Semester Reflection Story

The semester started in the midst of August heat. Corn sweet tantalizing.  The sugars drifting through the air as the stalks bent and crinkled in the summer’s blowing.  Tomatoes rich red and deliciously dripping in mouth-watering tanginess.  Raspberries expanding with rivulets red and juicy.  And I was prepared.

I had gotten the courses organized, syllabi written, exams built. 

But I wasn't prepared. Truly, I wasn't.

The tolls of chemotherapy, double mastectomy, breast expanders, every three week Herceptin infusions, coupled with daily radiation therapy…. for the first 4 weeks of school… I struggled.  I struggled to be engaged and manage my courses well.  And while I was sequestered to Hope Lodge at Mayo Clinic I actually did.  Yet when I returned home the family expectations returned.  The farm beckoned.  The skin reddened and peeled sending spasmodic penetrating pain deep into my chest.  Sleep was scarce.  Lotions and creams, antibiotics and salves soothed the depressing distractions. Eventually the skin split and sloughed off and the breasts were left clean, pink, and healing.  A month later they even tolerated pressure from the mattress so that I could curl into blissful sleep.

Periodically they still spasm.  Tight, as though a rubber band were gripping them.  The edges of the expanders tender, digging into the chest.  Bruising the ribs and chest wall.  Painful with arm movement or lifting.  Oddly shaped and unfamiliar. Restrictive.  And the axillary cording shortening my extended arm movements.

But my work entails only punching letters on a computer.  I could complete it.  Albeit slow.  Mentally weary and chemo-fogged, it was hard to concentrate, communicate without ambiguity. It took me hours, hours to interact and provide constructive feedback.  Deeply cognizant that my students needed more than I ever received in graduate school.  They needed to learn, to be transformed, in their thinking from a nurse to a nurse practitioner. They needed to be prepared – their patients needed them to be prepared.

But the students beat me up. Left me broken. 

I’m feeling the un-met expectations of disappointment and frustration.  Or could it just be my expectations and my frustration?  But I am repulsed by the criticism and interference.  “Please, can someone, anyone, be supportive or positive?”  And so I plod on.  Grading, reading, evaluating, answering inane and repetitive emails.  If only students would read the information I had posted.  My time and energies are so limited.  The questions which really shouldn't be questions leech my resolve, my strength. Yet they require an answer.  And so my energies wane.  And my aspirations in teaching do as well. 

But I look fine.  My hair is growing; I’m gaining weight.  I laugh and plaster the smile on my face.  My voice is strong.  I can walk in heels again.  Is this what people with chronic disorders face?  Un-well inside but seemingly fine on the outside?  No grace or gentleness for expectations. 

Three weeks to go until the end of the semester.  And one week until I return to Mayo again.  Tests and infusions.  Exams and consultations.  Scheduling and hopes.  A tiny squeaking voice of unknowns, what ifs, and uncertainty.  Am I really almost done with this chapter? 

And Thanksgiving is upon us.  Eucharisteo. The perspective which makes sense 
in any season.  Remembering I Thessalonians 5:16-18 – giving thanks always, always.

 

Today’s Journey Joys: gingerbread cookie dough, an amazing video, warmth on a snowing day, cold metal mailbox filled with spring seeds of anticipation, toasty comfy blankets, chocolate chip, butterscotch, oatmeal and M&M cookies, shopping for scrumptious meal of farm raised turkey and pumpkin pie.

Six degrees and thankfulness

Six degrees. That's what the thermometer on the car read this morning as I zipped up our lane to meet the bus with Ally.  Six degrees.  It's not even Thanksgiving.  An inch of snow covers the gardens.  A few untamed remnants of crusty brown weeds (and seeds) poking their defiant heads above the cold white blanket.  These will eventually succumb to the winds, wet, and decay.

Seventy two.  That's what my indoor thermometer on the desk in the living room reads.  Toasty warm.  Snug as a bug.  Grateful that our outdoor wood burning furnace is puffing away....heating the water and keeping the house comfortable.

The house is quiet.  The hum of the refrigerator.  The creak of the house.  The wind of the heater blowing. The tick of the rocking chair as I glide back and forth.  But overall quiet.  The skies are wintry gray and the bare bone trees are shaking in the gusty breezes.  Few leaves remaining except the mulberry who clings to those last rust-colored crunchy remains.  Light snow blurs the horizon.

I have a pause.  A pause in the chaos which has been my life in the last month.

A welcomed, restful, quiet, peaceful pause.  Unexpected.  As if it snuck up on me without any warning. Sigh.

The perpetual drone of grading papers, answering emails, creating exams, interacting with students.... all activities which I have typically enjoyed.... has become arduous.  Laborious.  Students repeatedly complaining or asking questions which they already had access to the answers, if only they had read. Papers with the same mistakes over and over again in spite of my correction.  Plagiarizing. Scheduling and organizing student on-campus days.  Details.  Final clinical exams.  More details. Feeling criticized.  Regardless of preparation and input. Weary of pressing on.  My stress bucket is full.  I am eating poorly and not active or exercising.  I read, read, and read paper after paper after paper. Scrambling like a rodent on a wheel cage trying to catch up.

And then finally, I did.

The papers were graded.  The exams readied.  The evaluations posted.  The discussions interacted with. The face-to-face exams completed.  Only a few more phone evaluations and some weekly assignments before the semester is completed.  Whew!

And when I get a chance to breathe... like now.... I remember.  I remember that weariness is caused by treading without purpose or direction.  My focus nearsighted.... myopic.  Failing to recall the purpose of this trek.  Looking at the hurdles, the difficulties rather than gazing at the goal.

"One thing I have asked of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple." (Psalm 24:4)

"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)

A heart of ungratefulness is a poison far worse than any physical ailment.  Without a heart, a life, of reflection on the grace and mercy of the Lord, life is wearisome.  Arduous.  Painful. Deeply hopeless. An ungrateful, un-thankful heart is a cancer waiting to spread its metastasizing, menacing, and malignant fingers into any and all nearby.

Oh, how I have failed to give thanks!

Eucharisteo.

Today's Journey Joys:  quiet restful reflective opportunities, washing machines for dirty ol' gloves and mittens, blue skies peeking through wintry cloud cover, outside cats all snuggled together on top of worn out pillows in the igloo, cleansers to scrub away the ring on the tub,  turtlenecks keeping my skinny little neck warm, students who have learned, opportunities to demonstrate grace and love, continued recovery from cancer.