The Week That Took Its Toll

Courthouse: Minden Nebraska

Job 33:19 He is chastened also with pain upon his bed, and the multitude of his bones with strong pain:

The Week That Took Its Toll

Yeah, what was supposed to be the best week of my life didn’t quite turn out the way I planned. Now I’m thinking I should have just picked some random day in ANY month of the year except MAY to get married!

My back did not take too kind to the torture I put it through last week and as of today it is in retaliation of anything that resembles moving or work. While I’m not trying to sound whiney (I might come off as such) I NEED people to understand my pain!

My left hand has gone numb and typing on the keyboard might be lost to me soon, so I need to get this out. While many of you see a picture of me and say to yourself, she doesn’t LOOK like she is in pain, let me tell you, I hide it well until I begin to walk then I am visibly in pain and then the questions start shooting at me like I’m the bulls eye on a dartboard!

“How’s your back?”

“Are you okay?”

“I hate thinking of you in so much pain.”

Look people, this is my cross to bear!  Some will even toss in a ‘you’re too young.’ Gee thanks, I’m glad you have done all that I’ve done in my life abusing my body and you’re older with no pain, good for you! Alleluia amen! This is MY body, the one *I* was born with, not YOU!

I started when I was about eight with the rearranging of furniture. Not just a table here a lamp there, I’m talking beds, sofa and chairs, bureaus and it continued in life until six years ago when I realized I had shoveled 2 ft. of snow one too many times! I also cleaned houses dragging equipment around and cleaning stuff. I over did it, now I’m paying for it!

Five years ago I fell down the steps obviously damaging a nerve somewhere in my left foot. No medical insurance led me to self-medicating and taking care of the problem myself. I wonder if it ever healed?

Then there were the many drives to Omaha. A good 3 hour drive from Minden but I remember one specific day it took me every bit of four hours to drive there; it was during that time that the winds were so high, I kept straining to keep the car within the two lines with 18-wheelers flying past me at 75 miles per hour pushing me around like a pinball machine. I knew something was wrong when I got out of the car at the half-way point where we stopped to eat; I couldn’t lift my right leg! It just dragged behind me as I limped into Wendy’s. I just thought it would pass after I got home but many more exhausting trips to Omaha (7 hours round trip of being the sole driver) took its toll on my back and I finally went to the doctor. I was told I had lower-lumbar-facet-joint arthritis.

Great it had a name but guess what, no cure! No money, no meds, no physical therapy; I was on my own, explaining effortlessly my disability to people who had seen me BEFORE and were now seeing me with a crippled limp!

The arthritis didn’t stop at my back, it went to my knees, down to my very toes; more pain, more limping and more people not understanding why this disability hasn’t just gone away.

I don’t know how to vividly explain it but I will give it a shot. Have you ever seen one of those Tesla balls? Where if you run your hand over it is like electrifying magnetically charged particles? Take a look at the picture: Taken from google pics

See the center? Imagine that is my heel; with every step, pain in little veins of fire, light up and I clench my teeth just to take another step! The pain stretches from my foot to my knees to my thigh ending in my back; sharp quick sudden pains. When I sit too long, if not sitting properly it gets hard to keep tears from rolling down my cheek.

Sunday was my last straw in a long, pain-bearing week. It was so bad on Sunday I had to leave my stepdaughters’ graduation (before everyone saw me in tears) and before I had a chance to congratulate her.

I might have been okay had I not been told to climb at least ten steps into the uncomfortable bleacher seats that I do believe were made for people under 100 lbs., neither of which were any of the SEVEN people in our row. Being squished did NOT help matters any and so as not to ruin the day for his mom, sis, aunt, uncle and HIM, I chose to bail as the indecisiveness of where to stand when she parted was being decided.

I couldn’t bear one more second!!!

I left in tears before anyone saw that they were tears of pain. I hobbled to the truck, with Adam by my side, where a good cushioned seat was a welcome relief, putting an end to one pain-bearing, back-wrenching week.

Too much walking, too many stairs to climb, too many uncomfortable seating arrangements and too much indecision; today I sit in pain wondering why I’m breathing.

Grateful. I’m grateful for my wedding day and the man I married and the wonderful family he has, now the only real family that *I* have.