Laidupedness

IN THE MONTH OF MAY the sharpshooters began to stand down. That electric nerve pain, worst kind, transmogrified to arthritic inflammation, pulsing along the nerve corridor like I was a bioluminescent sea creature. Lately I have lots of painless moments, or so they seem upon casual observation. If I inquire too solicitously my body usually reports that Pain is in fact still there, perhaps sleeping.

The controversially-called 'painless' moments are strictly conditional. I get to have them if...and you don't want to hear the ellipses contents. In brief, absurd limitation paired with ibupanacea.

I've had to cultivate some weird other kind of discipline. The kind where you don't do stuff--not even the sensible, responsible things your brain says to do. See the chickenshit on the patio, but don't hose it off. Hear the coffee beans crunch underfoot, but don't sweep up the resultant grounds. Faced with a heap of dishes, wash only one dish.

The little feline Buddhist nun understands such things. If her water bowl is empty, she says, Do not attempt to reach it! Merely open the door, that I may go and drink from the water garden. She is conducting clinical trials on the efficacy of feline saliva, applied topically, on spinal disc regeneration in humans. With a sample size of one.

I READ BOOKS about The Back and about Pain, trying to learn from them without being steamrolled by their high church pronouncements. Bed rest should not exceed 1-2 days. I agree: it should not. Not least because it FUCKING SUCKS. But what would general medical wisdom have had me do instead? Keep moving about until my screams summoned the neighbors?

I hold as my bottom line the oath I felt like a lot of doctors failed to make me: First, do no harm.

The research I do and the interactions I have about my back problem are often painful themselves, though I do learn from them. In such case I must unbandage the wound, saying, This hurts and I wish it would get better. That invites clucking opinions and facile judgments as readily as sympathy or genuine help. Princess SHao brought what I really wanted: chocozucchini bread.

AND NOW FOR a quick lesson in making a person's hardship their own choice and fault. It's a neat trick: 1. Think up something the person should be doing. 2. Suggest it to the person. 3. Sit back and relax! If the person fails to be better, it's on them! You tried.

Nothing I hate more than people's little self-solacing notions of What I Should Be Doing. The suggestey shit pricks me til I bleed with self-doubt. The philosopher JBird said what I really wanted to hear: that my ass retains its splendor.

But what would I have people do in lieu of solacing themselves? Doesn't provision of empathy require suffering along with me? How can I ask that?

AFTER THREE MONTHS of laidupedness and discouragement, I gave myself the following advice:

This will last...some amount of time. Some awful, unbearably long period of time, way beyond reason. The progress will be invisible slow; setbacks many. You won't have the support you need. Won't have options that could make it easier. Instead eight million things will conspire to make it harder. You'll often be mired in depression. Your self-confidence will wear down. Your life will get all off-track. You'll get farther and farther from being as you were. You'll lose your fitness and your beauty to some extent or other. You may not even feel like yourself; you'll feel like you are the Pain. Fully parasitized. All this will happen. Continue happening. Even so it will end. You'll get well.

That has proven useful. Eventual wellness is a damn fine promise, one beyond the reach of many who are unwell.

FINALLY, for Lolo, a word on bullshit-skimming. You see, ordinarily I care about a lot of dumb shit, like what people think about the things I do, and why I don't make more money, and whether quoting rappers makes me ridiculous. But with Pain at my back, how can I possibly care? Jay-Z said it best:

I used to give a fuck

Now I give a fuck less

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