Ambivalent news

I got a call from the oral surgeon's office today saying that I wouldn't need surgery but to still come on Friday.  I still have pain in my jaw so if they didn't find anything, what does that mean?  How can you help something you can't find?

I went to Ginger's today and old emotion, raving terror mostly, poured from my body as she worked.  Maybe I'll be able to sleep tonight.

Friday 1:30

Just got the call from the oral surgeon's office.  They won't tell me anything over the phone except to say that the doctor has reviewed the results and wants to see me at his first available appointment which happens to be Friday at 1:30.  I'm hoping that if they found nothing, they'd wouldn't make me pay another appointment to say "You're fine."  I'm guessing, they found something definitive.
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I just called back at 4:31 to ask what my diagnosis is and they closed at 4:30.  I have requested a call tomorrow from a nurse or assistant who can read it from my chart to me so I don't have to sit on pins and needles for 3 days.  Shout out for my mom for thinking up that solution since the receptionist doesn't know and the doctor's not available.
The antibiotics are holding but not solving- I can feel it.  Given that, I am really hoping for the good news that they've found something they know how to help.  I suspect that I will be comfortable enough until Friday and then I'm betting they'll know how to hold it all in check until whatever intervention is necessary.  6th round of antibiotics, perhaps?
I keep saying two things to myself.  1.  I'm so sorry I let it come to this; I didn't know.  2.  I'm so grateful that there is help for me because many people in the world would die from this.

Dr Jenny and his assistant are decent people.  I saw it in their eyes when I told them I had been sexually abused and strangled as a child and that the exam could get hinky.  They had kindness in their eyes and the exam went fine.  They are good, competent people with that rare quality in medical people of a genuine sense of humor and I trust them.

I wish this was over.

Quick update

I just got back from visiting the oral surgeon who is completely confident that my pain isn't going to intensify, my x-rays show perfect teeth, and that this is referred pain from an unhappy nerve up top.  I'm going to get a CT scan on Tuesday to see what might be in there that everyone is still crabby about. 

I am not nearly so confident as Dr Jenny, however.  I'm hoping Dr Jenny is confident with good cause but I'm not taking it on faith.  Neither of the other teeth ever showed an infection on x-rays, ever.  So I have a call into my dentist asking what my back-up plan is, just in case my pain escalates over the weekend.

On a positive note, I am proud of myself for advocating for myself this morning, for following through quickly, for asking questions, for openly stating that I was very nervous and had been strangled as a child, and for respecting my need to have a plan, just in case.  This whole "I'm trapped in pain and no one in authority believes me or will do anything truly helpful" presupposition has got to go. 

Also, I got a copy of a really cool x-ray of my whole mouth and I'm going to get a 15-second CT even-way-cooler scan of my upper jaw next week.

Thanks for reading and for caring.  

Needing to connect and it's not pretty

I've been awake since midnight.  I'm 90% sure another tooth, lower left, is failing. As Tim pointed out, I only have so many teeth which means this can't go on forever, which is the most positive thing I can say this morning.  I am very worn, coming up on spent.  I have no sense of humor and no reserves.  And so help me, if the dentist's office says anything but "We've got you down for Monday morning at 8:00" I'm going to lose it.  I keep thinking this can't possibly be happening.  People don't have 3 teeth go bad in 9 weeks.  But lo, here I am. And yes, I'm just going to have them pull it out, and they're going to loooove that since they usually only "lose" a handful a year. 

I hate "losing" and I hate disappointing people, more intensely than I should, which I also hate.  I really, really hate being the odd patient.  Amy "1%" Reisdorf.  Hell, I hate being odd, period.  I feel like such a trouble-maker, such a problem child. 

Our family never made waves nor stood up for ourselves or each other nor advocated for ourselves or each other.  We took it, assumed this was as good as it gets given our solid rock belief that "Pain is the only way."  No matter that grampa was a known pedophile or that I got bullied at school or that I got sick every year.  It could never happen to me because they weren't the kind of parents who would let that happen and besides he would never do that to anyone else.  We were above all that stuff like feeling safe and getting justice for ourselves because we were too busy having compassion on the bullies for their tough lives and insecurities.  And life is just like this.  This is as good as it gets so quit whining.  You think this is bad?  Cause trouble and you'll be kicked off the island with no help or support whatsoever.  Insist on your way and you're dead.  I've worried more about being a good little patient/girl/student/wife/Christian/mother than I have about actually getting well and being happy.  And look where it's got me. 

On an ironically positive note, if I do have this tooth out on Monday, I'll still be on the second round of antibiotics from the last one so I won't need to start a 6th round.  My intestines are shot as it is.

