HOSPITAL STAY

"Every disease is a physician." 

~ Irish Proverb ~

Generally in life, I am busy and moving fast, but I have had a chance this week- not by choice, but by circumstance- to slow way down and experience the passage of time in a hospital setting. And that changes everything. Minutes pass more slowly than usual, maybe because we are dealing with pain and discomfort, while whole days blur together as a blob, peppered with nurse visits, medications, and the high-intensity fear-filled situations that arise because of unfamiliar threats to our sense of how things are supposed to be.
     And what feels a bit like numbness is actually a kind of attunement to the environment, I think. We adapt to patience and acute physical realities erupting and dissolving in waves. It's impossible to attach to anything. A hospital is a great place to learn of the inconstancy of all things. We are ok, and then not ok, grateful and fearful, very sick, and eventually well enough to venture home.

Sickness teaches me gratitude for wellness, and hospitals teach me gratitude for being home.