Emerging

Finding my way back to what helps me feel alive

Photo by Emme Kearns on Unsplash

It’s been a ride

Friends, I’m so sorry for the radio silence. It’s been a rough few months over here in Kellyville, where I spent several months in a deep state of illness and dissociation. Things are getting better and I’m going to try to get back on track with my plan for this space. I’m so very tired of the story of my life since early February, so I’m going to try to tell it in lists. I’ll start three-ish years ago when I got Covid and didn’t fully recover.

In that time I’ve had:

1. 2 more Covid infections, 2 non-Covid viruses

2. Multiple ocular migraines most days

3. Constant fatigue, brain fog, and tinnitus

4. Worsening IBS

5. Inability to work full-time

I’m also middle-aged, and the constellation of symptoms begs these questions:

1. Is it long Covid?

2. Is it ADHD?

3. Is it menopause?

Answer: Yes. 

Back at the end of 2023, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to work with a friend preparing for her state board coaching exam who needed some people to coach.

Working with Melissa allowed me to:

• Interact weekly with someone who inspires me deeply

• Identify what I wanted most to bring to life in those couple of months

• Set a goal

• Break that goal down into actionable steps

• Recognize that I overload myself with unrealistic expectations

• Adjust steps to be more reasonable 

• Execute those adjusted steps

• Launch my Substack

Yes, this space was that goal and I felt so proud of how I accomplished it. Seriously, launching it was such a satisfying creative endeavor. I was in a beautiful state of flow with my writing, too. Thank you, Melissa!

Two days after I published my last newsletter, I came down with whatever not-COVID, not-Flu, not-RSV virus my daughter had and that thing took me down in a way I wasn’t prepared to handle.

Some things I learned during this last viral aftermath:

1. It’s possible to survive on DoorDash deliveries and the generosity of family and friends for the ten days you can’t stand up for more than three minutes.

2. There are consequences to eating nothing but prepared or restaurant food for ten days.

3. You can lose 15 lbs in one day (see #2).

4. It’s good I get regular bloodwork.

5. A body is only supposed to produce so many platelets. 

6. This body produces way too many. 

7. Even if I have the suspected bone marrow disorder, I can’t be treated with the chemo drug until I’m 60, so yeah, I’m good with waiting until then for the bone marrow biopsy, thanks. Now to figure out how to pay for the inconclusive molecular blood tests that the insurance won’t cover.

8. If it’s inflammation, which is not a stretch considering all the rest, I’ll keep working on reducing that. 

9. One can have 23 ocular migraines in one day, many days in a row.

10. Many of the “healthy” foods I consume to try to manage my IBS and get enough protein trigger ocular migraines. 

Goodbye, cashews and almonds, I will miss you, but you can pry these pickles out of my migraine-blind hands. 

The depression that hit this time around was deep, but I’m feeling much better after several months of focusing on all of my systems. I heard someone in some context that I can’t remember saying they’d rather feel tired than regret. 

So here’s me trying. 

Now for some talk about love. Spring came on like a green totality and summer is inching in with a level of bird activity, tree seeds, and blooming everything that feels like it’s so much more than usual.

Some things I’ve loved about this spring so far:

1. Experiencing the eclipse with Cheril—the first friend I made when I came to Ohio nearly 21 years ago. We watched from a blanket with pillows in her backyard on the banks of Lake Pippin and I still have goosebumps from hearing the birds go silent, the peepers in the nearby vernal pools start peeping like crazy, the Canada geese on the lake joining the neighborhood dogs in a barking and honking frenzy. I will never forget it. 

2. Purging my kitchen pantry, cupboards, fridge, and freezer of foods I can’t eat and equipment I no longer use. My adult children got most of it and they were thrilled. The space feels orderly and manageable in a way it never has before. I shop several times weekly at the local natural foods co-op and farmers’ market where I get to have sweet and welcome conversations with people I know. I waste very little, which feels like a miracle, and I spend less because it’s just me here. 

3. Attending a nine-day Vipassana silent meditation retreat that began on my 57th birthday. Nine days of sitting meditation, dharma talks, walking meditation, QiGong, and silence with strangers. No phone, no computer. Just me and—waves hands around vicinity of head—all of THIS. More about this later.

4. Noticing that the spring ephemerals I transplanted to my shade garden a few years ago came back from winter in greater numbers. The ferns I transplanted from my late friend Mary’s beautiful garden also multiplied and are pushing their tender green ostrich necks out of the duff into the chilly spring air. Me, too.

Some things I love in my neighborhood:

1. I witnessed the fresh leafing out of my two favorite neighborhood maples, which I pass on my dog walk most mornings. I stopped to admire the trembling tender leaves just barely unfurled, their structure delicate, like wet paper. There’s one tree in the front yard, close to the street, and another in the back yard. Their leaves are that ridiculous, show-off chartreuse that’s hard to comprehend. The house is owned by Blue Lives Matter/Trump sign folks. Whenever we walk past and the man is outside, he always says hello in the friendliest way. For years I’ve worked to keep my heart as open to him as to his trees. 

2. When we do the 2-mile loop, we pass a huge property enclosed with a wooden slat fence. Two gorgeous bloodhounds and a tiny white fluffball of a dog live there. The big dogs race back and forth along the fence barking like crazy, but in that hey-you-come-play-with-us way. Ginger used to freak out and get all aggro, but now I sing-song-shout hi friends, hi buddies, hey beautiful doggos to them and we trot past without incident. The little white one presses her whole face into a slat opening and yips her sharp little barks at us, her wet nose glinting in the morning sun. I love her. 

3. The corner of that same fence has a massive tangle of Trumpet Vine flowing over it onto the edge of the sidewalk. It reminds me of my paternal grandfather, Leroy. He had a huge one in his back yard and my siblings and I sat on the grass inside the cave made by the flopped cascade and made crowns out of the flowers. 

4. Fueled by that idea of preferring to be tired than feel regret, I applied to college to finish the BA I abandoned thirty-five years ago. I’m still deciding between Psychology or Peace and Conflict Studies, and I want to pursue an MA in Ecopsychology when I’m done with the BA. Starting a new career at 63 or later is insane. But I will have to work until I’m dead, so why not learn something I’m deeply interested in and possibly make a difference in other people’s lives? Lots more about this later, I’m sure. 

5. The city planted new trees in the Devil Strips all over the neighborhood, and many of them are Redbuds. How glorious this will be in ten years.

There’s too damn much horror in this world. I’m emerging from the healing hidey-hole I’ve been huddled in and looking for ways to help beyond phone calls, emails, voting, and loving-kindness meditation. Things are strange and exhausting and upsetting on so many fronts and I’m sending you all so much love. It’s amazing to me that we all keep showing up.

If you read this far, thank you. If you feel like it, let me know in the comments how your spring is going. What’s heavy on your heart? What’s lighting you up. What’s helping you stay connected?

♥️