Mother Nature dropped by to tell me that just wasn’t so….
I THINK MOTHER Nature has stepped in to help me adjust to all the changes going on since Connie passed on April 20.
From the morning of her passing I began “doing.” There was a lot “to do.” Most of it had to do with lining up legal stuff. I had done a lot prior to her passing there is still an “after” when it comes to various notifications, lining things up.
After close to three years of caregiving at one level or another I suppose I had the phrase “I have to….” Burned into my mind. It’s hard to go from care-giver to….well, I guess the emptiness that death brings.
So, I got to my financial advisors, checked in with the funeral home on the logistics, notified friends and family with what they needed to know, threw myself into a bunch of chores that I can’t even recall now.
Then I got sick. Not life-threatening sick, just miserable sick. It started out as hay fever. With the warming weather and spring breezes came the floating about of tree and grass pollen, two of my triggers. It happens every year. No surprise.
But after a few days I realized something more was going on. I had a cold. One night I took my temperature and had a low fever. I tried to remember when I last had a cold and couldn’t. I don’t know that I ever had a rip-roaring, mess with the nose, head, chest cold on top of some pretty serious hay fever.
I became a walking, talking prolonged cough. I coughed all night, all day. Didn’t sleep. Zombie-walked through the day. If I tried to talk what came out was a rasp. I loaded up on inhalers, allergy meds, nasal sprays, cough medicine, a teaspoon of local honey every day.
Nothing worked. It stretched into two weeks. As I type this, I think – and I stress “think” – I am feeling it lessen a bit. I went online to see how long a cold lasts. I couldn’t remember. Most sources said 7-10 days depending on your overall health.
I am easily 10 days in and still hacking. Is the cold leaving and I’m back to hay fever? Dunno.
I finally decided I would leave behind the “poor me” moaning behind and try to be philosophical about it. Maybe Mother Nature was watching me and shaking her head, tsk-tsking “doesn’t he know when you’ve had a loss like this you need to just take some time, not rush everything?”
Well, I guess he didn’t. I finally decided that being passive was what was called for. Rather than feel guilt, feel like a slug, just roll with it. After all, I’m retired. No one is expecting me to be anywhere.
Back when Connie went into memory care I got the bright idea to redo all our photo albums – get rid of countless pictures of things and stuff and just keep ones with people in them, or significant places. I think I did one album early on in her memory care stay then lost interest. Well, I’ve done four in the last two days with maybe four to go. It’s been fun revisiting our lives together, even when the tears have come as they have more than a few times.
I’ve gotten some reading done, a lot of puttering and spent a fair amount of time napping. I had my annual Medicare Wellness visit with the doc this week and I laid all this out for her. She agreed that maybe my body was sending me a signal and she thought my reaction to it was spot on and she had nothing to add, other than to say “stay hydrated.”
So, I am puttering, napping and hydrating and I assume at some point I will break out of it do whatever needs to be done. Thanks, Mother. As usual, you were right.
Rich Heiland, has been a reporter, editor, publisher/general manager at daily papers in Texas, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio and New Hampshire. He was part of a Pulitzer Prize-winning team at the Xenia Daily (OH) Daily Gazette, a National Newspaper Association Columnist of the Year. Since 1995 he has operated an international consulting, public speaking and training business specializing in customer service, general management, leadership and staff development with major corporations, organizations, and government. He also writes the blog stuffonmymind.blog. Semi-retired, he lives in West Chester, PA. He can be reached at [email protected].