bleh....

Well, I'm finally getting back on my feet again after being totally socked in the face by whatever ailment this was. According to the doctors, it may not even have been an ailment. It may just be discontinuation effects from the radiation and from going off the steroid they used to control swelling. The steroid sure was nice for a while--it gives you lots of energy, a great attitude, and the whole shebang. But there were some nasty side effects, too, like the swelling you get in the face (I know, I know: the steroid reduces swelling, but at the same time causes it?) and the complete inability to sleep. Now that I'm off the drugs I sleep all the time; you can tell there's something like a six-week sleep deficit there. I read recently that sleep deficits never really go away; they just keep weighing you down until finally you let yourself catch up.

So I sleep a lot, and then I worry that maybe I'm sleeping too much--as in, maybe I'll just keep sleeping until I get to the point that I just don't wake up. Is that what dying feels like? I make myself do things to reassure myself that this really is recovery, not regression, like balancing on one leg and doing isometrics, which I couldn't do a couple of weeks ago. Plus I check what I can do now against my daily recovery log, which I've been keeping ever since getting out of the surgery. I'm so glad I kept that log, because sometimes you get down and you can't remember how far you've come. But the log invariably shows that I haven't taken two steps backward.

Which is a good thing, because I like to keep my spirits up. Too often it feels like I'll just never get back to what I was again.