the trick is to keep breathing

So last Thursday around 10:00 I had a bad fall and ended up in the emergency room, with both ankles basically busted.

Cut for discussion of injury. ( yeah )

Can’t really walk. Couldn’t really even stand the first few days without supporting myself on wheelchair / nearby table / couch / something else. Crown helped make the first floor wheelchair accessible and put together one of the basement beds for me to sleep on in my sunroom cause i cant do stairs. Feathers brought me down enough toiletries that I could brush my teeth and actually wear deodorant. My parents came to visit with groceries and fruits and lots of help getting everything set up so that I can survive first-floor-only for a little while.

Check-up with the ortho on Wednesday put me into a boot - good news; boot FAR better than cast! - and predicted about 6 weeks before I’m back to any normal kind of motions, with next check-up in two.

This certainly isn’t my first time impaired — I spent most of my senior year of high school on crutches or in a wheelchair for a variety of reasons. But that’s very different; you have friends at school willing to help you out so that they can use the elevator, and you have parents at home who still do your laundry and get your mail. I’m nearing 40 and don’t live with my husband for a variety of mutual personal reasons, and I’m kind of lucky to have a basement gremlin in Feathers at this point or I would be, just, you know. Boned.

All projects are behind. Drawing? Writing? Don’t know ‘em. Today for the first time I sat down at my desktop while in the wheelchair and while I can make words, it isn’t really that easy, or that comfortable.

My life as a cripple (patent pending) so far has been interesting. I have my grandmother’s wheelchair, which is great because I have it and didn’t have to pay for one, but not so great in that it’s made to be pushed, rather than for self-propelling. And wheeling myself around on carpet also not made for wheelchair ease is, well, fucking exhausting. I better have massive arms after this. I’ve had to rearrange nearly everything so that I can access it without having to stand up. Hell, even a trip to the bathroom is like a 20-minute quest montage from Lord of the Rings.

The poor cats are not adjusting very well at all.

ANYWAY! Friends! I will be literally useless for at least the next 6 weeks. I still plan on putting out fan stuff just to keep my own sanity, but will it be quality? Who knows! Will i open commissions again? Depends on the emergency room bill! Do i consider crying at least once a day? Of course!!

Love, Sev

• Last night I took an epsom salt bath. I did some research that said epsom salt baths work for arthritis pain - the magnesium can penetrate the pores and help with inflammation. SO I went and picked up some epsom salts from Rite Aid (plain, along with a lavender variation and some other salts I found for aches and pains - with eucalyptus and spearmint?) and ran some hot water and I spent about 45 mins reading TIME magazine in the tub with the jets on and off as needed, and I do feel better today. Could be coincidence, but I'll take it. My neck is still stiff, but the rest of me feels a lot more mobile. And less grate-y and grind-y.


• Last week I went to pick up my new glasses - mine are four years old and I'm finally starting to get vision headaches from the slightly-expired prescription - but they were wrong. All weekend I felt like my depth-of-field was off in my left eye -- turns out the axis of the astigmatism was 3-4 degrees off. (ASTM for lenses is 2 degrees I guess? That's great, when my vision is so bad that I'm sensitive to the actual margin of error?) So the glasses went back in to be fixed.
  In slightly better vision news, in the last two years it turns out that one awesome line of contact lenses has been extended into my prescription range - yeah technology! - so it's now possible for me to get good-quality contacts (that will correct my vision over 80%) that I can wear all day without feeling like there is sand gauging out my eyes. They're even rated to sleep in. For up to a week. That's right, I can wear them to a con weekend and not have to worry. Thank fuck. Too bad I can't contacts at work, but it will still be convenient to have for the summer. So as soon as we figure out my script, I'll be buying a million of those.
  I realize I'm quite lucky that my eyes can be (mostly) corrected and my vision is (mostly) functional. It's just hard to feel lucky staring down this $500 bill when I still don't have a new pair of glasses.


• Spent the weekend declaring war on my lawn. I accidentally killed half of it trying to smoke out garlic mustard (Weed & Feed works great on the parts of my lawn that are actually grass; turns out there are a lot of weeds that look like grass but ain't grass, and that's how I murdered half of my front yard) and so I spent Monday mowing, re-treating the yard one last time to just get this shit over with, and tossing Grass Seed For Dummies everywhere. I also threw giant handfuls of "wildflower seed mix" on parts of my yard to cover up the fact that I don't give two epic shits about gardening right now. I actually love gardening and flowers but that is a hobby to be adopted at some future date, preferably when I am not exhausted, grumpy, and still unpacking.


• STILL NO NEWS ON THE JOB


• Our birdfeeders are finally kicking off - it's like finch city on the one, and the tufted titmice really like the second one -- much to the everlasting joy of the neighborhood troll cat, who has already caught one of my chipmunks and has spent time staring up at the feeder like it's some epic cat buffet. GTFO. You're cute but if I can't pet you I don't want to feed you.


• I am so broke. Like godsbefucked broke. Note I am saying broke - I am not poor; I've been poor; this is not poor - what I am is broke. Buying a house costs a lot. Taking care of the house costs a lot. JFC I want my savings cushion back. Looking at my net cash is giving me spasms.


• I'm so not here mentally. I should have taken vacation this week.