Taking a break--already

So I am posting this earlier than I normally do because tomorrow, I am leaviing the wicked Boston winter for 10 days of sunshine, swimming, and walking on the beach. While I am sure there will be quiet time to continue to write about our journey with Melanie’s cancer diagnosis, I have discovered something while composing these first four parts of the story. Writing about this is hard.  It is hard and sometimes painful. After completing the account of Melanie’s first biopsy surgery, my heart was pounding; anxiety coursed through me as I pictured her lying vulnerable in a hospital bed, and it did not go away. It has stayed with me.

The heart palpitations were familiar. About a year into Melanie’s cancer journey, I began to feel my heart pounding and then sometimes skipping a beat. Several doctor’s visits and an EKG, I was asked if I was experiencing any stress in my life. Ummmm –yep. That’s the thing about experiencing major stresses like losing your job, or a spouse dying, or maybe having a daughter diagnosed with cancer. Some stresses build and then linger—often for years—even when the crisis has passed. When I first experienced them, I had begun working full time in a new church, and Melanie was still living with us.  Having a particularly hard time getting her Thyroid meds at a level that allowed her to have enough energy to work, she was struggling. Teaching every day took all her energy -- nothing left over for exercise that has always been so important to her, or any kind of social life. Everyday was a challenge of will to override what her body was saying. Watching her struggle to just get through the day was heartbreaking. There were times when I wondered if this was to be the story of the rest of her life.

About that time, people began to tell me that I was looking tired. Maybe I needed a vacation.  “Just get away from the stress of the past year for a few days.” Really?? And just how was that supposed to happen? With a new congregation in the throws of a transition and a struggling adult child at home, a vacation was not in the cards and the suggestion irked me. Friends wanted to help, but a vacation from daily life was not the answer then, or now. Carrying stress and hiding it while at home is not healthy, but sometimes that is what life looks like. Not only was “getting away” the last thing I felt I could at that point, I did not want to. Work and home both required my attention; what I needed was to find other ways to cope. That did happen eventually, but it took time and ingenuity. (It will be the subject of a later blog entry.)

Yesterday talking to Melanie about this post, she told me she was not at all surprised that I was reacting to digging up such dark times. (I am still trying to protect her from some of these feeling but since I knew she would read this, I also had to tell her first.)  Once again, I realized just how much we have grown on this path and how traveling this journey together we have learned to support each other in such remarkable ways. She was wise, understanding and shared some of her own feelings about when she gets sick today.

So, tomorrow, Chris and I head for the Florida Keys for several days. From there we will take in a Red Sox Game and then spend time with my “Friend Extraordinaire and Best Walking Buddy in the World” and her husband. AND every morning and every night I will put two pictures beside my bed and think of the joy they bring into my life.

That’s Melanie and Ben on the night before they got engaged, and Justin, Farracy, Jackson, and Cooper. I will think of them with joy reveling in the goodness of having them in my life. I will breathe in new life and soak up the healing warmth and I will know that I am—we are—blessed to have each other.

So see you in ten days or so. Blessing to you all.