Hello Everyone,
Many thanks for your posts and love and support. I have my laptop on my table in my "recovery room," so I can sit and type for a bit. Catherine and I were just laughing that I look like a bit of a lodger typing away in the corner of my room under dim lighting in my flannel shirt with my toque on.
A room of one's own.
I can't express the range of emotions I have experienced over the last few days, but I will flesh some of them out over the next few days and describe them as I can. I am happy to report, however, that three of the Beatles have left the building. That process was ok - mostly the pain was from the three sites where the skin already was attaching around the drains. Once that skin was detached, my nurse, Christina, always calm, cool and collected, told me to breathe.
Oh oh. This can't be good.
Simply put, that process could have been in an episode from the X-files: with each drain, it felt like a three-inch flattened worm slid like lightening under my skin until it left the opening. By the time my brain registered the pain, it was over. Only one more to go. Probably Wednesday. Then I'll eat as much ice cream as I want.
I am beginning to understand the reason for this nerve drug. I didn't have any nerve pain to start, but now I'm having nerve sensitivity on my left side, and in my left arm, so I'm happy to keep the drugs coming. And I'm having strange sensations where they took out the lymph nodes - I'd swear I'm leaking fluid from my left arm, but I'm not. It's just a ghost feeling. Totally odd.
My fingers ache tonight from the Taxol, so I need to stop typing, and I should elevate this left arm. But I'll write again tomorrow.
Much love and thanks,
Kip
Hmm, so which Beatle is still hanging around? Because John left this world 1st and not of his own accord, I am going to say it is John. So, sing some nice tunes to him and tell him you love him, but he has to go now.
ReplyDeleteYou've had parts of your body taken away, so there is all kind of ghostly pain. No wonder the emotions and sensations are all over the map. Yep, this is samsara-- suffering. The only way to alleviate the suffering is to meditate on the emptiness of that pain, and you have such a strong experience of that emptiness to assist you. Emptiness is not nothingness, but the mere absence of what you believe is real. So focus on the breath. Bring your mind to your heart. Contemplate the mere absence. Keep coming back to the breath and mere absence. No judgment. Breathe. Mere absence of things you normally perceive. And then ... that mere absence can expand to be as extensive as space. That is where you find the relief. In the mere absence as extensive as space.
Love to you and all sentient beings, dear amazing Kip,
Roberta
good to read your words, kip.
ReplyDeletei would've thought the last beatle standing was paul. mellow paul. never the radical revolutionary john or the spiritual seeker george or the go along with it ringo. but well-meaning superstar paul.
but i don't know them all that well, really. odd things to ponder -- beatles and draintubes.
i am glad that three quarters of that pain is done.
the nerve sensation must be so strange. i remember thinking once (more than once) that grief felt like water. exactly like water running through my nerves
all is well here. it feels very much like january. the engine is cold but must start anyway. term has begun and it looks like a long road from here. but a road to spring.
you don't sound gabapentastoned, by the way. do you feel like the stoner effects are easing?
thinking of you muchly. glad that you've been up to writing. a very good sign.
appropos of nothing, really, here is my favourite song these days for you to enjoy (-- it is an angry break up song, which is not where my head is, at all, but i love it anyway)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lazyDlfaptM
take good care. love, e
dear kip,
ReplyDeletei don't feel qualified to join in the beatles debate, but i do know something about ice cream. are you partial to any particular flavours these days? i'm coming to toronto next week and hoping to see you. perhaps we can have a frozen dessert date?
lots of love to everyone on berl ave.
i'm wishing your pain away.
sammi
xox