Andrew is my hero

4:00 a.m. I woke up on fire, and not in the good way. Entering into TMI territory--I'd gone to bed without pants on, just my underwear, hoping that less clothing would, I dunno ease the pain a little, prevent it? Seemed a good idea at bedtime. But at the hour when late night ended and early morning began, every. Single. Touch. was sending shockwave shots of puke-worthy pain straight to my alligator brain. The blankets sliding off? Like sandpaper ground into the most sensitive skin you can imagine. The blankets floating back on? Like a sledgehammer slammed into an open wound.

Maybe a little poetic license, but at 4 in the morning, when one is woken up by pain? I think one is entitled.

I guess I'd thought that by now I'd, sure, maybe not be able to step right back into my Pilates routine (ha!), but be walking around fluidly like the graceful dancer--okay, at least stumbling around like I usually am. I didn't think the very act of sitting down would make me lightheaded and slighly nauseous, much less that standing upright would feel like I was asking my torso to tear horizontally from hipbone to hipbone, leaving me a bloated and rubbery upper half and a scarred and swollen lower half.

I'm trying to take it as gracefully as possible, keeping my whining here and to just before it's time to retake my pain meds. Mostly. (Oh, and by the way? If I haven't been that good or graceful, let me retain that illusion, because I've quite painfully lost my illusion of quick recovery.)

Andrew's been a champ. He's cooked. He's cleaned. He's got a clipboard where he keeps track of my ambien, my ibuprofen, my dilaudid, my reglan, my poop-ability drug (I still, btw, haven't pooped since Wednesday), my iron-replacement drug (which I'm not taking because if I'm not pooping now, the iron would put it off until October), and now my antibiotics. Some are on a 6 hour schedule, some are on an 8 hour schedule, some can't be taken within two hours of eating, and he's kept track of all of it for me. He has kept me fed and kept me drugged. Seriously, what more can I ask for? (Especially since I'm not allowed to ask for sex for another month--yay!)

So he's already my hero.

And then 4 a.m., and everything falls apart. Apparently the Ambien I've been taking has worn off with a vengence. Of course, this is the night I decided to try to make it through the night without waking up to take my narcotics. The fire! And it hurts to roll over because the fire! And it hurts to stay where I am because the fire! And the fire! I'm crying that keening wail I've developed because it involves less sobbing and therefore less torso movement and therefore less feeling like I'm about to rip apart my insides with the power of my own muscles--well, that and because it's a total hot move to pick up guys. Waking Andrew up after I promised him that I wouldn't wake him up or expected him to wake me up for another pill popping session. He tried to help pull the blankets up over me but that just caused the fire.

And here's how he is really and well and truly my hero.

He smoothed my hair back from my face. Held my shoulders, let me grip his arms with the death grip of a dying Jedi knight. He murmured nothings. And then he said in my ear, "C'mon, babe, you've been so strong through all of this. You can make it through this too."

Which was, in short, exactly what I needed to hear. I can make it through this, and for the times when I don't believe it, he does and will remind me.