In trying to explain where I was on the race course, I felt a long ways away. While Tommy straddled the bike saddle to ride the epic races he’s so well prepared to ride, I’m thinking about when I can lie down to “recharge” my back. The feeling lingers as I come home to the ongoing madness of class meetings, practices for my kids, sports events, and the needs of the business we run. I feel stretched, like so many of my friends, knowing the place we are is not always the place we want to be.

I may be too vulnerable here, but I’m disappointed on every level about where I am. The pandemic has challenged every goal I scripted for my bakery dreams. It’s messy and hard. The numbers don’t add up but the effort is astronomical from all of the talent I have hired. I’m no longer in the driver seat.

I’m also not healing nearly as fast as I had planned. I feel humiliated because I can do very little (according to my original baseline) but I’m told I’m doing well in my progress. Perspective is a canny thing. My first PT was a series of tiny exercises that are meant to build my core. Really, they just make me feel so incapable. For all of the big efforts of controlling my health goals in the past year, I’m stripped down to the basics. I fully understand baby steps but they should be for babies. My back was so bothered after these tiny movements and I find myself realizing it is such a silent ache, a feeling no one but me will be able to temper or fully understand. I try to rock the moments. Don’t we all?

Let me be abundantly clear. This is not a sympathy post in any way. This is a personal mental exercise I created to make a space for my negative thinking and hopefully give audience to the part of the brain that antagonizes every best effort. For all of the forward progress, my brain creates the most comfortable space of self pity. It’s a dangerous place because it’s not accurate at all levels. It’s a place where the mirror is enlarged and all things are skewed. It’s a place of brutal judgement that when I can step away, I’m actually surrounded by acceptance. If you are clear headed and pay close attention, you are surrounded by people who loved you first and will love you through the heartache.

So I may be feeling disappointed, but I am feeling surrounded. (And for the record, I wear this sweatshirt to remind myself…choose happy!)