Version 5.1. I think.

I have a much more exciting post that will hopefully go up later today, but for now... at nearly 430am... I can't bring myself to finish it. And it's good. Commander-in-Chief Ball good. But until then... you have this.

I'm so tired of being tired. I went to the doctor last week and he seemed concerned about my fatigue and constant pain issues. So he ordered some blood work to be done, all of which (thankfully) came back negative. The most plausible diagnosis would have been an inflammatory disorder, but no such explanation. I also finally visited a sound chiropractic office, which took X-Rays and a full assessment, of which no underlying issues were discovered.

The truth? I'm tired because I don't sleep. I don't sleep either because my husband snores like a damn train or I just can't stay asleep. It's usually a combo of both. Some days I feel as if I never fully wake up. I quit taking a sleeping pill because it required more time than I was willing to risk. I also woke up painfully dehydrated. I am in pain because I am horribly out of shape and have been wrecking my body with the requirements of our "new" lifestyle. I don't know how this can still be "new" though, because as of March it will have been a year and a half since Aaron was blown up. What's new about it? This isn't temporary.

I feel like we must be doing something wrong. Actually, there have been shortcomings that I only recently learned about, so after his return from a ski trip he is taking this week we will reevaluate what we are doing and what actually needs to be done. I am actually a little excited that I have the apartment to myself for nearly a week. I feel like I can finally get it in order without more work piling up before I can even finish the task at hand.

I'm no longer uncomfortable with what my role in the this has to be. I don't fight it anymore; in fact, I make attempts to attack it. I feel as if I rushed into "me" things when what we really need is someone who focuses on "us" things. Aaron  really needs to focus hard for his remaining time at the hospital, because it is running out. So if he's working on him and I'm working on me, who's working on us? Who is doing things for the bigger picture? I know that for a marriage to function well everyone must have their own "things," so I'm not saying that I am laying myself and my needs on an altar for sacrifice. I'm just readjusting. I don't need to attend school on campus this spring term. I really want to and I thought I could, but then it was brought to my attention that I still need to focus on Aaron and supporting his recovery with a hands-on approach. There's no getting around that. I suppose I thought that if I were one of those people that just wished hard enough for something and behaved as if what I wanted was what was happening right then, it would happen. That's not how reality works, though. It's not very fluid, you know?

As long as I'm getting some educational requirements under my belt I am not short-changing myself. I can still be happy. But what will most certainly hurt both of us and our marriage is Aaron not recovering on schedule. And yes, there should be a schedule. We should feel pressure to get out of the hospital and on with our lives. I hear a lot about what we want to be doing, what we hope will happen in the future, but nothing ever seems to happen. I have tried so hard to force some normal normalcy into our lives that perhaps I haven't been focused enough on what isn't normal. I am sure there are some people out there who can do everything they want to do and get 6 hours of sleep a night. School work is done, spouse is happy, house is clean, outside commitments met. But right now, I'm not exactly a paradigm of health. I am tired, I hurt, and I can't ignore that anymore. And until I can get my act together so that I don't feel all of that every day, I can't pretend that I can do all the things that need to be done. So here's to readjusting. Again. At least I am becoming very apt at constant reinvention and adaptation, right?