It’s crazy how time flies. I keep meaning to write more on the blog, to do another post, and the days just get away from me. It’s not that I’m not doing any writing. I wrote over 50,000 words in November in my series. It’s just that I’m doing other writing and don’t get to any of the blogs I do. I hope to work in blogging again as a habit, so I do it on a regular basis more.
Occupational/Physical Therapy:
OT and PT still consists of what I do on my own. As winter sets in, it has become harder to do a lot of walking or to go out for hikes. Instead, most of my physical activity consists of using our small indoor trampoline, doing chores around the house, using a balance board and stretch bands, and just trying to move as much as I possibly can. We do have a gym membership, but once summer came, I was outdoors so much I barely used it, and getting there in the wintertime can be challenging with the road conditions.
My pain level still varies by day and by the changes in the weather. The cold is rough, having had so many broken bones and some nerve damage. I try to find ways to adapt to it, and bundle up when I need to go out so the pain isn’t so intense, but sometimes there is just no way around it. Sometimes I avoid outside all together if I can, which is one of the perks of working from home now. Sometimes I have to go out , or really want to, and we use hand warmers to help counter the pain. I love the outdoors, so staying inside all winter is difficult, so we try to find a balance between just staying indoors and finding ways to keep the pain at bay outside.
Ben’s Health:
Ben’s neuropathy continues to progress, with no known cause. Almost two years later, we are still waiting on the nerve biopsy that was supposed to happen a few days after the accident occurred. Some days it feels like we are no further closer to answers than we were a few years ago. For now, we just keep on searching for answers and trusting God that there is a plan and a purpose in all of this.
Where did autumn go?
It seems like just yesterday it was the first day of fall. Now, here we are in December, and I haven’t posted anything on this blog since September. Time goes by too quickly. Since my last post, I’ve enjoyed many outdoor trips, including hikes, outdoor tennis, and frisbee golf. Ben and I celebrated 11 years of marriage. Annie enjoyed the first real snowfall of the season, and I successfully made a hike down a steep hill. We’ve enjoyed sunrises, sunsets, and the beauty that Autumm brings all around us.
I’m going to wrap this post up here. It’s almost that time of year when I review goals again, so there should be another post coming very soon. Among my goals for the coming year is to get back into blogging regularly and making a plan to do so. Hopefully I will be posting more into the coming new year.
Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy and Surgery
About three weeks ago, I had surgery to fix some of the internal damage caused during the accident. As I mentioned before, I had two hernias that needed to be fixed, one large and one small, involving a couple of my organs. The surgery itself went pretty well, but during surgery, they discovered that what they thought was a small hernia was much larger than expected, and more of my organs than initially thought were involved. The surgery took longer than planned, and recovery is also taking longer. It ended up being a pretty major surgery, but thankfully the doctors were still able to do it robotically with just a couple of extra small cuts.
I have a weight restriction until at least the first week in December, and have to limit exercise to walking. I haven’t been able to do many chores over the past three weeks either. Most of Physical therapy has been put on hold until I recover from this surgery enough to start back up. I will begin increasing how much weight I lift in the next couple of weeks, and see how it goes. Recovery has been much slower than we expected, but each day I am able to do a little bit more.
Writing
One of the few perks of not being able to do much after surgery is having more time to write. I have a wireless keyboard and mouse, so I’m able to sit back with an ice pack on my stomach and write while I rest. I mentioned writing briefly a couple of posts ago, and again in my Thanksgiving post, but wanted to talk more about it.
I’ve been a writer since I could put pencil to paper. I’ve written articles for others blogs and newspapers, run my own blogs such as this one and www.myamuseinglife.com, and had a little something published in someone else’s book, but I have yet to publish my own books. Over the past eight years, I’ve really started taking my writing seriously and tried to write more each year. For the most part, even with getting two Master’s degree, I’ve been successful at writing more and more. Until this year at least. Not being able to write has been really tough. I found ways to keep trying to write, like speech to text, but it hasn’t been easy, and I’ve found myself feeling anxious a lot. It’s made me realize just how true the following quote is:
Writing has become as natural as breathing. November is National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo as we call it in the writing world. If you aren’t familiar with it, it is where you write 50,000 words or more in a month. Some people are what we call “NaNoWriMo Rebels,” and they may set smaller goals as well. I did this back in July, knowing I wasn’t likely to hit the 50,000 with everything going on. My goal in July was 15,000 and I was able to meet that.