Oh, and since lemon tarts are on the menu- I finally got to watch the 4 hour Shackleton movie starring Kenneth Branaugh from 1:00-5:00 a.m.  Interesting character study of this Antarctic explorer and crew in like 1916-17 whose ship get crushed by ice flows on an expedition.  28 of them then spend a year and a half on the ice and finally make it back without losing anyone.  Intense survival story.  Well done movie and gripping story.  I won't put it on my Top 10 List but definitely fine company for a sleepless night.

I see now where "pain is the only way" and "love hurts" have gotten me and I am officially opening my clenched fist and beginning the process of letting it go.  It's going to take me some time but I see what I've traded off for and I'm choosing another trade off.  Happy, happy, happy seems unrealistic but I've walked the road of pain and putting up, I know exactly where it leads, and as crazy as happy is, I'll give it a shot. 

And once again

I'm thinking about changing the title of my blog to Amy's Teeth Catastrophes.  Two days ago my jaw started to swell and ache and yesterday I threw the kids in the van and made a fast trip to Vadnais Heights to see the dentist before he closed.  I told them that the reason I'm coming every week is that I'm angling to get my own designated parking spot with a nice sign and everything.  Dang.  She x-rayed and he poked.  Pronouncing his lack of worry, he prescribed different, bigger antibiotics than the ones which made my whole abdomen go painfully rigid last week.  Thank heavens they're a kind I've had before with no side effects and I can already tell they're working. 
I don't even know what more to say.

Ambivalence

Ok, I'm nervous.  It's time to start my Art Show Blog and I've actually got a couple hours this afternoon between lunch and dancing.  I didn't know how to set it up, so Angela came over and gave me the 2 hour intro, and now I know how- no excuses.  Now, it's just straight nerves.  Trepidation basically.

I've been reflecting a lot about what I'm going to say.  Heck, I've been reflecting a lot for a decade.  I'm really tickled that stuff is concluding.  Really.  When I lay awake in the middle of the night or while I'm washing dishes or walking laps or driving about, I'm often thinking about who I'm thankful for and what they've done for me and who I've become and how happy I am- and how I'm going to capture that with brevity and wit and deep sincerity on my blog.

And yet [Yep, that's me- Amy "And yet" Reisdorf] I've been living with these projects for 10 years.  The healing journey it commemorates spans decades longer.  How do I lay the sword down?  How do I unfurl my life from being tightly wrapped around suffering?  How do I actually trade-in my old belief that pain is the only way to learn for a new one like Happy, happy, happy?

At some point, my blog will be a finished product like my quilt and dozens of other pieces.  I like that moment when a piece is done; it's a satisfying feeling.  Aaah, closure.

My finished quilt came several weeks ago by mail and I didn't open it.  I let it sit there until Anjali saw a promising looking package and opened it.  The kids spread it out and walked all over it, touching everything, admiring freely.  I looked and re-folded it but I couldn't bring myself to sit on it or hold it.  Packed it away to get the last signature.  Packed it away to take to the dry cleaners.  Now it's hanging there, dry and ready for pick up. 

Ambivalence.  That's the word.  I used to think it meant "I don't care.  Whatever."  But now I understand differently.  Ambi means both and valence means positive and negative charges which attract, from the root strong or strengths.  I am both drawn and repelled, doing an approach/avoid, pinging back and forth into an equilibrium which appears frozen.

Maybe my questions aren't really "how" questions.  Maybe they're "why" questions.
Why do I lay my sword down?
Why do I unfurl my life from being tightly wrapped around suffering?
Why do I actually trade-in my old belief that pain is the only way to learn for happy, happy, happy? 

Maybe my questions are more about being ready. 
Am I ready to lay my sword down? 
Am I ready to unfurl my life from suffering?
Am I ready to trade-in 'pain is the only way to learn'?

Yes and no.  Yes, I'm ready to begin the conclusion.  No, I'm not ready to conclude.

My suffering and kind friends have been faithful traveling companions.  I've been faithful too-day in and day out, year in and year out.  This closure feels unfaithful, like somehow I'm breaking faith with myself and what I've learned.  And yet, what I've learned and who I've become has lead me here, to happiness. 

Ok, I'm going to upload all the photos onto different pages.  No text, just labels.  Then I'm going to dance this out tonight.  Plus I've got a movie to watch and ponder called The Yes Man. That should carry me to the next steps.
  

Resolved

I suspect that the tooth next to the one they pulled in November is also failing. I've had a series of headaches in the last couple weeks which culminated in a blinding one yesterday. Big thanks to Emily's advice, I dissolved a niacin pill under my tongue and within minutes my headache eased, leaving an ominous pressure in my jaw. I called the dentist, got advice to wait until morning and call back if the pain had persisted. Not only has the pain persisted, it has localized to the jaw bone deep under the tooth. I was dozing after Tim's alarm went off and was awoken by a significant zing followed by the pounding heart of an adrenaline rush. I've popped an advil and left a voicemail on the dentist's after hours line giving him the heads up.

