oh how things change

It's amazing how having a big old stressers changes everything.  Things you thought were super important seem so silly and things I took for granted seem so precious and important.  I feel like I've been blind, and now I see.

I was listening to one of my friends talk about weight loss and how to get her extra five pounds off and how often she things about it.  I looked down at my belly and thought, I can't remember the last time I even thought about my body or my wrinkles or my sagging places.  With a whole new set of much more pressing worries, physical appearance has gone out the window.  Not completely, of course; I still want to be look my best, but my best has changed.  My best is smiling.  My best is a good day where I can easily smile and laugh.  My best is a daily prayer of gratitude that we've gone another day healthy and well.

Today, that changed.  Finn's been complaining of a pain in his leg since May and for about a week, he walked with a limp.  We had him stop everything for a few days and then only dance because he had a performance.  Then no running for a week or two and it felt better.  Way better.  But as he's gotten back into running distance and speed, he started noticing the tenderness.  He asked to go to the doctors (something he avoids unless he's worried).  We asked our friend and doctor what he'd suggest and he gave us a name which we called and got right in this morning.  Finn was nervous and scared (he hates the doctors) and I was too.  The doctor was very serious as he examined Finn.  He had an idea of what it was (shin splints), but needed x-rays to make sure.  The x-rays showed a healing stress fracture, a healthy healing bone--two healthy bones on strong long legs. 

Right there the mother in me sighed in relief.  No weird growths or suspicious stuff.  Just a little healing fracture.  

Then came the bad news.

 Due to the tenderness, he declared, absolutely no running for a month.

Finn turned pale and I thought he'd cry.  He quit dance and cut back on karate to focus on running.  He spent his last summer and fall sick with pneumonia that would not go away.  He ran hacking and shaking and hurting.  It took a massive round of antibiotics to clear up the last of it.  Finally, he was healthy and getting speed and strength.  He was running with his friends (on varsity).  He was there . . .

Then this.

We were both shocked, shell shocked, and walked out without saying anything really.  We sort of stumbled into the car and tried to figure out what the doctor even said.  I think that's when it hit the hardest for Finn.

On the way home, he kept saying, why me?  I am not even a fast runner.  I'm just so-so.  I don't even understand.  A month?  Mom, a month?  I can't run for a month?

I looked over at him and thought about how in the beginning of May he couldn't walk it hurt so bad.  He couldn't do anything.  But since then, he's run about sixty miles at a fast pace and then spent the days hiking or playing pickleball or racing after his nieces and all he feels is a tenderness in one spot.  His leg doesn't ache, just tender to the touch.  The x-ray showed old healing.  Not new.  He was/is on his road to recovery.

I turned to him and said, We are getting you into the best Physical Therapist I know.  Our cousin being one of them.  They know so much about this.  They will get you running.  They will be able to tell how long you need to stay off it.  Henry (oldest son) had a third degree sprain on his ankle and they told him he wouldn't play for a season or two and the physical therapists got him back in the games in two weeks (with a lot of ankle wrapping).  You're going to be ok.  Even if it's a month, you're still going to be ok.  You are strong.  You are smart.  Your body is a machine.  We've got this.

And I believe it. 

We got home and called/texted all our Physical therapists (cousin at the top of the list).  Tomorrow we are going to see our cousin to see what he thinks.  And we are going to start biking and strength training.  And it's going to make us all stronger (because we are all in this with him).  Breaks, hurts, sprains, pulled ligaments and strains, they make us all stronger in every way.

I don't know how this will end.  

Again.

I don't know how long we will have to wait.

But it will end and Finn will be stronger for it.

I believe it.

I'll let you know how it turns out.

And I'm just grateful it's something we can fix.  Something that can heal.  Something thing that is already healing.