Surrender

25th May 2011

I couldn’t get up this morning. Well, I could, but my legs felt like jelly and my head like a fat football. I thought, ‘I’ll just go and make some hot lemon and honey and go back to bed for a bit’. And then another thought ‘What would happen if I stayed here and just gave in to feeling ill?’

So I did.

‘Surrender,’ said my sister on the phone - ‘it’s a better word than give up which sounds like defeat’.

We’d been talking about surrendering last night - my habit of holding on, powering through, keeping relentlessly busy. And the cost of all that - losing sight of myself - and my husband - in my Jolly Green Giant I-can-overcome-anything mode.

I cancel all my appointments with lovely friends. My husband makes the hot lemon. The pussy cat curls by my feet and I drift in and out of sleep. I notice the guilt waves washing through me and let them sink into the sand. A hammer drill starts up - some men digging up the pavement outside - almost shaking the bed. I think how the habit of feeling guilty - about everything - is like a hammer drill inside my head - drowning out the music of any thought of happiness.

I do get up on my wobbly legs in the afternoon. My husband drives me to the dentist where I need three injections before my gum will go numb enough for the drill. So now my lip and my chin and my tongue are like dead meat and tea dribbles from the side of my mouth. I need to surrender a bit longer till I feel the tingle of nerves coming back to life. And then my husband says he’ll bring me my asparagus supper on a tray in bed.

PS Lemon curd spooned and swirled into a bowl of cold Greek yoghurt is very soothing for a sore mouth.