Day 193. A Zero Day, Skipping Stones

This will be a short one, skipping topics like skipping stones across the surface of a pond.  It’s about yesterday and what it did to my body, about what I did for an art project, and what I need to do for homework.

Yesterday I had a to-do list of seven items.  I accomplished an amazing one-seventh of them when the Comcast man came and went.  As for the rest, well, I scratched through them in red pen: incomplete.

Here is why:  when I awoke, I wasn’t sure about how I felt.  In an iffy situation like that, I try to put makeup on and dress as though I am about to go somewhere, so that I will create a sense of momentum (and sometimes propel myself out of a funk).  I didn’t realize until after the Comcast guy had left that I had applied the eyebrow pencil a trifle dark.

Old Lady Eyebrows

People, this makeup mistake is a definitive crazy old lady marker.  There is no pussyfooting around it.  I looked in the mirror and laughed at myself.

Trouble was, I just felt all wrong.  My body was on fire.  To give a simple example, I wear soft, fleecy socks all the time around the house because they are warm and protect my feet, from which the fat pads the rest of you have, have disappeared (making walking on them feel…well, like walking on sharp bones).  Yesterday, though, the little nubbies on my regular soft socks felt like they were razors across my toes.  I kept telling myself to ignore it.  You know, like, “Hey, stupid.  You have too much time on your hands.  If you were driving railroad spikes someplace, your stupid foot pain would not come to mind.”  Trouble was, this stupid food pain was starting to feel like railroad spikes driven into my toes.  Finally, I had to dig through the various pairs I have to find the very newest and softest pair of soft socks on which the little nubs are still perfectly squishy.  That was only one part of my body that felt like it was being poked, prodded or twisted.  There were the ankles, the wrists, the knees, the hips….WTF?  I thought this was all going to resolve itself once the PT was over!

Since I was no good for the concentration involved in doing the kind of writing I am doing now, I found some Zentangles to work on.  I posted one last time; I worked on the one here most of the day yesterday, until my hands hurt so much I had to stop, and then I slept for a while.  Then I started again.  They are fun to do when I need to stay in bed because no paints are required, just a pencil, eraser, pen, and a ruler.

I tried meditating before working on my art, just as I am making sure to meditate before I write each time, so that I stay on task and feel the work flow out of me.  I’ve been trying to work on doing that, as something I have been discussing with my therapist.

My therapist, Dr. A., who specializes in working with people to deal with chronic pain and grave illness (rather than “how do you feel about your parents” kind of stuff) does cool things like help with meditation and things like that.

This week, though, he has me stumped.  He gave me an assignment to think about what I need to work on, in therapy. To him, that means what I need to improve, discuss, or problem solve as it relates to dealing with my illness or the situations around it.

I am drawing a complete blank.

It isn’t that I feel cured or resolved by any means.  I just feel a great blank when I try to think of the answer, because I often draw a great  blank when I try to think deeply. Now, I need to come up with something by Monday. Help a sistah out. What do you guys think?  I  thought it would be cool for my brilliant readers to opine (since I am so blind to my own situation).  This means you!

Have you been given similar therapeutic assignments? How has it worked for you? What am I missing?