April 24: Easter, Teaching, and Peter Pan Jr

Last Sunday the kids had an Easter egg and jelly bean hunt upon our arrival home after our time in Florida. Amy then made color-coded hunts for the rest of us to complete throughout the week. There is still a bright pink plastic egg hiding in Sarah’s bright pink shoe, waiting for her to notice it. We also had two real bunnies in our yard, taking shelter from the rain and snow of the week.

I tried driving my car and that didn’t feel good for my hip, which was discouraging. Luckily, my in-laws didn’t need their van this week so I was able to drive that since the angle for my hip is more comfortable. It was definitely liberating to be able to go places on my own. I took Sarah to one of her dress-rehearsals and took myself to teach my first class since surgery. It was an Alexander Technique class focused on breathing. I was so glad it wasn’t the class that I designated to be about walking! The class went well but was definitely pushing my edge. I thought it would be easier on me than it was to stand and work with people for a short time. I could even take tiny baby steps (without a cane) to shift my angle, but after working with a few people I realized my right toes were feeling tingly and I needed to take a break. I also helped a couple of people with how they worked while giving a massage. It was definitely challenging and I couldn’t work the way I’m used to working. Being able to teach and having it be easy are two different things! This week I begin teaching regularly again so I will just aim to have as much rest time around that as possible.

I had my one-month post-surgery appointments with my PCP and my surgeon. All seems to be healing well and the x-rays looked good. I start PT on Tuesday. I will say this whole process has been more emotionally challenging than I imagined, though in retrospect that makes sense. It is hard to have things be hard and to still need help and to be slow at moving. I feel overwhelmed often as I try to add in small pieces of normal life. Also, since I had a cold I’m not permitted to get injections in my head for my headaches until more time has passed. I am now on the fence about the injections. The headaches are awful and my sleep has not been great, but I’ve had several times where I was able to have a good cry that I didn’t know I needed or take big relaxing yawns while listening to Wyndham Hill’s Autumn Portrait (or watching the dvd) and that has cleared a headache in short order. At other times I was less successful. But I’d like to give myself a bit more time to maybe resolve things on my own, so perhaps it is ok that my doctor wants me to wait.

Sarah had an intense week of dress-rehearsals for Peter Pan, Jr. She had energy and happily managed her whole week with grace and poise. Friday night’s performance was wonderful. And… as I had either feared or intuited via premonition, she got sick yesterday and was not able to attend her final performance. She didn’t have any individual lines so this didn’t impact the show, but it was too bad because she loved being a part of it. Her whole participation and performance felt like a culmination of all of our collective Sarah-Rise time, effort, and ambition. She performed in a show! She sang songs and did coordinated movements with a whole group of people. She did all that she needed to do and never distracted or interrupted things in any way. The only hiccup sometimes was needing to exit the stage more speedily. Overall, what a phenomenal achievement, including so much time just patiently waiting for when it was her time to participate. I simply could not be more impressed or proud of her. One of the best moments was during dress rehearsal on Thursday after a scene in which she helped bring a pillow to Wendy when the Lost Kids built a house around Wendy. Sarah exited while holding her hands above her head to indicate a house. That was so perfectly Sarah-ish and perfectly timed with the moment in the play.

Amy had a zoom yesterday and snuggled next to our cat for most of it, with Olivia’s head on her shoulder. That went well and Amy even regrouped well after having huge feelings of upset when she learned that Sarah was sick and couldn’t attend the show. We had originally planned that Anna would come to hang out with Amy that night since they watched the show Friday night. So Amy had big plans and was very upset that they couldn’t happen. She rallied though and Carl became his overly-confident and underly-capable character Joey for participating in the Fairy Olympics that Amy had designed. I’m pretty sure Amy won.

Sarah spent most of yesterday sleeping and she is sleeping now. Any healing energy you can send her way is most welcome.