It’s a weekend, darling. It’s a weekend. We’re not even on the lip of it, it’s Friday night and I’ve Monday mostly off for the insane notion of a Bank Holiday so…I feel like I can somehow unclench my sore muscles, relax, release. Sorta.
Strike that, it’s a Sunday and I’m afraid the unclenching has not happened. Instead, it’s very much the opposite where I feel not sick, but aching in ways and places that I can only attribute to age and some sort of psychological or pathological inability to fully take up space. In other words, therapy stuff. We went out last night and I’d been fine during the day, but simply walking quickly through the city to stand for two or three hours has left me almost immobile today. Sore muscles are stiff and hurting and full of, maybe, lactic acid. Which isn’t great. It actually sucks. I miss having a bathtub I can adorn with candles and soften into after these sorts of days.
This is kind of why I wanted to have some somatic therapy because so often my body will be completely invisible to me until we have this moment of shutdown. Of aiaiaiaiaiaiayai, no more. And so, in this moment, all I feel and all I am aware of is body. Body angry. Body sore and body say stop. And I’m not entirely sure what I’ve done to piss it off, save, the sedentary, cross-legged gremlin lifestyle that drinks no water and barely eats vegetables. And I’m trying to, today, at least, take a few steps towards listening and serving her needs. Because goodness knows I can’t tolerate anyone being furious at me the way I feel my musculature is furious at me today.
The Sore Muscles Fight
Gotta do something all the while being the usual afraid that something won’t do anything, or, at least, won’t do enough.
So there’s a bit of tiger balm menthol lotion I’ve put on my shoulders, seeing just how effective it will be before I slather it elsewhere. That’s coming. I’ve pulled out the Hitachi Magic Wand for this neutral purpose and it is doing something. Something. I’ve got my feet up and my knees are not mashed up against me, but I will be going on a brief walk later, simply because I’ve got to do like the lady says and start a habit. A habit of movement. That will pay dividends. I’ve got my reasons, but mainly, it’s the use it before you fully lose it. And I could easily lose it.
Some days, I think of my mother, queen now of ladybirds and the Great Beyond, and all that she was enduring in her final months and not telling us – assuring us she was fine, never mentioning sore muscles, or the aches and pains that undoubtedly she was experiencing – and I don’t want to ignore the alarms simply because it might upset someone. Including myself.
I don’t know anything about electrolytes, not really, not beyond the fact that I am surely as short on them as I am on everything else. Magnesium, right? That helps, right? So we’ll pour some into a cup of water and see how that goes, too.
Doing More, Somehow, When You Can’t Do Nothin’
So we’ll see what tomorrow brings, we’ve got D&D tonight. A leaping out of this body and into another – one who can heal pain with a single night’s sleep. Seems like it’s definitely what the absence of doctor ordered, so why do I resist doing all these little necessaries? Why am I questioning and fighting back against water? Why do I hold myself to this weird rule? I force myself behind a barrier when a few small tasks will free me? Or at least moderate the negative sense that I have right now.
It’s terrifying to think about, I guess, that my assumptions are wrong and there’s something really awful going on. There was something really awful going on for my parents. So much of me wants to dart and dash my own way into the grave, never really knowing or claiming the suffering that a body comes loaded with. Just running through the raindrops.
All this is playing out across a landscape where hormones are tracking, bubbling, surging towards their peak. And I’m officially out of Lexapro so the shell is officially going to crack. I wanted that, too, when I had it. A chance to feel more deeply things that felt blunted. Get back my highs and lows and my tearful engagement with the world. But you also get back the overwhelm, the overstimulation, the sense that you are walking through the world unshielded. It’s the place I was when the driving anxiety held sway.
Girl, You’re In It with the Devil Now
It’s hard to recall that I don’t have to drive here. I don’t have so many of the risks my life in the U.S. demanded of me. It’s nice having access to my creativity. I like being able to write when I sit down and write. That’s nice, but another element I am having to wade into without knowing how far the shallows hold.
The time of transition isn’t over. We aren’t settled in space simply because I’ve made this move to England. We are still spinning, with grief and fear and big change in unfamiliar territory all coming along for the ride. I keep looking for this idea, this Beatrix Potter cottagecore existence, this gentle life of tea and walks in the mist and village fetes that came to me from BBC America and PBS. I’m looking for Jean Pargeter and adorable coffee cup sized comedies of errors.
A Real World
Instead, we are on the windowsill, watching what each day is and what I am becoming while still being above and outside of it. It’s still a mystery along with the mystery aches. I am still clenched and flinching and awaiting someone to send me the message that now is the time to relax. Hi body, hi sore muscles, I hear you, I know you don’t feel safe yet, but I’m going to try hard to let you know that you can. We’re here for one another.
All I got for sure is that I can look at someone I love and see light reflecting in his eyes and know I’m somewhere solid. I might not have coordinates for this place, I might not know this place by heart, but I am welcome enough to rumble around, spy the ginger cats that live in the neighborhood, listen in to the folk bands playing ABBA songs in the square. And that’s a lovely something. Lesson of the day: I don’t need to punish myself for not having my footing. I choose not to do that anymore.
