In between my Mother being diagnosed with cancer in March and dying in May, I had knee replacement surgery in April. The knee had completely gone, prior to that. Some days I could get by with a cane and some days it was crutches. Mom didn't want me to put off the surgery waiting to see how things would go. Then things went faster than any of us expected.
Three things have kept me from feeling hideously guilty about going ahead with the surgery. Two of Mom's friends, DeeDee and Paula, formed a wonderful support group for her, and my Youngest Son more or less went to live with Mom, except for during my actual surgery and the first weeks back from the hospital. Then his Devoted Girlfriend took over driving me around while he went back. He was the one who took her to the emergency room when she started to be unresponsive and, weeks later, he was the one who was with her when she died. In beween, he ran all her errands and kept her in contact with the rest of us with an iPad and Facetime. She loved that.
It's been about three weeks, now, since the pain has gone. It's odd not to have it there after all these years. It's started building up around 1999, give or take a year. So I have my mobility back, but I need to build up the muscles that weren't used, not just after the surgery, but for months before. It's embarrassing the little it takes to make different muscles sore. And if I make the mistake of thinking that I'm a regular, fit person, I end up pulling something.
I'm still behind on a lot of things and it would be nice to put in some straight-ahead hours catching up. But I have to potter instead. I always think both that I'm not doing enough, that I'm using the weak muscles as an excuse to be lazy, AND that I'm doing too much, that I'm risking racking myself up so that I'll have to take time off. It's a very busy sort of laziness.
Time to let the dogs out. Whatever else happens, the day is always punctuated with looking after the dogs.
