MRI shenannagins

So, I went for my MRI last Monday.

I know I can be super nervous doing "medical" things, so I prepped.  I meditated and looked forward to getting and answer. Frankly after the work with Charlsey and Grace, I was looking forward to hearing how good it's looking.

So...I go change, as I am waiting there is a lovely older lady in the waiting room. She, too, is getting her left ankle scanned.

I go in....both the tech and the assistant get excited over my choice of music....all signs are looking good.

I lay down....the assistant then straps my leg down....Ugh I hate that feeling.  I ask, "it's just my ankle, so how far do I go into this tube?'

Oh not far, but we can show you....


So she hands me the head phones and I think, ok...a 20 minute meditation....I ask..."so, will he talk to me, tell me where he is in the process?"

She looks at me funny...No, that takes too much time, he has to move this along...


Um...Ok...Well, I can ask him if you really want him to..

"um, no that's ok..."

So she is standing next to me and she starts to slide me in to show me how far I will go into the tube....

As the top of the tube gets closer...as it is over my chest....

I freak out...

It is seriously an uncontrolled response...I think I yelled something like you have to stop this thing, you have to stop now....

They stop and the tech comes over and tries to calm me down as the assistant unstraps my stupid leg. He is as gentle as he can be....says that many people never even know they are claustrophobic until they have an MRI.  I say, "I'm fine now, let's try it again."

He says, nope, I could see your legs start to shake before you were all the way in, I will never get a clear image....

UGH.

The word Ninny comes to mind....I fell like a little kid again, about to be screamed at and spanked for being afraid of the dark....The tech doesn't of course....he just says lots of people need sedation....and even for some mild sedation doesn't work.

REALLY?

Kill me now. 

I DON'T WANT SEDATION.


I just want for a moment to be a normal fucking person who isn't panicky. 


This right here is why I laugh when people have tried to label me a bad ass or strong or whatever....

A big fat ninny is what I really am...

Or....I am just a person, for whom panic and anxiety can get triggered....

SIGH.

So now I am waiting to see if they can transfer the order to ABQ so I can have an open MRI..'cause I am betting a little mild sedation is NOT going to work.

And frankly..I almost don't care to know how bad the Achilles is anymore...I mean I do....but I don't.


I will see what happens this weekend in Phoenix....I suspect I will know pretty quickly if this thing is healing or if I have to get knocked out for this damn MRI.   I can't imagine going back to get the one on my neck now....

I really did feel ready, I really did try to stay excited and positive...I looked forward to the long meditation....Hell, it would not have been nearly as long as the awake part of the dang heart surgery I had.

Whoa

Well, here we are at the end of February....I guess I haven't written since December....

Again I start the year with weirdo health issues, most of which I have already cleared up and been told "false alarm." So that's good....

Except my Achilles and my knees....

But Grace and Charlsey are working on them and I have an MRI on my Achilles scheduled for next Monday...yippie.


It's thick.

And not in a good way like thick thigh way....thick and in danger of tearing....

The Ortho that saw me said, Well, this is not good for what you do...you'll probably need a year off.

I HAVE already been throwing on it...but....Charlsey doesn't think so...and....seriously...the PT and massage...it has been shrinking back.

Side giggle....I asked him if I can still lift...he did say, as long as it doesn't make it worse....he then proceeded to show me how to squat.

Oh LORDY.

He actually said...never squat deep and there is NEVER a need to even come to 90...he then showed me what I would guess was not even a 1/4 squat...more like a 1/5? 1/8???

Oh trust me...you will still be working those legs.

Ok dude...thanks.

But I will say about him....he said NOTHING about my weight!

What.

An Ortho not telling someone of my size I needed to lose weight?!?!?!

Shocking.

Really .


Anyhoo....there are no updates on the show....we did the piece in ABQ as part of a festival, but as of yet we have not heard back from other places we have contacted.  We do, need to start working on this more.  It is really difficult for me.  I have so much support and help, but I really don't understand the next step.  I suppose the first thing is to imagine what Rod and I want...

As for the show in ABQ.

Rod and I have decided it was a huge gift....filled with amazing and important lessons.

Lessons that I think have both stalled us and empowered us....

Thanks for reading....I'll try to let y'all know how the MRI goes....and Phoenix is around the corner.....I used to always post goals....but well, there is a whole other blog in that issue!

It's a long time....

 Yes yes...I know I post this photo every year...both on December 6th and on Father's Day.  For the longest time, it was the only image I had...But I have a few more now...at least on my computer.

