Life interrupted

On holding a moment in mind, goodbyes and the space in between it all

I find myself in a liminal space right now, not really here, not really present, still finding this a strange place to inhabit, so please accept my apologies for the lack of coherence and continuity. The words below come with a little warning as they refer to surgery, periods, gynaecological conditions and grief. (There is a smattering of hope and wonder too.) So if this is not for you, feel free to scroll on by. But thank you for reading if you do.

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These past few weeks have felt as if the buzzing static of the world was getting louder each day. 

By the end of April, everything felt like it was a ringing, jarring cacophony of noise and fizz that filled my ears and head. All shades of life came to the fore and all emotions seemed to simmer at the same time. 

And then it all stopped. 

A couple of weeks ago, I had some surgery to remove an unruly and unhappy womb, it’s been something I’ve known was going to happen for a while now and yet the finality and abruptness of the actual operation catapulted me to a place that I hadn’t been in for a long time.

My last ever period arrived just one hour before I went into the operating theatre and the full moon began to rise as I was brought out. Pretty wild timing…

Coming around from the procedure, tears filled my eyes as the surgeon stood at the end of my bed explaining that things had been a bit tricky, there was a complication (albeit minor) but that overall it went ok, my womb had been removed and so had the endometriosis adhesions that had been causing me such pain. In the background three songs played on the radio that reminded me of three very different and equally important people, each song arriving almost serendipitously to hold me in recovery.

As the mists of the anaesthetic still clouded my view, I began to think of others across the world without access to healthcare and in fear of their lives and I cried again.

As I was given more morphine and something to stop me shaking and feeling sick, I told the recovery nurses that we all need to read more poetry and that we should get it on prescription.

They laughed and smiled at the morphine addled me, gracing and humouring me with pleasantries… Oh to be a fly on the wall of a recovery room and hear what people say as they reenter the world of consciousness. 

It’s taken me a long time to get to this stage of a proper diagnosis and course of treatment. I look back to Lucy, who at the age of sixteen, asked her GP to stop her periods so that she could experience her German exchange trip without the shame and fear of bleeding through her clothes and I want to give her a hug. I look back to Lucy aged twenty six who ended up hospitalised with unexplained and crippling gynae pain twice in the space of a month (who was then discharged, dosed up with tramadol with no answers nor a plan of action) and I want to give her a hug. I look back to Lucy, ten years ago, who had a c-section and was told it was a miracle that she had a baby as she had endometriosis and could her husband please take the baby away as they needed to keep operating and I want to give her a hug. I look back to Lucy, seven years ago, who went through two procedures to remove a coil that had gone awol and I want to give her a hug. I look back to the Lucy of two weeks ago who was coming around from surgery, groggy and tearful, both grateful and hollow and I want to give her a hug and tell her the smile will return and she will feel a sense of relief.

As I’ve switched off and checked out over the past few weeks, the white noise of distraction and jarring discord that had followed me to the end of April has all but quietened. Instead, the gentle miracle of being that has always been humming softly in the background got louder and life opened my eyes again to its fragility, soul-shattering beauty and fickle cruelty. 

A wonderful friend died over the weekend and the tears arrived again. As she departed, a brilliant sunset emerged, streaking and lighting up the sky. She was a shining light unlike any other and taught me so much about ways of being and how to live. Even in the face of a ticking clock and adversity, she held herself with grace, humour and a steadfast determination to live her life, to be alive to do the things and to fully immerse herself in the miracle of being and most of all, to keep holding on to hope. 

I will miss the truly wonderful book chat I would have with her.

I will miss her beautiful view on the world. 

I will miss her humour and spark.

I will treasure the snatched moments I got to spend with her. Fuck it, I wish I had had more. 

But that’s me being greedy and life rarely leaves you with leftovers, so I’ll take the memories and snatched moments and will cherish them.

Lingering as I am now, in a period of hibernating, resting, recovering and grieving, I’m trying to approach things with a soft tender touch rather than grasping out to find the edges. I’m trying to stop myself from attempting to have any kind of firm hold on the shape of things and allowing instead the space in between to open up. 

Recently, life has done its best to show me that I have so little control over things. In the face of a world that seems to insist on productivity, growth and profit and turning a blind eye, I’m finding this little pocket of enforced rest and switching off for a while to be an unexpected gift and one that is opening my eyes and ears.  

By shutting out some of the noise of the whirr and the conceit of showing up, the soft quiet hum of the miracle of being starts to sing a little louder and I find myself comfortably small in its presence and in awe of it all.

My mind is not distracted by a mindless scroll or the cold sweat of comparison.

I find instead that I am making more of an effort to reach out to friends and connect with them in real life. I find instead that my attention wanders and strays in such beautiful and unexpected ways.

I’m spending time thinking again, most of it crap and oh my goodness, I am such a slow thinker (!), but there are moments when my brain starts to fizz with the excitement of making a connection.

I’m writing again, most of it is crap and again so very slow going, but there are some words appearing.

But most of all, I’m exchanging the time I used to lose for time to read and to wonder and a chance to cherish the memories of a friend who lived a life fully and joyfully in the face of limitation. 

Rest in power, beautiful one.

Thank you so much for reading.