better equipped to face it now; I have insurance, we have enough savings that it won't be a serious issue if I can't work for a while, and medical technology has progressed a lot in the last ten years. I'll cross that bridge if and when I ever come to it again, and I hope I never will. For now, though, I'm healthy and strong and relatively clear-headed, and that's enough, more than enough.
I was reading through the the Velveteen Rabbi's Haggadah (which, incidentally, is very beautiful and life-affirming, and now I want to host a proper seder one of these years) this morning, and the Dayenu section leapt out at me. I'm too tired to sum it up now, so instead, I'm going to quote a small portion of it:
"Dayenu means to celebrate each step toward freedom as if it were enough, then to start out on the next step. It means that if we reject each step because it is not the whole liberation, we will never be able to achieve the whole liberation. It means to sing each verse as if it were the whole song-and then sing the next verse."
I'm rambling now, and I have work to be done and email to answer, and I should probably go shower and start thinking about dinner. But I wanted to write about this, now, while it's fresh in my mind and I'm still amazed and grateful.