 

This one is super old...well, not really, but look how young.  40 years ago this year, he died......The photo below is how I mostly how remember  him, I choose to...40 years this year with out a Father....some have less time, some have more.  I remember thinking 40 or so years ago, that he must have been old...after all he was dying, and it's a child's view point after all.  

This anniversary is one I generally nod to...I post a photo, I move on.  But 40 years seems a little odd.  Perhaps a good time to think a little more, pause a little longer, think on things that were, and things that never were. 

I am pretty sure I never saw him as a saint...I never held him up as something he never was...He was a man of his time, not this imagined perfect Father that I almost had "if only" he had lived. Well, I lie...during some difficult times, I often wondered if I would have behaved differently if I had a father figure growing up.  Would I have had someone standing near me to not allow certain things....to step in and challenge a man about the treatment of his daughter?

Who knows....as I said he was a product of his time...there were things thrown, faces slapped, and worse.  

But now, as I age, I do often feel him closer, realize he was standing there saying to me....this is not how my daughter is to be treated.

I have no illusions that if he was alive now: that he would, at the very least, try...as my Mother has to support my youngest son...but I am guessing it wouldn't be smooth.

And in quiet moments, as I age, as Emery needed his grandfathers, they were both there.  Billy Joe was there for him as he was for me.  As an adult I had some wonderful years with my father in law.  I know he loved me too.  I know they both love Emery and have watched over him.  Billy Joe more so than my dad..as he had a relationship, albeit a short one, with Emery before he passed. But, on the day of his surgery, and the days after, Emery wore his Grandpa John's police uniform shirt....

And maybe Emery looks just a little bit like the young man in the wedding photo above and he looks a little bit like Billy Joe as well...

So these Father figures swirl around us both. 

They let us feel their presence occasionally and for that I am grateful even 40 years later.

There's no crying in the squat rack.

So, I posted on Facebook the other day that I started crying during a bench workout.

Honestly, I had no idea why at the time....it was my third set, I placed my hands, tightened up my shoulder blades....and looked at the bar.  I looked that the knurling...I looked at my hands...and tears started.

THANKFULLY, it was when the weight was still light so I did not have a spotter yet.  I had everything and nothing floating through my head. 

I spoke with a friend about it....and she thought perhaps it was the "safe space" thing. 

You know...the gym is my safe space...

But...I wasn't upset about anything.

Or?

Ok yes...I just closed a show, a significant piece of the show is about using weight lifting as A SAFE PLACE TO FEEL.  You know...feel the weights...of...things....

During some of my darkest days...BJ and the Zia/Praxis crew were there....allowed me to fall apart and allow me to let the weights help rebuild me. 

And well, it was just about a year ago that Praxis closed their doors.

You know what?  Little has changed for me...I fucking HATE working out alone.  I have been doing it for a year now.

I
DON'T
LIKE
IT.

I'm doing it....but I don't like it.

I like my long distance coach....James...He got me stronger...until I had to back away for the show.  And....he understood why I needed to back off...he wrote baby workouts to keep me moving, but not to push me.  Shit, I even had 2 lifetime PR in throwing this year.  Crazy.

Really?  Kinda amazing.

He gets that life pulls you in all sorts of directions thing.

But...I lost it again yesterday.  In the squat rack...well, I didn't lose it, but I teared up.

There really is no crying in the squat rack....

Then a surprise...I saw one of the old Zia folks and we talked~at length~about peanut butter and PB&J sandwiches.

Is it the same, no...but it never is....it never will be.

So we roll with it....I miss Hersch and Brittany and Josh and Faith and Gilbert

and....and....and.....but I got to have that time with them...I had a tight, supportive, smart, funny community to work out with once. I'm lucky I have that to miss.

Dead lifts on Friday....please let me hold it together....

And just like that....

we are done.

The show is closed.

It's been an odd week.  I did have the usual "the show is over so now it's time to get sick" thing happen....but I was sick for only about 12 hours.

I have also had this odd feeling that although the show is over...it does not feel quite over.  No, I don't know what I mean by that...it's just a feeling.


Two things were said to me during the run that have shifted my perspective.  Things that in my 35+ years of acting I have never heard before.



"this has changed me."

"this healed something in me I didn't know needed healing."


All I could think...I understand....and I am experiencing this with you as well....


I feel changed.

I feel healed.

I seem to have let go of some of the fear that has gripped my throat for far too long.


I don't know what this means,  I don't know what is next....

I do know I am endlessly grateful for this work, for Rod, for my son who gave his blessing, for the innumerable people who supported this project, for the folks who sat in the dark together with us as we shared this, and for all the folks who wanted to share this but couldn't.

gratitude

deep, warm, gratitude

Thank you.