I usually do NaNoWriMo and Camp NaNoWriMo (which run in April and July) every year, every chance I get. Sometimes I fail, sometimes I succeed. But I try to remind myself that every word I write is more than what I would have had otherwise. NaNoWriMo has changed my writing life, and I often write 50,000 words under normal circumstances during non-NaNoWriMo months as well. Before the accident, it wasn’t uncommon for me to have 5000-6000 word days, especially after I finished my second Master’s degree and had more time to write. Sometimes I would even have 8000-10,000 word days.
Since the accident, I’ve been able to write very little. Most of the writing in this blog after the accident was done at first using a microphone and speech to text software. As I started being able to type, I began writing more with the keyboard, but it’s been a long road back.
This month, November of 2021, I met my NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000 words. I averaged about 2000 words a day, took a few days off for surgery recovery, and had a few 4000-5000 word days as well. I even managed to finish a few days early, and started writing more in another series I’m working on. All together, I’ve written over 60,000 words this month. This is huge. It’s still only half of what I could write on an average day, which means if I had the time and physical ability, I could probably write almost twice that in some months, but I managed to meet my goal. It was a pretty big deal, and another step on my road to recovery. It’s also helped to keep my mind busy while recovering from surgery, since it is taking much longer than expected. So this week, I celebrate not only meeting that goal but going over it.
Ben’s Health
We’ve mentioned Ben’s health a few times. Most people know that he has idiopathic peripheral neuropathy. We still don’t have any real answers on his health, and the neuropathy has started spreading to his hands. We try to just take it one day at a time. He has several medications that he takes. One of them makes him sleepy a lot, but it has helped him get more rest and improved his overall mood and pain level when he is awake. Hopefully one day we will have more answers than questions, but for now, we keep searching and asking those questions.
Songs on Repeat
Help Is On The Way- TobyMac
Lauren Daigle- Rescue
Lecrae- I’ll Find You
This one really isn’t a song, but worth the share…Jordan Peterson; A Wing and A Prayer
Scripture and Quotes
It’s Enough to Keep Going
This year really hasn’t been an easy one. If we’re honest, we’ve had a lot of really difficult years. A lot of loss, pain, death, sorrow.
Ben and I will celebrate ten years of marriage on Friday, and even in all the loss, even with all the pain and grief we’ve faced, there is still light and hope. Our relationship is strong, and good. God has given us each other to lean on even in the really tough times. And there certainly have been a lot of them, but that seems to be so much of life. Just when we think things might get easier, better, something else happens. Life is full of surprises. To quote Michonne from ‘The Walking Dead’ TV show:
“But it hasn’t gotten any easier. Sun keeps rising. Days keep passing. World keeps spinning. Time- it just keeps moving forward. Weeks, months, even years go by., while you try to make sense of it all. Try to find where you belong, try to look ahead to a better future. But the truth is, the path ahead has only grown darker. It’s harder to see. You can feel so lost, so alone, so desperate for something, anything that might show you the way.
But even now, after all this time, surrounded by darkness, there are still flashes of light, tiny beacons that shine out, calling to us. It’s not enough to light the way ahead, but it’s enough to keep going. Keep trying, keep fighting, Keep dreaming. So that’s what I do. Every second of every day. For you, for us. I haven’t given up, and I never will.”
Life is full of so many twists and turns. Sometimes it feels very dark, and yet the light is always there. Our Christian faith carries us through these dark times. Our trust that God is there, lighting the way, even if all we can see is a small flicker of the way ahead, is enough. Years fly by, and sometimes we can’t understand everything we are facing, but we don’t have to.
The little flickers of hope are always there. The love we receive from others, sometimes strangers we barely know, the messages from those who don’t even know us but want to reach out, the love from family and friend are all beacons of light. Our story becomes part of others stories too. All of it speaks of something greater than all of us, of a purpose for everything that happens.
I’ve always loved the Christmas season and enjoy watching Christmas lights blink on and off. It’s amazing how much those little tiny lights can light up a dark room. In the Christian faith, Christmas is important because it is the day we celebrate the birth of Christ. Now I know that He wasn’t really born at this time, but it is when we celebrate. Every year, when I see the lights, I am reminded of the Light that came to the world.
Sometimes when life throws us so many curves, it can be really hard to see light through the dark. But light shines through the darkness, always. Sometimes only in small flickers, but it is always there.
Look to the Light. He’s enough to keep us going, even in the midst of dark times.
Tales From North Country 