Sylvia's Journal

The mechanics of the body don’t seem to follow simple cause and effect rules. I am searching for what triggered off my most recent crippled-ness. After paying attention to the tight Psoas muscle and doing faithfully my exercises it is more limber now. But then my gait must have changed once more triggering another muscle into spasms, tightness and tenderness. This time it is the Ileo-tibial band (ITB) which runs form the side of my hip to the side of my knee. Last night I tried to take my sock of my left foot, balancing precariously on the still weak right foot, when something happened with that muscle that made me stagger to my bed. And now, the morning after, it is so sore that it takes all my concentration to walk straight.

Currently, someone posted a request at the OBTS-Listserve about teaching system dynamics to students and did anyone have any interesting material. Now I think that I could be that material. My body appears to be one big systems dynamics mess; a headache for diagnosticians, but it’s also the source of its robustness, and its elegance. These days, when I enter Julia’s office for PT I always surprise her with what needs attention now. I can hear her think, ‘what is it now?’ The body parts distinction imposed by the insurance is pretty useless. Yesterday was an upper-body day but she ended up calming down the middle part of my body.

The word patience is beginning to loom large in my life again. I think when I was on painkillers I was much more patient. Julia reminded me that it was only 5 months ago that our bodies got all shaken up and that we should count on one year for everything to fall back in place. One year? Seven more months? In my next session with Ruth we will focus on my patience. It needs some attention again.

A full and long workday at MSH which included a birthday toast and then I had to rush off to PT while the rest celebrated the holidays. It is frustrating that I am missing all the end-of-the-day fun that is organized with some frequency these days.

Margaret Benefiel and Ken Haase showed up with a delicious Thai dinner when I came home from PT; a wonderful treat to have dinner delivered like that. It reminded us of the August days when this happened every night. We would not want to go back to that time but it nice once in a while to be spoiled like that.

And today Sita comes home from India. In fact she is already on her way after spending her last night in Delhi with our friends Nathalie and Sanjay. It appears that Sita is carrying a harmonium with her. This is a habit she started on our trip to Senegal 2 years ago when she carried a Cora back. She collects musical instruments. India must have been a treasure trove. We can’t wait to have her back.