What a Day
by Bella Rum
We’re home. It’s been a long day and a little stressful, but all ended well. The doctor was concerned about the heart palpitations I’ve been experiencing (so was I), and even though my heart sounded pretty good, he didn’t want to depend on his ear. So they gave me an EKG and I’m still in rhythm. This is excellent news.
He did change my blood pressure meds to a bata blocker because of the palpitations. One of the side effects is depression. You know I’m not thrilled about that, but it only affects about 5 percent. One of the other side effects is a slow heart rate. That wouldn’t be a bad thing in my case.
I’m glad to be home. We sat on the deck for a while. The humidity is low and the temps are in the seventies. There was a slight breeze. It couldn’t have been more perfect. Isn’t the sweet comfort of home and hearth all we need at the end of an emotional day?
While I was waiting for the results of the EKG, I promised myself to stop getting stressed over things I can’t control. Of course, that is my nature, and you remember the fable about the scorpion and the frog.
“Hellooo Mr. Frog!” called the scorpion across the water, “Would you be so kind as to give me a ride on your back across the river?”
“Well now, Mr. Scorpion! How do I know that if I try to help you, you wont try to kill me?” asked the frog hesitantly.
“Because,” the scorpion replied, “If I try to kill you, then I would die too, for you see I cannot swim!”
Now this seemed to make sense to the frog.
So the frog agreed to take the scorpion across the river. He swam over to the bank and settled himself near the mud to pick up his passenger. The scorpion crawled onto the frog’s back, his sharp claws prickling into the frog’s soft hide, and the frog slid into the river. The muddy water swirled around them, but the frog stayed near the surface so the scorpion would not drown. He kicked strongly through the first half of the stream, his flippers paddling wildly against the current.
Halfway across the river, the frog suddenly felt a sharp sting in his back and, out of the corner of his eye, saw the scorpion remove his stinger from the frog’s back. A deadening numbness began to creep into his limbs.
“You fool!” croaked the frog, “Now we shall both die! Why on earth did you do that?”
The scorpion shrugged, and did a little jig on the drowning frog’s back.
“I could not help myself. It is my nature.”
Source: All About Frogs
Ah, our nature, but still… it is a sweet evening at our house and I’m wishing the same for you and yours.
I’m glad you’re doing ok. I know that heart things are stressful – trying to be calm just makes you stressed too
But it sounds like things are mostly under control…
I have a friend who’s a complete curmudgeon, even though she’s female. I guess I don’t know what the female equivalent of a curmudgeon is. Never thought about that before.
Anyway – after she had a stroke and some heart problems and fell and put one leg out of whack and couldn’t get up from the floor at a Lowe’s, she got put on some meds with a possible side effect of depression.
As she tells the story, the doctor was getting really tiresome about the side effects, and she finally put an end to it by giving him the evil eye and saying, “Listen. I don’t care what you say. Depressed beats dead every day!”
Glad you’re alive and ticking! If you get depressed, just come over here and whine. We’ll listen.
Dear BR, Glad you are home and feeling well. Sometimes, we just want to hear that we’re ok though a little help from some sort of adjustment would also be beneficial. And we have to kick back and allow that, whatever it is, after sagely pondering it.
But your comment about being “home” and safe. Oh, yes. I hear you. Thank goodness for home. Really. It is the shining star, the place of sanctuary, the rock amidst the quicksand, the one place that has anything at all fairytale-esque about it.
Getting home yesterday, at the end of a work day that was…well, let’s just say “fraught,” was as you mention – full of all things good and meaningful.
And so enjoy the breeze and the patio and the sun and the evening and the constancy of going forward. Bravo to you and the many things that give us strength!
I can totally see you on your lovely deck, as the light breeze and the comfort of home ease the stresses of the day. You are so spot on with your comment about home, I think it’s why I was so desperate to get back to my house when we had the horrible weather this week; even though they were talking about tornadoes touching down in my town I just wanted to get home because that’s where I feel safe. And thankfully we stayed safe. I think you handle your health concerns with a lot of grace and humor; as you know I am right there with you when it comes to worrying about health stuff, but you are taking care of things and you are learning to live with it. Mind you, can’t take the urge to sting out of the Scorpion, right? Just don’t do while on the back of a frog
Glad all is done — and that perhaps you can relax a bit now. It’s good to have a strategy and you can watch for the depression — if it happens, there are probably numerous options. I hope! Good ! I have my physical on Wednesday, where he will look at the weight I’ve gained and be sweet (but I’ll know…) and look at more blood tests than I can imagine and the cardio thing I had done after I passed out making breakfast. Hopefully, I’m peachy keen or easily fixed up like you — I know how scary it is when you don’t know.