PerihelioN

It was a lovely holidays. I don't want to go back to life.
*pout*
Being off for surgery recovery before holidays gave me a long stretch off and it was lovely. Even tho a good chunk of it was a bit of a blissful painkiller-induced haze, being home with no stress was a lovely thing. I could honestly refuse any and all duties if I wished with no guilt. Having gotten uberfit before surgery gave me some wiggle room for christmas goodies as well, and the week of christmas I thoroughly enjoyed any and all snacks and cookies and apricot beer and mulled wine and...well you get the idea. I got it out of my system for a while and am now ready to get back to a bit more balance. Visiting my sister and family was lovely and low stress and I wish I could be with them more. J's family was nice, but it was a bit awkward since his brother and his wife are newly separated and I was quite close to his wife...so her absence was very noticed and she was missed...it was a bit weird, but still a nice day together. We even had a few days for just J and myself to relax and recharge and it was muchly needed.

As of tomorrow I am cleared to do lower body exercises and physio so I can hop on my bike and do some squats and lunges and start some physio stretches on my arms and back to start getting mobility back. I really need some activity in my life for balance both physically and emotionally. Now that it doesn't hurt to move my arm about I've found that other than a few extreme stretches, I can do most regular things and it's really nice to not get pinged with pain randomly anymore. I've noticed the lack of muscle in my arm only once so far, since I'm still not supposed to do any pushing or heavy lifting for a few weeks - I finally went back to driving the other day (we have a standard so I had to be sure I could use my arm without pain before I drove) - putting our car into reverse requires pushing the shifter in and up to the left and that pushing movement is actually a concentrated movement now...it's odd, but expected. It will take time to get the other muscles to compensate. I just had the last fill on my expander - apparently ~150 mL is the matching volume to bring Frankie to the same size as my remaining breast so now I just have to wait a few months before I swap it out for my implant and they do a lift on my natural breast for balance. I can't wait. The expander looks a bit "off" for lack of a better way to describe it - since it's hard and not naturally soft like implants, it doesn't quite feel or look right. Yet. I hope in the end it will all come out fine...or a reasonably facsimile of fine. I have an appointment at the end of the month wiht my plastic surgeon and he'll give me the final go ahead then if all seems balanced. It looks good now - I can wear a sports bra and look entirely normal, even in a tank top now. In a week or so I hope the incisions will be healed completely and I can wear a regular bra. So hooray. :)

We had people over for a party for the first time in eons on saturday night and it was a great time. The house was full of old friends and a few new ones. We had snacks and wine and mulled wine and mix. Friends brought their decks and drinks and games and some mixed music all night...some ended up building cozy forts in the basement and giggling and dancing and laughing until the sun came up...and oh it was so nice to be a human again. :) I am still very tired (feeling my age indeed...) but it was a great reminder of all of the really lovely people around in my life and a bit of a celebration for me that the worst is over. I really wanted to have a "hooray I'm back!" party without all the heaviness that declaring it to be that sort of thing...so when we noticed that the Perihelion for where we live on the planet was on the 2nd it seemed like a good reason to have a gathering. It was a good way to start the year.
I haven't made resolutions for the year really, other than to be more present. I'll talk more about that later, but in my counselling I've been doing some work with the enneagram personality system and learning a lot about myself. I'm trying to see how I interact with J and others and how to get in better touch with myself and what I need to be happy in this "new" me.
Cuz it's It's a new year.
Further up and further in...