Life's Little Way

I have said it before, no matter how much is on my to-do list, life has a way of making me rest. a few years ago when I went back to school, work was giving me a hard time about the time I was taking away to be in class, and I was taking a statistics course that literally hurt my head, and my car was breaking down and I didn't have money to fix it...I ended up getting Shingles back then and it made me have to rework some things in my life. Then when I was working out and losing a bunch of weight and took up running, not knowing my form was bad because I had weak hips and glutes and ended up tearing cartilage in my knee, that was life telling me to slow down and rework some things. The surgery to fix my knee slowed me waaaayy down and took a long time to heal. And now, life is telling me to slow down again. I was disappointed with how my physical therapy was going on my right achilles tendon. There were things I felt like I absolutely couldn't do because something was so tight in there that it felt like something bad was going to happen if I forced things. For instance, they wanted me to stand on the edge of a step and lower my heels down to get a deep calf stretch. Normally I love how that feels but with whatever was going on, I couldn't drop my heels, the tension was so intense I was sure something was going to tear. On Friday, Nov 6 I had physical therapy and I tried to do those things and could only do a very little bit of any of the moves. They worked on healing the tendon with massage and ultrasound therapy. That night, I was walking the dog and decided to try and push off the front of my foot (which was similar to going on my tiptoes like they wanted me to do for therapy) and I suddenly heard the tear like velcro letting loose in my body. It was pretty painful but I could still walk as long as I didn't put weight on the front of my foot. I called my doctor and she put me in a walking boot that I am to wear 24-7, even during sleep. I only take it off to shower and drive. I had an MRI on Friday the 13th (in hindsite, maybe not a good day to get an MRI) and it confirmed that I tore my achilles tendon down where it attaches to the heel bone. My podiatrist said the tear might have healed OK if she just had me keep wearing the walking boot for a couple more months, but I have a significant bone spur on my heel bone so she thinks that spur will keep causing tears if I don't get it fixed. So I am scheduled for surgery Dec 7. I will be in a cast for a month with no weight-bearing on that foot, then I will be in the boot for another month with no weight bearing, then the third month I will still be in the boot but can bear weight on it. It won't be until roughly 4 months from surgery that I can walk with a shoe on my foot. They have to slice my tendon all the way down in order to get to the bone spur and repair the tendon and reattach it to the bone. I am really worried about how much pain I will be in and about getting around in general. My left knee had torn cartilage again too and that's the leg I'm going to need to rely on for everything for the next 3+ months. Granted, I will be off week at least 8 weeks so I plan to be resting as much as I can. I will use this time to get ahead, if not finish, on my coursework for medical coding and hope to sit for my exam shortly after coming back to work. I will blog if I have anything interesting to say. I might actually lose weight since I won't be the one doing the grocery shopping so there won't be as many snacks and options in the house! Though I know I will be in a good deal of pain for quite a while, I am actually going to look at it as a blessing that my mind gets a little break from the work stress for a bit, which is becoming so hard to overcome lately. I have high hopes of implementing some things I have been putting off while I have the extra time. Meditation, focusing on gratitude, maybe even some chair-based yoga and taking care of my skin now that the air is getting dry again. Ultimately, I know the universe it trying to tell me things that I need to know. Slow down, pay attention to YOUR needs, your health can be fleeting, You are not invincible. Probably the hardest thing for me to learn is to let others help. I won't have a choice not to this time.