Big Changes, Minimal Acceptance

I’m lying on a stretcher in the preoperative care unit waiting for my VNS surgery. What better time to write a blog post? (I finished it, however, a few days later.)

As I mentioned in my previous entry, last week was a doozy. Most notably, on Tuesday we had a team meeting in which I was told that I’ll be discharged needing to use a wheelchair both inside and outside. That was, as you can likely imagine, hard news to swallow. I’ll also require a special hospital bed like the one I sleep on/spend the majority of my time lounging on here, and my husband and I need to move since our current apartment isn’t wheelchair accessible.

And so my life won’t be what I imagined it would once my work in inpatient rehab is done. To be honest, I feel as if I’m grieving what I’m losing—the space I’ve called home for twelve years, the ability to ambulate freely, many aspects of the independence I took for granted for so long. I’d be lying if I claimed to have fully processed or accepted this, but I trust that I eventually will. I’ve come so far from where I was in June, when it wasn’t clear if I’d make it. I’m alive and I’m me, in a wheelchair or not. For that I’m truly, truly grateful.