Post Mortem

i am doing well. truly.

the year built and built from the moment of the phone call from gear. i moved first as if under water, swimming and clawing my way through mire and sludge. sometimes it was as if i were climbing a mountain, out of breath, then finally making it over the top, only to run, nearing falling, plummeting down too fast to the bottom.

i still spend time floating on my back in the pool, staring at the sky, watching clouds, tracking birds, swaying with tree tops, wondering about Kyle. but the pain has lessened, the burden is lighter. i breathe more easily.

so i've made it through the entire First Year. there are no other firsts to face. except the anniversary of the memorial in Eagle Rock on August 19th. but i think that will be fine. it's different than the reliving of the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 13th of july. and every holiday, birthday.

i am well. i feel well. i have kept on my eating plan and have lost 57 pounds and wearing size 10 pants (omigod) and am swimming a lot and am healthier than i've been in a long long time. Kyle would be happy, cause he worried about my weight. and Miranda is relieved, i'm sure. she once said, and it stays with me, "Mom, you can't die before I've learned all your wisdom." how could you keep killing yourself with food with a child like that to live for.

soon i am heading off to visit family and friends in New England and that will be both exhilarating and exhausting, but essentially good. i never spent enough time there with the children, but i can't dwell on that, or on any regret, now.

it's all good, isn't it, Kyle.

The Vision Thing

The eyeball is mending. The attachment of the retina is successful. Vision in my right myopic/post surgery eye is pretty good--can see light, shapes, colors--just much blurrier than the left myopic eye still. If reading from that eye, things up close look wavy. and my worst case scenario fantasy was that my chin down position hadn't been perfect and the gas bubble hadn't given the proper pressure on my retina and that I had permanent wrinkles. But as I sat waiting (interminably) for the doctor and reading an article for work, I could see that the wavy words were not really wavy, but that I have little pale pale deposits--not floaters--in the way. Like I'm reading through a thin pane of antique class or through water droplets, so that little magnifications are distorting the words, to the point that a line of writing is uneven. bizarre. The doctor said it was unusual. Didn't like that piece of information.

In another 5 weeks I will return to the surgeon and then go back to the eye doctor to see what adjustments need to be made in my glasses and lenses. Supposedly my vision will continue to improve. Amazing, huh?

Every time I have something go wrong with my body: my thyroid condition, the uterine freakout that resulted in my hysterectomy, and now my detached retina--I'd think, What if I'd been living in the 1800's in Illinois or the 1600s in Salem like my father's people, or in the 1700's in Scotland or forever in Wales like my mother's people? Would I have lived long and heartily like so many of them? Probably the thyroid disease would have killed me off in my 30s. Or I would have bled to death in my early 50s. Or I'd be half blind and then fully blind in my 60s, and then have fallen off a cliff or been eaten by a very quiet bear.

But, lucky me, the wonders of modern medicine have saved me, once again.

Los Angelean Earns 9.8 in Chin-to-Chest Event

So I returned to the doctor yesterday, this time well-armored (successfully) against motion-sickness (from riding face down in car) with dramamine. Eyes dilated and head bowed, I sat in the dimly lit waiting room of the Retina Vitreous Associates Medical Group, tightly packed with patients. Now that I have spent a half dozen or so appointments in the North Hollywood and Beverly Hills offices, I am quite familiar with the several hour wait and complaining waiters.

Although everyone in the waiting room has had their pupils dilated, not everyone has to be in the chin-to-chest position. That depends upon one's diagnosis and the waiting folks may have diabetic eye disease, vitreous hemorrhage, macular degeneration, retinal detachments, uveitis, or ocular tumors. Only the post ops from surgery for retinal detachment and a messed up macula have the gas bubble, which requires a head down position so that the bubble floats up and pushes the retina/macula gently into place. It is an odd thing, sitting with one's head down in a darkened room with strangers. A point my friend Linda, also a clinical social worker, made captured the experience: Having one's head down is the ultimate position of passivity. She demonstrates with her clients the difference between feeling assertive and feeling passive by having them assume a head up position and a head down position. With my chin to my chest, I do feel vulnerable--only gingerly do I insert myself in a conversation. Not being able to make eye contact makes me feel like an intruder, like a not enthusiastically welcomed guest.

However, sitting among the complainers, vulnerable or not, I eventually become indignant and announce kindly--but firmly--that the office is understaffed because of the recent death of one of the doctors in the medical group. On other occasions, I have offered, "Well, I am here for an emergency and I am grateful to be seen at all." My points made and seconded by others, I resume silence.

There are other things which keep patients apart. We span many decades for one. As well as cultures. One office visit very late in the workday, where I was about the last patient, I could tell that the only other person in the room was a man and possibly an older man, from his fairly formal coffee colored leather shoes. Not able to look up, I ventured, "Excuse me, sir, do you know what's happening with the Celtic game tonight?" He didn't respond. Soon, someone came in and spoke to him in Spanish and then led him away. I realized that he didn't understand my question, nor did he have the sight to know I was addressing him.

