Riding on

12 days to Rich Happy and Hot
Music: The Social Network soundtrack
Location: the study

The last thing I remember is riding. The wind in my face, rushing in my ears, sun on my cheeks. Then blackness. Then confusion. The musings of the mind is so subjective. What I think is the next thought might be a dream, might be real, might be the suggestion of a thought or story that I saw or read somewhere. Scary to think one can'r trust their own recollections, the images in their own minds. So cerebral!

The next thing: waking up in hospital. 11 days later. WTF. Sensory overload. Voices. Faces. It would take another 5 days before I could trust what I was thinking, what I heard, what I was seeing.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: Intensive Care Unit (ICU) psychosis is real. It happened to me, and most likely countless others. Should someone you know or love end up in the ICU, please make sure you familiarize your self with the signs and symptoms. It will save you and your loved one a world of grief. There is more than enough data to support my notions. But who wants numbers and figures when there are stories to be had?;)
My family told me I was in a bad bicycle accident. My husband would tell me a year later, that it is a miracle I survived and a blessing that I can walk today.
I stayed in hospital for 3 months. I have an injury list the size of a weekly shopping list. I have many scars. My body still feels the after shocks of the last day that I rode my bicycle. My mind, well, on a good day it is succinct. My psyche took a massive hit.

It is two years, one month and seven days since the accident. I am much better in some ways. Before the accident I worked as an Emergency Room Nurse. What I knew then about mind and body feels so immature compared to what I know now. My understanding has deepened, like a leather jacket that has over time moulded to the wearer's frame. If or when I go back to work, I will be a completely different nurse. More present. The line between nurse and patient is blurred. Less absolute.

Thank god for the internet. Once I was discharged, I was at home. Undergoing therapy. Resting. Sleeping. My head felt full of cotton wool from lying dormant for so long. The internet gave me access to the rest of the world. Other bloggers, online businesses. This was around the time that using social media as a marketing tool and running businesses online became very popular. I found Etsy, the online market for crafters alike. Etsy became the perfect starting point for hobbyists to test the waters - setting up shop, learning how to sell and run an online business. The handmade movement sprang up and bloomed quickly, a renaissance of all things arty and UN-bigbox store. For someone stuck at home, it made for the perfect entertainment. I went from a thrifty, in person shopper to an internet savvy, cyber consumer of handmade goods. The net was my band aid, and it provided the best day to day distraction from my current reality possible.

Bedtime. Tired. Sore. Pain creeps up like the boogey monster at night. Slowly, slowly and suddenly intense. It's medtime. Nighty night.


Xxx
J.

PS - I'd like to start a segment called Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes. Any good Blog has a sense of balance, and I'd like to share information as well as personal happenings, neat net discoveries as well as the realities of recovery. More later. Good night!

Heroic act #1

This blog has been ages in the making. I don’t really know what I was so afraid of. Frank Herbert once wrote “fear is the mind killer.” My mantra for when things got frightening, overexposed. A blog is nothing more than a discussion with your self in cyber space, where people eventually join in and start to talk. I feel like I have so much stored up in my mind that maybe if I just puncture the seal, and get it all out on to paper/a computer screen, I’d have more space to grow something new and vibrant. I’ve spent the last two years taking in information, opinions, and points of view. Perhaps it is time to change the flow. A two way valve is so much more advanced than a one way valve. But enough babble.

I started Recovery Inc a year ago. It fizzled out, most likely because everything was still too new. Too raw. There wasn’t enough incorporation and not enough recovery.

You wouldn’t believe how often I’ve dissected the word “recover, recovery”.

Recover: To find, to save, to hide, to soothe, to tuck into bed.

Recovery: the process of starting again

How ever you spin it, a story is waiting to be told.

So here I am. One year wiser. I am ready to give this project another go, if for no one else than for myself. Recovery is a business - my business. Let’s see which way this dice rolls.