Journal to a Muse

Chugging along-- and it gets deep sometimes.
The Arrowhead Lace blankie is finally domesticated. Not completely tame, mind you, but not running off in all directions, either. I still have to watch the chart I made on Excel when I first resume knitting or else the K1 ribs at the beginning and middle of the pattern get wonky.

I had a phone call from my surgeon this afternoon. Imagine... she wanted to refer one of HER patients to ME. What a compliment. I guess I'm doing OK with the whole cancer/treatment/recovery thing after all. Sadly, the person she wanted to refer thought she'd rather die than have treatment.

There have been times when I felt nearly that hopeless and helpless. But two things have happened that turned me around. One is that a therapist flat out told me I owed it to my children to keep living. She said that a parent committing suicide is PERMISSION for the child to do the same. Pretty sobering.
The other thing was recognizing that nothing stays the same for all THAT long. If I could sit on the couch (sometimes holding tissues and a pillow) and breathe in and breathe out for 15 minutes, I would always recognize something I WANTED. And if I could hang on to that thin thread of desire, I no longer felt helpless or hopeless.

Eventually, I also learned that it is worth doing "what it takes" to avoid getting in those helpless situations-- or at least be honest about the situation I'm in.

Which is why, starting this morning, I'm on back on the road to healthy self care. And wise spending. And maintaining friendships. And telling people how much they mean to me.

When you're empty, you have to let people fill you up. But when you are back up to speed, you realize that you get out of life what you put in.