Today Is My Birthday

And, in the normal order of things I really wouldn’t mention it. But I am especially pleased about this one.

Last year at this time I had been out of my rehab for about a week – full of plans as to how I would be busy every day and how I would be productive and profitable (therefore worthy), and how I was going to transcend this “unpleasantness” with both vigor and style.

I even put together a plan by which I would break each hour into 15-minute segments, devoting one segment to housework, and another to writing, and another to something or other, and then something else (unnamed) with the fourth. What utter nonsense.

I believe I have already mentioned the progression of my thinking. First, I refused to believe I had any brain damage at all – none, no way, no how – and my recovery would be full, flawless, and fast. And, I would be better than I ever was.

When that didn’t happen immediately, I was forced to reconsider. I allowed as how perhaps I had suffered a bit of a brain injury, but it was minor and there was no need to plan on a lengthy recovery.

As each month has passed, I have had to loosen the string tying my ambitions together. Recovery has taken longer, some of it, than I would have imagined. I remain too tired, too wobbly, and (occasionally) too grumpy to declare myself healed.

And yet, and yet. Here I am. I have even reached my goal of being substantially better in some ways than before! Really.

I am less likely to be foolishly sentimental; I am more likely to be grateful. I am less likely to put up with something because I “should” and I am more likely to invest time and effort into family and projects that are genuinely helping others. I’m in the gym every day, and have discovered that I can reach God and the eternal from my treadmill.

I take the time, each day, to pray for and remember my friends and family who are in my heart, especially people who have had a Traumatic Brain Injury for whom there will be no recovery, or who will face lifelong limitations. They will never write crowing blog posts, never join me at the gym – but I think of them all the time.

At the risk of painting an impossibly rosy picture of everything I’m doing – my husband, St. Kenny, has made recovery possible. After saving my life (literally), he has silently taken on every burden, every worry, every fiddly-bit of our lives and has saved me from even having to think about anything but getting better every day. What a gift!

My sons and soon-to be daughter have been kind and loving – there can be no greater joy. My friends have been delightful, my sister a steadfast rock and constant source of encouragement. I now know what to do to really help when someone is in trouble.

And here one other thing that is very cool. I am now a painter of sorts. Just goes to show that the universe is in eternal balance. I have had to give up my hopes for a career as a boxer or deep-sea diver, but I have been given painting.

I hope each of you celebrate your birthdays with as much joy as I am. It is a blessing to be alive to each moment…and when there are candles involved…so much the better!

Dare I say, icing on the cake?