In an interesting bridging of culture and age among the sitters yesterday, a young Chinese American man, sounding in his late 20s, was engaged in conversation by a woman in her 80s with mid 20th century slightly Boston Brahmin accent. After complimenting him on how well he spoke English (he clarified that, while being Chinese, he was born here), the woman--out of the blue--began to boast about having had a very good return of serve in her day and of having played an exhibition tennis match tennis with Pancho Gonzales. While the young man had not heard of Pancho Gonzales, I remembered him from watching tennis matches with my dad on television in the 1960s. After listening to her anecdote and perhaps wondering about the origin of her accent, the young man asked, "Was that in England?" The woman explained that it had been in Santa Monica. I learned no more because--at that point--I was called into the one of the treatment offices. Alone, I sat wondering how many other conversations in these offices similarly span a variety of US generations and cultures.

The doctor was very pleased with my condition and remarked that he could tell I must be following the head down protocol very well. He told me I could look up at a higher angle now and that I didn't need to use the neck brace in bed. So, just as cousin Wanda has written in her comments, following directions exactly leads to promising results.

I can't leave the Eye Doctor Office saga without thanking my dear friends, Linda and Marylou, for driving me to and fro and providing the best company a somewhat-sightless gal could wish for. You are the best.

i'm doing okay

you know, they don;treally explain things. like the doctor calmly said, "and you[ll have to keep your head down for a while." but he didn';t say for weeks and doing this head down thing is really difficult. this wohn[t be a long blog cuase i can;t type in head donw position very well. sitting reading isn''t bad but the neck hates it. trying to sleep on your stomach or side but still with your eye facing down is near ijmpossible. but i listened to the laker game (GO LAKERS) and used my imagination, but it took some doing. we sighted folks are sure lucky when our sight is working. tonight i'm looking forward to HEARING THE CELtics (GO CELTICS).

also must cancel clients for weeks. that's not cool.

oh and riding in a car back and forth to doctors with head down resultsin nausea and vomting. that's been the low point so far.

at least i can use the phone. tho i get tired. and i probably could practice putting and really keep my head down quite well.

so, usually cheerful pretty much, i know this wiill get OLD real soon.

but, hey, i had nothing to blog about when i had no life tragedies, so i guess this little run in with eyeball aging is designd to keep me a blogger. Clare our great UCLA coordinator has been telling me that i can make this little ibook of mine talk. think i'll try to figure it out.

so with greetings and salutations and love all around ---

i remain (partially sighted and mending),

cynthia, cyn, cindy, mum, aunt cyn, great aunt cyn

Get Thee to a Nunnery

since sal brought it up on Mir's blog, i'm going to talk about my weight.

when ky died i couldn't eat. couldn't think about eating. people kept saying, "you've got to eat," but no, i didn't have to eat. i have enough stores of sustenance on this body to keep me going for a long time. if i'd been in the Donner party, i still would have been been worth munching on at the way end of the trek.

true to form, a few days after my appetite came back. in spades. it was if my stomach thought it could bring kyle back if i could just fill it until bursting. and talk about really understanding the meaning of comfort food? ohmigod. i only wanted ice cream, french fries, cheeseburgers, candy bars, chips. not good. i was miserable about kyle and miserable about eating. i loved and hated every morsel. i gained 7 pounds in the weeks and months following kyle's death. but i didn't care.

except that i do care. in fact, i am a little hyper-aware of my mortality. i have a nasty genetic situation. my mother died at 59 (i am 58 and 11/12ths) of a pulmonary embolism; my father died at 61 of a massive coronary; my nana whitham had 3 heart attacks in her 50's--although lived to 84; and there's more. cancer, diabetes, stroke. we have it all in my family tree.

i needed the dietary equivalent of a nunnery. unless i did something drastic, weight loss was not gonna be happening. and then i remembered the UCLA RFO (Risk Factor Obesity) Program. i had done it 4 years ago and lost 35 pounds--i looked pretty damned hot for a zoftig gal. but did i reach my goal weight? no. did i do the maintenance classes? no. did i resort to my old habits (Eating Equals Over-Eating)? yes, i did. and regained the weight.

so, on miranda's birthday i returned to the RFO clinic, where they have a team of folks on you like white on rice. weekly you are weighed; they take your blood; they give you an EKG; you visit with the doctor and the nutritionist. then you go to nutrition, behavior, and support classes. it's a chunk of one's Saturday morning (and i have to be there before 7:45 a.m. in order to get to work in Eagle Rock by 11).

oh, also that's when you buy your food. well, your boxes of envelopes of nutritional product. you get 7 soup/shake packets a day, each packet containing 15 grams of protein and 100 calories. "Seven hundred calories a day!" you gasp. yes, indeed. and ohmigod does the weight fall off. i've lost 15 pounds since 11/17, even with Thanksgiving.

i am feeling terrific. the stuff tastes fine. i usually take Saturday nights off so i can be a bit better of a companion when i get together with friends. even then, i am cautious in my choices. you would never believe how good a cup of fresh berries (with a little whipped cream) taste when you've been living on soy protein.

i know this sounds extreme, but i need to take extreme measures. i was killing myself with food. and that is selfish and unfair. i have a daughter and brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews and cousins and friends. and, damn it, i am not going to give any of them one more loss for a long long time. i'll meet up with kyle at that great reggae sunsplash when i'm ninety and not a day before.