recuperation – Wrens on a Wire by Amanda Varrella

If poor surgical outcome can be likened to something, which I sometimes do doubt, it may just be a Tilt-a-Whirl. It’s definitely not a roller coaster, as is often said. Roller coasters have an easy symmetry—up, down, up, down. You know what’s next and, for the most part, when. But with this sudden and jarring health condition, I’m a child again in Ocean City, feet dangling from my seat on the Tilt-a-Whirl, one of my favorite Wonderland Pier rides, getting thrown from one side of the car to the other. And just when I think I’m stationary, with my little sister stabilized next to me, both of us white-knuckling the side rails, the car dips and circles and catapults me to the edge, bones crushed by the force of the thing, jointless and windblown into abandon.

There was a distinct joy to the pain then because I knew it would end. I knew that within a certain time, a time that was almost the same every time, the cars would slow and everything would fall into place. The dizziness would slip off and I would be upright and walking, only to wish I were still in that little circle of a car. The suspense was palpable–which there was a great deal of despite the pattern of the ride–and it was riveting. It held me in place with great anticipation. I was overcome and, now breathless for different reasons, with an entirely different measure of suspense, I dare to trust that it is still riveting—pinning me in place in far less pleasant ways, yes, but directing me intently and affording me a certain privilege: The opportunity to be a better host to inexplicability.

Existence is baffling, and maybe being in the thick of this unsought turbulence is a matter of accepting that the Tilt-a-Whirl of my 30s is the best Yogi Teacher I might ever have. As Henry Miller puts it, “Until we accept that life itself is founded in mystery we shall learn nothing.” How does accepting go? It has to do, I am slow to learn, with asking the right questions. Not “Why is the opposite of what was supposed to happen happening?” and “Why do doctors have no answers?” and “Will my body ever not be balky?” But maybe, “How might remaining riveted, simply and purely riveted, amidst all that is inscrutable, allow me to be sinewed by grace?” How might it force me into abandon again and again, rawboned and having no choice but to believe that, just as it was on those summer rides, I am encircled by something unfathomable and amazing and it holds me. There’s certainly not a lack of variety; the adult version of this boardwalk ride is showing me that there are several ways to remain still amidst thrashing and trick landings, and so several ways to be held. It’s a surprisingly difficult thing, giving over all one’s weight, unguarded and trusting. But maybe it’s the only thing?

One more question for now: How does being on the turn enable me to lend a hand to those who are also on a protracted ride, bodies undependable and foreign (which so easily can turn into bodies threatened and threatening)? It may just be a matter of endeavoring, feet dangling with anticipation, to describe again and then again what I know I need constant reminding of, that one sure thing among a gaggle of uncertainties: The inexplicable is not only tolerable, it is actually, regardless of what happens and how much it hurts, harmless. And we are all in this little car, riveted and ready, together.

For one human being to love another; that is perhaps the most difficult of all of our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

You thought that this was going to be about what you would give this Christmas to the legions of doctors and nurses you’ve seen: a thesaurus to each of the unkind ones. You were going to riff on Orwell’s essay, “Politics and the English Language,” making a point about his argument, “A speaker who uses [stock] phraseology has gone some distance toward turning himself into a machine.” That, indeed, the rote phrases MDs use, like “quality of life” and other such drivel, amplify the blunt force of being anatomized and are central to the often mechanical nature of patient doctor interactions. You were going to concur with Orwell regarding his ideas that “language corrupts thought” and “the invasion of one’s mind by ready-made phrases […] can only be prevented if one is constantly on guard against them, and every such phrase anaesthetizes a portion of one’s brain.” You were all set to prove that if health care professionals paid attention to using words dictated more by solicitude than by litigiousness, it could have the serious effect of healing callousness, of building heart. That by starting with language we could get rid of all the anesthetized parts and give rise to interactions more humane in those sterile, fluorescent rooms where so much of consequence transpires.

But you will save this for another time because you instead find yourself taking out your mouth guard, as it were, unclenching your fists and slackening. You realize that you are still waiting to awaken from the surgery that was supposed to lead to a party. You are still a babe in swaddling robe, back in your neck collar. And you think it’s probably a good time to look a little more closely at this fact, given the season.

