I don’t know if it is because I am crabby that I haven’t written or if I am crabby because I haven’t written. Either way, it is time to write. It’s past time to write, to let you in on what has been happening this past week.
It seems that time is getting longer and faster. I think to write something down and next thing I know, it has been almost a week. Today, though, I stopped to notice things. As I drove up my driveway, the road bare of asphalt, breathing earth, letting off steam, I noticed things. I noticed the magic of this last week. I noticed the Earth turning so green from the last twenty four hours of rain. I noticed the scent of last weeks ritual still in the air. I noticed the way my house looks when it is trimmed, weed wacked and taken care of.
Things are getting so back to normal, or at least it looks like it, that it is hard to believe that Orien Rose’s accident was just over two months ago. She is fighting everything, wanting her way, spirited, just like she always was! Orien Rose is passionate. She is enjoying her new puppy and getting in trouble sometimes for not taking care of what needs to be take care of. Orien Rose is strong. She argues her point adamantly when she feels something is not fair. Orien Rose is creative. Her drawing is increasing, getting slightly more complex. This is the area we need to work on the most right now. She is getting fatigued quickly.
This past week was filled with insurance approvals for OT and speech, appointments and anticipations. A lot of time has been spent on the phone, talking with doctors. We don’t know yet when the next surgery is and the limbo is painful. I think if there were something solid, concrete, I would feel a little better. As August quickly flies by, I think about what we have had of a Summer. I realize there is over a month left, over a full moon cycle of time before Summer is officially over, but it doesn’t feel that way. If we gauge by the school year, it is so close.
My semester starts soon. A week or two more and I will be sitting in a classroom again. Only one, though, as I have decided to drop my other class and I can’t do my internship. I am becoming more torn on this. I don’t feel ready, which is why I dropped my class, but I want to be done. I am feeling more defeated than I have about the internship. I know what I need to do to take care of my family. It is only within this week, as things become closer to real, that I mourn. I feel slightly defeated. I know that at some point that empowerment, that drive will come back, though. I have faith in that. Right now, it is as if I hit a wall and everything that was following me is coming towards me fast! It is hard to breath sometimes and I just need to sit still.
Orien and I have been okay, though he and I have fought a few times. I found the past few days that issues we were dealing with before the accident have resurfaced. They had not gone away with this trauma, but apparently they were not that important for the trauma. They are sneaking back in. I feel as if I have been living in one absolutely miraculous moment after another, so I know that this to shall pass. I am uncomfortable, but very loved. I know this. I feel this with everything in my core. It is time for a break for me, I am just trying to figure out how to get it. There is so much to be done.
Orien is away for the next few days. He is taking care of some things he needs to do for himself. I am glad he is. I need him strong. I need him to take care of himself. I need to be able to take care of myself sooner than later, so he will need to be somewhat recharged.
I will meet Orien with Orien Rose in RI on Tuesday. We are going up for another neuro appointment on Wednesday as well as an Athena’s event. I am looking forward to being in RI again, being at the Cottage, sitting if only for a day. I am know there will be more to process as Orien Rose may go on the boat this time (a new life jacket is being purchased for her as hers was cut off of her body).
Orien and I met with Orien Rose’s new principal and guidance counselor as well as her old principal and social worker this week. It was a good meeting, one that put both Orien and I at ease about the upcoming start of the school year. Orien Rose is healing so quickly, so wonderfully, she will be back to school in September. We talked at the meeting about the committee on special education, getting a 504, and making sure needs were met. The school is great, and so there for us in what we need. Suggestions, talk, solutions, accommodations…all lay on the table in front of us. We don’t know how she will be walking in that first day, whether with a helmet or fresh scars. We don’t know. I wish that we had some idea, but I am sure that we will be prepared either way.
This is where I realized that there is a lot inside of me that just wants to come out in tears. I feel as if, when I am talking to people, I don’t have a lot to say. All I want to do is cry and I spend all of my energy trying not to in the moment. As I sat at that table, talking of Orien Rose, the realization that she would be going to school, that we were so close, hit me. I couldn’t talk, only listen, or I would have broken open.
The same happened earlier in the week as I met with people who are doing a fundraiser for us in
And I want to cry. I feel as if people think I am not intelligent, or perhaps not grateful, as sometimes all I can do is stare, hoping they can read my eyes. Please know, that my gratitude is so immense that I cannot put it to words. I cannot even put it to paper. It is larger than a shooting star veering across a moonlit sky. It is larger than a circle of people sitting around a fire stating what they bring to the celebration. It is larger than music played on a stage by someone dear. It is larger than a room full of powerful business people standing and sending energy our way. It is so big, so powerful, that I am filled with it!
During the meeting with the school, the question was put before us about therapies. Yes, she is in OT and speech, but will she be doing counseling? I don’t know, but it got me thinking about how Orien Rose was feeling. She is so incredible at healing, that sometimes I need to ask her how she is feeling about it. She won’t readily volunteer the information. It reminds me of her pain management in Hasbro. So I asked her what she was feeling. She told me that she gets scared sometimes that something is going to happen to her, something else. She is scared there could be another accident, not necessarily a boating accident, but an accident. She is happy she didn’t die, but knows she came close. She wants her own skull, not a plastic piece, but will be okay if she gets the prosthetic. She asked why Grandma couldn’t give her a piece of her skull. When we explained that Grandma’s wouldn’t grow back like hers would because Grandma was older, Orien Rose said, “then I guess the plastic piece will be okay.”
Orien Rose is amazing. I want to put my hand on her head, like a scene in Empire Records, and just say, “she is okay, she is fine.” Behind that, there was a lot of healing to be had and really, for us, there is healing still to be done. We have a few months left to retrieve what lies beneath the surface. Then there is Orien and I, and our healing. I need to fall apart some more. I need to open up some more and allow the broken pieces to purge, to rip out of me, to heal.
As far as the surgery, we don’t even know yet the procedure, what they will be doing. Plastics left a message saying they were ordering the piece and neuro’s last report was the split skull. Ahhh….I just want to KNOW. Both doctors are on vacation (how dare they…lol…). So, we wait.
And wait.
And soon, there will be an answer. We will know when the procedure is and what type they will do. Soon, we will be able to prepare Orien Rose for the next surgery, to talk to her about it, to walk with her through it. For now, we will party. For now, we will enjoy every moment, even as some feel raw. For now, we will show up and say thank you. We will accept, graciously, the help that has been offered to us. We will know, or at least try to, that we deserve it. We will open our hearts to it. We will stop creating the gremlins of rationalization. We will heal in many ways. We will learn to move through this crisis, not only for Orien Rose, but for ourselves. We have to. There is no choice.
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