people pleaser, table for one

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The trauma of the last four months has really brought my people-pleasing ways clearly into focus.

When I think back, I have:

• apologized to the anesthesiologist who was putting me under for the emergency surgery/hysterectomy for being "too much trouble"
• apologized to the doctor for slapping her hand away when she was trying to find the bleeder on my ute (stats were 30/60 and heartrate of 212 - and there I was, apologizing away like a 15th century monk - all I really needed were the self-flagel*lation tools)
• thought the whole thing must have been my fault, and apologized to Scott over and over for losing my woman parts
• still find myself rationalizing to other people who notice that our nine month old foster son is gone the "whys" of giving him up ( I mean, what kind of person am I? Had him since two days old and gave him up?)
• always asked 10 million people their opinions before making a decision (trying to reach some sort of impossible universal concensus, I suppose)
• apologize to people at Target when I am standing in front of an item and they walk in front of me
• constantly ask my children if they are having 'fun', to the point where they don't want to clean their rooms because "it isn't fun"
• always had trouble believing my friends and those I am close to are really wanting to give me things (food, time, attention, gifts) without expecting something back  - and don't get me wrong, there are many who don't give without strings attached
• always had trouble expressing my opinion to others or letting them know how I feel for fear that they would shut me out or not like what I had to say
• apologizing profusely for even *having* an opinion (I'm much less opinionated in real life than I seem on my blog - I don't have to look you in the eye and face your scorn if you don't like what I have to say here)

getting a stranger's blood - i'm sorry, stranger, for taking your blood...

I googled "emergency hysterectomy" today and found the blog of a woman my age who had a molar pregnancy which turned into cancer and caused her to need an emergency hysterectomy less than a month ago. On top of the recovery, she is fighting cancer.

I am so thankful for how it all turned out. Don't get me wrong. (There I go, rationalizing again.) I got to keep my life, I got a beautiful baby girl, and I don't have to make any further decisions about my reproductive parts.

I am also angry that it happened the way it did. I'm going to admit that. Ashley (the new friend I "met" online today) has the balls to admit it, and I will, too. The question, "Are you going to have any more?" is a loaded one for me. "No, we're not having any more!" I say, too much sunshine in my voice. I also have to add that I had my tubes tied that morning, so that makes it all "ok".

I want to tell her what I wish I would have had the grace to tell myself three months ago. "Yes, you will feel better. No, you're not a failure. Yes, you need help from everyone you can think of to give it to you. No, at this time in your life, you can't feel guilty for taking. Yes, your other children will be fine. Yes, you need to measure your progress in centimeters, not even inches." and on, and on, and on.

It still stinks. I *know* it's a blessing in disguise that it all happened the way it did, but I also know that there have been many emotions and there's been a lot of "head work" that I've had to do as part of the fallout. I spent *so* long thinking of my own worth in terms of my producing a healthy baby that, now that that's gone, it gives me pause and has me re-ordering my priorities and also the way I think about things. 

I think that's why I googled "emergency hysterectomy" today. That's exactly why.

It's lonely and isolating having had this experience at age 32. It's easy to say, "Oh, that's great" when you still have your reproductive organs, or at least you still have the *choice*. When I read that Michelle Duggar was having her 20th, I will admit it. I was jealous. I won't ever have a baby again.

It is what it is what it is.

I read this other woman's blog, remembering sobbing in Scott's big easy chair (the one I wanted to get rid of so desperately because it was UGLY only weeks before) and asking my mother, "Am I *ever* going to feel better?" I had a panic attack over the amount of pain I was feeling in that chair. I thought I was having another blood clot. 

After the surgery, my doctor thought I had a pulmonary embolism but didn't mention it to me because there was no use freaking me out. After I was all-clear for the blood clot and it turned out to be good old-fashioned panic that was making my stats all jumpy, she told me about the suspicions she had had.

Anyway, yes. Panicking about the blood clot and the amount of pain I was having:

I hadn't want to admit the amount of pain I was in because my pain medicine prescription had run out and I didn't want to "bother" the doctor with a request for more pain meds.

I should be stronger than all of that. 

When I talked to the doctor, she told me there was no reason I shouldn't have more pain meds, and that it was silly to try to combat the pain without them.

That panic attack caused Scott to leave home early. He came home and I apologized for "making" him take off work early.

He said he was just glad I wasn't dying again.

I've had alot of time to think about some relationships in my life that I'd thought were really good. I'd thought they were good until I actually had the guts to tell the other party how I was feeling. I read "Jesus Calling", an awesome devotional my mom gave me, every day. I think there are still tear marks on the pages. It's all scripturally based, about how we need to rest and relax in the overwhelming goodness of Jesus' love...Jesus, the healer of all wounds.

I told friends I was sorry I couldn't get together more, wasn't a better host, wasn't getting up to show them out the door when they left.

It really took a full three months before I even *began* to feel like myself. I still have achey days where I have to load up on the Ibuprofen. 

I still cry.

I don't blog about it so much or talk about it so much because I don't want people to get "tired" of what I am saying or think I'm whining.

I have lived under others' expectations that I should be fully healed, happy I survived, and "over" it. I've been striving and striving and striving to *be* everything to everybody, and still it's not enough. I need to be more reciprocal in my relationships, I'm told.

Then, I realize: things don't need to be this hard. They shouldn't be. I don't have to apologize for things I have no business apologizing for. I don't need to apologize for feeling a certain way, having an opinion, or taking a parking spot I've been waiting for.

It's too tiring, and I can't do it any more.

and you know what?

That realization feels pretty damn great.