November 11: On Illness

I am sick. I am slogging through an ongoing illness that began with a trip to the emergency room and led from my doctor's office to a CT scan through two rounds of antibiotics and has me fasting at the moment, drinking a ton of water and returning to the doctor tomorrow morning.

For most of my life, I have equated being sick with weakness. This has a lot to do with my family of origin.  At times, it was not safe to stay home sick from school. I learned early to throw back some ibuprofen and get through the day.

As a grad student and more recently as a mom, I mastered the art of powering through almost anything, nothing short of high fever or active vomiting keeps me down and even then I am down at most for an afternoon.

But recently, my body has betrayed me. (This must surely be one of the double-edged gifts of growing older.) My body has put her foot down and stubbornly refused to power through. Trying to power through has taken me to relapse and pain and staring down the barrel of yet another round of antibiotics. My body demands that I stop EVERYTHING and pay attention. I am resting. I am lying down - with a blanket - in the middle of the day. I am fasting, drinking loads and loads of water and consuming very little else.

Not because I wised up and decided to take better care of myself and not because my doctor fussed at me, but because my body demanded it and I have no choice but to listen. I am finding I am quite fond of the old girl.