You are often told that you are strong, a fighter. That you will undoubtedly get through it all. And although you’re honored, because you know those who say it mean it as a compliment, you don’t quite understand. In fact, you’ve been wondering lately if you’ve become permanently breakable. And you fear the multitudinous noise of your post-surgical body will etch you into a specter of yourself before you even know what’s happened. For not only is your spine malfunctioning when it’s supposed to be shining, your sacrum is busted from the protracted recuperation, your leg is throbbing, your ribs are sprained, and they’ve found abnormalities on your chest, so you’re going in for a mammogram on Tuesday. And your head, well, it may as well be a pressure cooker and you wish it would just blow off into pieces already.

Yes, it’s six moths out of operative times and, although you were all but guaranteed that you would be resurrected, dancing with glee, you might as well be right back in your surgical gown, attached to machines; your endocrine system in not functioning properly–a side effect of the painkillers, you’re told–so you’ve upgraded from Evian spray to a host of portable fans. And you’re certain that upgrade is not the right word here.

When you think of that June day, when you were in the hospital hooked up to the IV line and other contraptions, waiting five hours for surgery to actually happen, rushing down the hall to pee every few minutes, as much anyone could rush while affixed to all that equipment, the image of your mother is the first that comes to mind. She is wiping the public toilet seat clean of the stranger’s blood you discovered splattered all over as you were positioning your body and the machines in just the right way so as not to rip out the intravenous line that took the nurses four tries to get into your vein. Without missing a beat, your mother does what needs to be done as she calms you, her germaphobe daughter. You are giving it all you’ve got too—trying your best to banish the thought that you could be done in before the surgeon even gets hold of your neck, if not by hospital acquired infection, as thousands of patients annually are, then by the unprecedented anxiety swelling.

Now you’re not into histrionics, really, but a tear wells up in your eye for the gift of your family, and your kin-like friends too, who have made your life possible during this humbling time. And you know, like anyone who has a spiritual bone in their body does, how the old saying goes—“You are never in control.” But this is no longer a divine lesson. It is a cold, hard fact. To learn how to tolerate the helplessness borne of post-surgical balkiness while believing in the metaphysical fact of your freedom, well, this is a course of its own that you’re very much in the midst of taking.

On believing, Mary Baker Eddy writes, “The Hebrew verb ‘to believe’ means also ‘to be firm.'” Infirm and firm. Consecration in unexpected states. So thank you, I say, for this gift of swaddling clothes. Despite its restraints, it continues to turn me around, to move me to see that it’s not about fighting, not in the least, but rather about trusting in the paradoxical nature of things. The pureness, after all, of that most determinative triptych—selflessness, longsuffering and love—around which much of the world is conspiring to gather this week, and that has quite literally saved me, was brought forth in a trough.

Yes, so much of it is about learning to love. And about recognizing love when it comes. So here in the midst of the maelstrom I pause to remember that I am stunningly fortunate, surrounded by people who refine me:

Carol, who prays without ceasing and gives in a manner that redefines miracles, that leaves beauty speechless.

Karen, who IS understanding, support and sanctuary.

Richard, who when I ask him to walk with me a mile, walks with me twain. My analog hero in this digitized world who waits for me to show up for a good amount of time, even though he knows I’m probably not able to.

Anne Marie, who carried me through that urgent first night, saw the true babe in me, and didn’t flinch once.

Dad, who lies down beside me when I’m unable to move, and stays with me there until I’m okay.

Mom, who is my voice when I’m unable to speak, whose patience is a grace, and who transforms so much by excelling at an art in danger of extinction—listening.

Gold, frankincense and myrrh. Faith, levity and light.

You sanctify the glow of silent nights. You say, “Peace child, it will be alright. (And, really, all is already well.)” Thank you, my Magi. I write this and hope my gratitude expands through the sky, echoing thunderously. For it is you who help me to trust that, with firmness as deep as the earth that steadies me, one day I’ll be afforded the pleasure of giving you frankincense, gold and myrrh of my own. But this Christmas I bring thank yous, and I send them out in defiance of all that tries to convince me there could be any undertakings more crucial, more burning, more influential than to believe and to love.

Category: recuperation

That Ride

this christmas