WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE MALM and OTHER STORIES

The past month has gone by without a moment to post anything here. One reason is that I am trying (although not necessarily succeeding) to focus on other writing.
I was enrolled in a class on plot structure at the Richard Hugo House, Seattle’s non-profit writing center. When I signed up, I thought it would jump-start my fiction writing, which has been slowly cooking on back burners over the past year. Unfortunately the class went by mostly while I was in the MALM-induced limbo. The apartment was a wreck, and I had nowhere to sit down and write. (I still enjoyed the reading assignments and getting feedback on a story I’d written months before.)


Only in my last week of class did I get the bedroom rearranged with my old excuse for a dresser and the fabulous new writing desk. I’ve had a few good days writing there, now that the class is over.

Meanwhile Ghusun decided she wanted to buy the MALM from me, at the bargain rate of $70. This thing was a tar baby to the very end. Ghusun loaded the drawers into her VW beetle, but we couldn’t get the frame to fit into my car or the Poet’s. (She and I discovered this only after we had carried it down two flights of stairs and had it sitting out on the sidewalk. It was a sunny day, but since we live in Seattle we were convinced that it would start to rain on the MALM at any minute.) The Poet jumped into the chaos on his lunch break to help get the thing back inside, then a few days later drove it over to Ghusun’s condo, by what he and Ghusun called “the Arab method”: seventy-five percent of it sticking out of his car trunk, the whole arrangement tied together by an extension cord in lieu of rope.



When my prescriptions came up for renewal, two of my main medications, preservative-free Heparin and Rocephin, were temporarily unavailable from the manufacturer. I spent most of a week’s free time scrambling around getting my Rocephin from a different pharmacy, and then ordering the blood-thinner Lovenox from Canada, as a substitute for Heparin. Even at Canadian bargain rates Lovenox is about $650 a month, whereas the equivalent amount of Heparin bought in the U.S. is $250. My insurance covers the Lovenox, but it won’t cover the Heparin. Go figure!


Once I was over the stress of wondering whether I would have any medicine, David arrived for Thanksgiving week. Since the Poet had to work, I ran Camp Naomi for the first three days. David is almost nine years old and arrived still not knowing how to ride a bike. (???!!!!) By the time he left I had him riding all over the place.

Throughout it all I’ve been going daily to the gym to work up a sweat on the stair climbing machine and the rowing machine. It boosts the immune system and makes me sleep soundly every night. Hooray for strength at long last! Hooray for exercise! This is the corner I’ve been waiting and waiting to turn… I didn’t know that by the time I’d got here, there would be yet other corners I’ve gotten myself on the wrong side of. It’s turning out to be more of a five tetrahedra compound I’m trying to get myself around.

My calf is starting to feel a little better, but now my low back is hurting. When will I dance again? It’s not clear.

Robyn, my physical therapist, says she thinks the two are related, and as we begin to clear up the tendonosis through myofascial release the back issues my calves/Achilles were compensating for are now coming to light. And so it goes on…

FLYING HIGH

Written a thousand miles off the ground and posted later.

Physical therapists are the bomb. Physical therapy for my tendonitis has been a godsend, and in the process I have learned valuable things, like how wearing clunky, unfashionable shoes can make you happy.

In fact, I now have two physical therapists. The second one is the amazing Liz Waldner, who is helping me with my stiff neck, headaches, tight jaw, teeth grinding, et al. She has been working with me to shift out of the rounded back, head-thrust forward posture I tend to slip into when I am reading, writing, etc.

(You must be thinking that I go around hunched over like a Quasimodo, but that is in fact not the case. Or so Liz has reassured me. “We all do this,” she says.)

This all relates back to my latest obsession, Lymph Drainage. Ever since I stopped dancing I have had terrible problems getting my lymph to drain. Lymies know the symptoms: headaches, swollen lymph nodes, that congested feeling in the armpits and the groin, general malaise. On Rocephin it’s gotten worse, and I am compelled to do huge bouts of exercise daily just to keep the systems in my body moving.

According to Liz posture plays in as well. If I can keep my chest open and neck straight, the lymph will drain more freely. I have been noticing this is true over the past few weeks, and I have tried, whenever I remember, to engage the middle back and drop my tail bone down just a little while I am sitting. This brings the shoulders gently back and opens my chest. I always feel better until I slip back into my habitual hunch.

I think over the past two weeks in DC my posture has gotten a little better—at least enough to for me to now notice when I am really uncomfortable and doing my lymph a disservice. For example, when I am typing at my laptop computer: totally hunched up.

And now today, on the plane home to Seattle I have had a revelation.

