She is clothed with strength and dignity;
Proverbs 31:25
she can laugh at the days to come.
I had shoulder surgery last Thursday. On Friday, I sat down at my computer to write a blog post, thinking, “Wow, maybe I can write a post today!”
It didn’t go so well…
So, after deleting the incoherent words from last week, I thought I’d try again today.
I started the day of surgery by having my husband write a note on my right shoulder, the non-surgery arm. Because, one, you can never be too careful. And, two, it was going to be an unpleasant day – why not laugh a little.
After general anesthesia, a nerve block/local anesthesia that would last three days, Tylenol, and a little oxy, Thursday night and Friday were also quite amusing in our house!
Day 4 the nerve block wore off.
I didn’t laugh on day 4. I don’t think I even smiled.
But I did have one very clear revelation: on those days when you can, LAUGH!
Certainly, there are days we just really can’t laugh, like day 4 after what the medical staff kept telling my husband was “a REALLY painful surgery.” They also told him to make sure I stayed ahead of the pain with medication.
Unfortunately, medications and I don’t mix well. So while the meds kept the pain at bay, they also sort of messed with my mind. (That noise was Chuck snorting, by the way.)
So, if you haven’t laughed yet today, maybe this will do it. The quotes are from an update Chuck sent to family…the parentheses are my version of the story.
“She’s staying ahead of the pain. She was hilarious – delirious – first night.” (I agree. I was literally bouncing off the walls in the hallway like a pinball as I tried to walk. Six inch long bruise on my thigh and no clue why.)
“She got in bed but 30 minutes later flashed lights to call me upstairs. (I was coherent enough to know I shouldn’t try the stairs.) I found her in the office saying she knocked over all her Oxycodone pills; she pointed at the rug. So, I got down on all fours and searched for the pills, which weren’t there. Then she abruptly decided to go back to bed. It wasn’t until I was in bedroom that I found all the spilt pills.” (Apparently, I went to the office instead of our bedroom after summoning Chuck upstairs. I was extremely annoyed that he couldn’t see the pills all over the floor. I think I decided it was a dream and got up to go back to bed…? I may have said a bad word.)
“Also, she mumbled incoherently from time to time. I had to get right up to her face to try to understand her. (Impossible.)” (I was speaking perfectly clearly to myself. The disembodied head looming at me out of the darkness [of the brightly lit room] quite frankly had me worried.)
“Instructed me to tell people ‘they could come back’ to her room in the clinic, but I gently reminded her we were already home!” (No clue what I was thinking. I do remember opening my eyes, looking around, and throwing my head back in laughter. Which apparently reassured Chuck I wasn’t having a stroke…he’d been starting to worry…)
Some days we have “Day 4” pain. The other days? The other days we need to laugh.
He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with a shout of joy.
Job 8:21
A happy heart is good medicine and a joyful mind causes healing,
Prov 17:22
But a broken spirit dries up the bones.
There is a time for everything,
Ecclesiastes 3:1-4a
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh…
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