Week 2- Fool me once
Two down, ten to go, one-sixth of the way through, if you're doing the math with me.
Last time I was caught off guard — new process, new fear, new anxiety, and me shivering in a t-shirt like an amateur. You don't get to catch me like that twice. This time, it was in a different office, different time of day, closer to home, and the time in the chair was reduced to a mere 4 hours… and I was PREPARED.
If you know me, you know I'm a systems person. If something doesn't work, you don't grit your teeth through it, you change it. Last summer I wrote a whole post about intentional experimentation, testing what actually works instead of assuming it does. That instinct didn't stay behind in the civic-association SOPs and the old morning routines. It just found a new relationship to manage.
So this week I showed up like I was summiting something, socks, gloves, scarf, sweatpants, a sweatshirt I had a nurse cut down the sleeve so the IV could get through (thrift store find, worth every stitch lost). Magazines. Newspaper articles. Snack bag. Small purse for phone, key, AirPods so I could access it easily. Hot tea. Cold water. And a quiet funeral for my plan to read Anna Karenina in that chair, because it turns out a several-hundred-page Russian epic does not survive being interrupted every twenty minutes or trying to doze off. You need something you can put down. Tolstoy does not want to be put down.
I kicked my husband out after 30 minutes. 4 hours is a long time to make someone sit in a chair next to my chair, and this one's between me and the chair now. The amazing nurses will help with the small stuff. The chairs were also closer together this time, so I actually talked to people, yay! AirPods turned out to be more annoying than useful, so I stayed quiet instead and somewhere in there I softened toward the whole arrangement. Relaxing, even. I do not sit still for four hours, like ever. But there I was, heated recliner, one arm out of commission, nowhere to be, and the chair and I were one.
So, if I have this time that I NEVER give myself, and I'm basically free from electronics, how can I use this as a service to myself? Remember, this is my summer of being served 🙂. So, I've commandeered the binder the hospital gave me at the start of this little journey that was meant to hold all my health-related material. Got rid of that crap and promoted it to my Reflections Notebook instead, made to live in that chair with me. I'm printing off some quotes to read and commit to memory, reflect on my web app PRD (IYKYK), plus a few motivational items — I'll pack my little vision-board cards I did last summer too!
That's the plan going forward. Not tolerate the chair, not dread it. Win it over. Make it work for me. I still don't know how this ends. But I showed up warmer this week, more prepared, closer to peace with it than last time. I'll take it.
See you next week.