They said, “we’re going to play kickball.” The next thing I knew I was out on my sister’s yard, chasing around after a ball, throwing my arms up in the air, and running around trying to make all three bases before getting hit anywhere on my body below the neck. That was the rule. We could hit each other anywhere besides the face or the head. Fast forward a whole 45 minutes later and I was limping around the same yard mentally attempting to convince myself that I was not in as much pain as I was feeling.
Thirty minutes after that I was standing at a 90 degree angle, in the restroom, with the lights out, and grasping onto the sink for dear life. I would have turned on the lights, but I didn’t want to stir any commotion with my screeching moans as I walked into the restroom. It was easier just to close the door behind me and grasp the marble on the sink as I bit my lips to keep from yelling.
I had felt this pain before. Only never to this degree. Still convinced I could not let my siblings see me in pain I finagled my way into my niece’s room across the hall, again in the dark, and carefully thew myself across the bed to see if the horrible pain would subside. It did a little, but only for a very tiny couple of minutes. By the time I was in the hall saying my goodbyes, I could no longer deny the amount of pain I was in, and how hard it was for me to walk even two or three steps.
“You’re driving,” I told Anjelica… and seeing how much pain I was in she agreed. On the way home I tried hopelessly to sit in an upright position so as to lessen the jolts of hurt hitting my lower back, legs and then my whole body… but halfway through the drive I had to send Edgar to the passenger seat and spend the rest of the ride throwing my legs up in the air in one direction and then another, simply trying my hardest to feel the least amount of dolor. By the time we got home the pain was a 12 on the 1 to 10 scale. Anjelica massaged my back, gave me medicine, set me up with a hot water bag, and eventually at some point my body couldn’t take it anymore and I just knocked out.
Ever since then (it’s been two days now) my back has felt progressively better, although I am still in a little bit of pain most of the time. But I am way better than where I started, and that my friends, is a true blessing.
It has also been a true wake up call. One, that I am indeed getting older, and my jolts and bones are doing the same right along with me. I can’t help but think over and over again, “if only I would have stretched first.” And two, that I am really out of shape. And that simple little phrase is causing me such a tremendous amount of stress. I’ve known it for a while. My body just hadn’t confirmed it until Sunday.
Uff… now there are decisions to be made. Do something about it, or just pretend nothing ever happened when my back gets to feeling 100 percent better? I’m kind of split either way at the moment.