I am resolved. I am not going to try antibiotics for the 4th time in 4 months. I am not going to try a re-root canal. I am not going to be talked out of my self-knowing. I am not going to wait for the infection to be visible on x-rays. I am not going to wait until the pain is a run-away train I don't know how to stop safely. I am not going to be up all night in terror. I am not going to push the play and repeat buttons of all my biggest feelings from my worst days. I am not going to try to save a tooth which died years ago. I am not going to expend my limited healing resources on containment.

I am calmly and swiftly going to have him pull it out. And I will put it in my tooth box with honor.

Possibly, it will not come to that. Possibly, it will get better. I am open to being pleasantly surprised. But since the infections in my molars started 25 years ago, I doubt it. And I'm not expending one more drop of hope or energy on trying harder for this.

My teeth are a symbol of my life. I have tried. I have waited. I have hoped. I have expended time, money, emotion, and the juice of my life. I have tried some more. I have hurt and hurt and hurt while I hoped and tried. And then have hurt some more. Some things yielded. Some things healed. But some have not and I am realizing at near-40 that some never will. I could never accept that before. I wielded my sword until my hand froze around it because losing meant I was a loser. If I admitted failing, I would be a failure. Winners never quit and quitters never win and all that jazz.

I am now ready to trade off. Dead teeth are not worth agonizing over. Some things are worth walking through my terror and body remembrances of pain for. Happiness is. Peace is. Joy is. I am. My dead teeth are not. Neither are my fantasy relationships nor my perfectly accomplished childbirth nor the approval of the disrespectful nor the affection of the unsafe.

I wanted to feel capable and competent and approved instead of betrayed and wimpy and irreparably flawed. So I tried harder and whipped myself into painful relationships which always had "so much potential." I tried to earn respect from those who despise me and embraced the menacing. Because THEN, I would be a winner. THEN, I would be acceptable. My heart would never break. My body would always perform. I would always triumph.

Except I was never happy.

Oh, I could feel happiness from time to time like a cool breeze in July but I didn't live there. I didn't know contentment. Year after year my themes tapped my deepest longings for satisfaction and rest and joy and power and pleasure and now happiness. I find myself swimming in a happiness so deep I can't touch bottom. And oddly it seems to have nothing to do with winning or being acceptable or demonstrating my ambition in accomplishment or being liked by the hard to please or getting people to do what I want.

I checked out a Paul Potts opera CD because I had watched his you tube video and been moved despite not speaking Italian or ever before liking opera. I drove listening to song 3 (I'll try to get the title) and wept- tears pouring down my face and running onto my coat- weeping because he sang my beauty and grief and glory in being a human being. Being fully alive, pain and all, is worth it.

To trust myself in being fully alive, I need to know that I am no longer going to sacrifice myself and my happiness in vain. I am not going to force myself to be with people I feel worse around. I am not going to sacrifice my peace to impress the difficult. I am not going to traipse back into the trauma to try to overcome it when I could walk respectfully around. I used to be afraid that I would never be happy again if I entered the pain, so I lived in the metropolis of Fearanddenial. Then, when that failed, I dwelled in the desolate Painandterror for years, like the Isrealites pitching tents for 40 years in the desert. Now, I could move into a nice place in Peaceandhappiness but find myself wondering if I accidentally wound up back in Fearanddenial instead.

How could I possibly be happy ever again after accepting everything I am, everything I am not, and everything I will never be?
How can I trust myself ever again after knowing how I've chosen before, knowing that even if I always try my best it won't always work out, and knowing that even with the best advice I can be tragically wrong?

My best working guess is a mishmash of things. Things like cheesy lyrics to old country-western songs like, "You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em. Know when to walk away, know when to run." And things like dancing more and buying myself my favorite flowers more often, just because. Going on walks with people who make my heart sing and listening to songs that make me cry. Spending time with people who make me proud to be a human being and telling and retelling every noble story and good deed I know. Revealing myself in an art show and putting it out there for all comers. Snuggling with those I like to be close to and eating food that I really like. Realizing when I'm straining irritably and responding to myself kindly.

Today it means starting blogging before daylight, responding to Mark's interruptions for a hug and a breakfast right now, washing Anjali's hair in the sink, looking for snowpants for myself at a clearance sale, buying Mark a cool toy off Craig's List for his plane trip to FL, figuring which good food I have time to prep and enjoy today, wondering how to prepare my space for friends this afternoon, and wrapping up this blog.

Thanks for listening. I see how much was in me now.
No more extreme measures for the tooth. No more standing around in the borderlands. I'm ready to trade off. I have a lot of life to live and a lot of myself to enjoy.