I wake in a pool of exhaustion. My chest hurts. My body resists movement, thought, or feeling. I stay in bed repeating,
“I am on my own side this day. I am on my own side this day. I am on my own side this day.”
Tears form. I am so moved by this small gift to myself in the midst of chaos.
There is hope, I realize, in what my son’s Lyme-informed therapist says about personal boundaries, about speaking truth, about future. Although I do not know how yet or when hope will arrive in its fullness. Just that this small glimmer found in repeated words brings an almost imperceptible expansion to my thinking, feeling, and being this day.
Yesterday morning drinking tea, watching the day rise I repeated a different set of words to myself, the windows, the wind outside,
“May I slow down. May I slow down. May I slow down today.”
Words remaining with me throughout day’s many hours. The push, push, push replaced by a new tempo forged in repeated words. As if time values my very being. Small slivers of self-care in less than forty-eight hours.
Tomorrow a new day.
Jennifer Ohman-Rodriguez 