I have always been miserable on planes. I get blinding headaches, preventing me from reading or watching movies to pass the time. I also have become violently ill from flying. On one terrible flight I sat through a particularly rocky last twenty minutes before landing trying desperately to hold onto my cookies. I tried to put my head between my legs to help with the sickness, but United Airlines no longer accommodates such luxuries—my forehead hit the seat in front of me. So instead I put my head in the aisle. The stewardesses bumped into me as they strode past, but it was better than the alternative.

We landed to everyone’s relief except mine. Instead of getting better, my nausea got worse. Then we sat and sat, waiting for a gate to open up. I fumbled for the airsickness bag just before I lost the contents of my stomach. Not feeling much better, I shakily pulled down the tray and put the bag, hoping a stewardess would come by. I rang the bell, but evidently no one was allowed to get up in that situation, because no stewardess arrived. For an endless ten minutes as we waited to be allowed out of our seats, I sat with a bag of my own vomit on a tray in front of me. No one asked if I was OK.

So needless to say I don’t look forward to airplane trips much. To add to my apprehension about today’s flight, I’ve had headaches and nausea over the past few days without even coming near an airplane. I managed to get over the worst of it, enough to think it might be OK to fly, but not enough to feel happy about it.

As soon as I took my seat a headache started up. We hadn’t even pulled away from the gate.

I noticed that the head cushion (unremovable) was thrusting my head and neck far forward and forcing my back into that terrible hump. There was no adjusting possible. Was this really causing all my trouble?

The night before my brother had given me a midsized hardback novel he thought I would like (Michael Chabon) and I had hastily thrust it into my backpack on my way out the door. I had little hope that I would read on the plane, but it turned out to be the best move I’ve made in a while.

Sitting hunched up in the ergonomically evil airplane seat, I thought of the book (who wouldn’t?), pulled it out and placed between my back and the seat. Voila! My back was brought forward just enough, I could now comfortably rest my head against the immovable cushion behind and everything was in alignment. I felt much better.

As it turns out, due to Swine Flu there are no pillows on airplanes anymore, so I have spent the entire flight with my brother’s book behind my back. And I have felt great! Tony the Tiger Great. Thinking happy thoughts, no headache, and hardly any nausea. (For that I have some fiber and charcoal capsules and they are taking the edge off. The nausea is only an indication that the lymph is draining, down into my unhappy stomach.)

Reading my book is, of course, not possible, but fortunately I wasn’t planning on it anyway. I brought my quilting on board and I have been stitching away, until I was inspired pull out my computer and write this post. Using the laptop is not ergonomic nirvana, but with the hardback in place it isn’t giving me a headache either.

ON WHY I SHOULD LISTEN TO PEOPLE WHO KNOW MORE THAN ME

For weeks my physical therapist, Robyn, has been bugging me about my shoes. The first appointment I had with her she told me there was a Mary Jane shoe by Dansko that would alleviate my tendonitis.

She told me the same thing on the second and third weeks, and the fourth and fifth, always with a smile and laugh, never with an I-know-better-than-you attitude. Nevertheless I resisted. My excuses being I liked my old shoes, I had no time to go shoe shopping (I truly didn't), I didn't want to spend the money, and I had a problem with shoes with an elevated heel.

The last excuse was the biggest and most legitimate. Even the lowest heels did something to my posture that made me exhausted. I always chalked it up to the fatigue from Lyme disease and gave up on anything but absolutely flat shoes.

So I held out. I wore the flimsy, converse-style sneakers I already owned and Robyn had reluctantly conceded might be OK. Weeks went by and my tendonitis slowly got better, then got a little worse, then a little better and then worse again. At last I had to admit it might be worth giving the Danskos a try.

When I put them on, I was amazed. My feet simply felt good. Walking around in them made my lower legs actually feel stronger, and made me feel happier. I kept them on all day, and went for a long walk in the afternoon.

After the walk my heels hurt and my Achilles tendon felt cramped. It was the elevated heel on the shoe.

I stretched my Achilles gently, and again before bed. I stretched them when I woke up in the morning, then decided to make a leap of faith and put the Danksos on for second day. I kept them on until the end of the day.

My calves ached here and there, and my Achilles tendon still needed stretching, but by the third day, my body had adjusted.

I am now wearing these shoes every day and I love them. I feel stronger when I have them on, my legs feel stable (there’s no other word for it) and I feel just a little bit more relaxed and confident, all the time. It’s great.

Post Script on the Tendonitis:

This has not cleared up entirely yet, but the new shoes have been a big—well—step forward. I am continuing with the myofascial release and physical therapy and making slow progress that has nonetheless been consistent over the past month. Robyn has admitted my recovery is slower than most peoples’, and we’ve chalked that up to Lyme disease. It will likely be months more before I am dancing again. Meanwhile, I’ve rediscovered the joy of yoga and am getting reacquainted with sit-ups and push-ups.