mental recovery

I think I was having a mild reaction to the withdrawal of narcotic meds from my system: not only did I have a bit of light headedness and mild vertigo, there were several times when my mouth didn't come up with the exact right word I wanted to say--a close word, but not the right word. Yikes, that was an eerie feeling. So far so good this morning, although I notice my brain can't follow as many indepth articles from the NY Times that I am used to doing (course two weeks ago, I read nothing and last week only some, so I am moving in the mental recovery direction, I think).

I just resist any sensation that takes me back to the experience of the 3 hour post-recovery: the sound without sight feeling (like death is, sound being the last sense to go), the heavy-lidded attempts to see, the over-wrapped sense of being in a cocoon and trying to squirm my way out (mostly unsuccessfully--how does a butterfly continue with that arduous effort?), the relief of a cold wash cloth bringing moisture to the my skin.

I tried to watch "Avatar" last night (the non3D version) and it literally made me ill. The avatars looked like blue fish or fetuses and their liquid-like movements and the multi-colored visual stimuli that surrounded them was like a psychedelic video. When the humans go into those chamber-pods, I felt claustrophobic and I just had to leave Mark to watch it alone. (He admitted it was "freaky and disjointed and had everything in it but the kitchen sink" but he was also very adrenalized at 11:30 p.m. when he is usually sound asleep).

I retired to bed and a rerun of Nationa Treasure/Secrets which was more my speed (slow, semi-literate) of a story.

I am beginning to move things around at home such as newspapers or magazines (my level of "straigtening things up" is low) and pulling stems from my gift flowers out of the arrangement as blue and purple petals fall to the floor.

We have overripe bananas that Mark wants to make into banana bread and I hope to guide him to that task and I look forward to the smell of break baking, even if I am not the one to pour the batter into the pans.

Moving ego aside every day, making room for humility and gratitude, accepting this nuanced shift from post surgery to recovery isn't an easy task for me. But unlike the dead left in Mississippi after yesterday's tornado, I woke up today, and the sun was shining.