Lost Day

Ben is doing well, which boosts my wellbeing. Maybe it is a psychic umbilical cord that binds parent to child, even if the child is half way around the world. As parent or as child, I think the cord is there. I still feel connected somehow to my mom, who passed away a year ago, although the cord is thinning, as she recedes into days of the past. But sometimes her voice shoots through the past to the present and says loud and clear in her sing-songy way, "Have you heard from Ben? Is he okay? I am so worried about him. I have been watching CNN all day and the war is getting worse. Tell him to come home."

Yet I can't tell him to come home. He is on his own journey: and I honor it. Driving a couple of weeks ago, we passed by a used car lot. I saw a sports car for sale that cost about as much as this trip and offered it to him instead: he laughed, knowing it was a joke. He knows he has the blessing of his parents and that, I think, gives him a psychic safety cushion.

Last night I had a killer migraine, so bad it made me go to the emergency room to get narcotics. Three hours later, my beast of a headache had ceased and I was released. Once again the beast had bitten away another day of my life. It is becoming a battle of will to withstand the pain and the inconvenience of these migraines that are attacking on a more frequent basis. I feel like I am at war in my own head. Except migraines are not just headaches. They are whole body illnesses. They attack my digestive system. They attack my neck and shoulder. They blind me to light and make any sound deafening. Touch, sound, sight, and smell are all compromised. For someone who used to be scared of the dark, the darkness is now my shelter; I crave it when I am being attacked. I hide from the light and shrink away from sound. I never thought I would want solitary confinement. Migraine is a confinement, a prison. If only I can find the keys to escape.

My friend Mary took me. My daughter, Mikayla was with us, too. When we walked into the emergency room, she said, "I like hospitals." Leave it to her to be positive. She is my buoy in the ocean of uncertainty and pain. She is my redwood during an earthquake. I love the lightness of her being.