Reluctant Convalescent

Like many people this winter, I find myself caught in the break zone of illness. Wave after wave, crashing on me when I’m already down. First a flu, then either a relapse of that flu or a cold, and now—yet another cold. A chest cold, that requires antibiotics. You win, body: Message received. It is time to rest, for longer than I think I need to, I suppose.

Three—that most archetypal of numbers—is apparently how many times I need to be told something to truly begin to understand it. So I have submitted. I am in bed, drinking a variety of herbal teas, reading fantasy novels, and lazily writing to you. I am resting, and have made no plans to stop resting. And having learned from the last two rounds, like any good fairy tale heroine, on this third round I intend to do it right, and continue to rest even after I feel better. I have at last arrived at a place both familiar and dreaded, the place of acceptance and surrender.

I say familiar because I have spent significant periods of my life in a state of waiting-to-be-better. I don’t have a chronic illness or anything like that, I’m just of a rather frail constitution, like a Dickensian orphan, or the Elven bard I was always playing in high school Dungeons and Dragons games. And I’ve had some nasty injuries, the earliest and most serious when I was still quite young, so it was pretty formative. In short, I have had plenty an occasion to learn that you can’t fight time, not as long as you’re embodied anyway. (Of course, if you’re a bilocating mystic this doesn’t apply to you! But what in the world are you doing reading my blog?) There is nothing so profound the body will teach you as you exist in time. For better, and for worse. Fighting an illness takes time, recovery takes time. Not recovering also takes time. Sometimes lots and lots of it. So familiar, yes. But why also dreaded? This is what I’ve been contemplating here tucked under my comforter, my velvet duvet, two fluffy blankets, and my faithful kitty. I fear this state and resist it. Why?

There are obvious answers: It’s uncomfortable. It’s boring. There’s so much that needs to get done that is not getting done. But I don’t fear discomfort. I mean, I was a dancer, which basically confers an honorary PhD in “Tolerating Discomfort.” And I don’t fear boredom; I rather enjoy it, as it is the portal to so many interesting places. And while much has gone undone—like two months of blog posts for example—I am fortunate to have never been afflicted with the worm of productivity. Maybe it’s temperament, maybe it’s Hawaii, maybe it’s both, but I don’t feel guilt when I am not “productive.” When I am well, I sleep in with relish, can rest without regret, and genuinely feel that time staring into space with my own thoughts is time well spent. But maybe it’s something more existential. Beyond these more tedious things lurks the reality that it’s always a bit scary when the body stops whirring along. If sleep is death’s sister, illness is her specter, ever making her appearances at the feasts of our lives. I am not so foolish as to say she doesn’t trouble me. Of course she does. But we are acquainted, and I set a place of honor for her in my banqueting hall.

But no, the dread is something else. I think it’s that while I don’t have a drive towards productivity per se, I love doing things. Yes, I rest happily, unless I really love the thing I’m doing, then I work myself sick. I’ve danced when I should have stayed home, I’ve written and read when I should have slept, and I’ve hiked and swam when I should have been in bed. I dread not being able to do the things I love to do. And if I can’t do that thing right now, says the fear, how can I know, really truly know, that I ever will again? I’ve talked about this and where it comes from a bit before. But um, this isn’t a broken neck. It’s the flu. It’s a cold. But nevertheless the dread is there, and it is strong. To assuage it, I jump back into action as soon as I am able, or you know, before. I do everything I fear I’ll never do again. These days, these are little things like take a walk, cook good food, have a beer with friends, do all my PT exercises, get to my Pilates class, and set writing goals for 2026 that scare me just a little.

These are very normal things. It’s not like I am trying to get through Swan Lake over here, so I feel like this should be fine! But it isn’t. I—apparently—have not made adequate space for myself to get well. And it’s not because I am overwhelmed by obligation—for the first time in a very long time, I am emphatically not—it’s because I am afraid I might never have the pleasure of cooking a tasty, nourishing dinner ever again. I’m afraid writing will be taken from me while still a seedling in my palm. I’m afraid I will never again move myself enough to become tired, truly deliciously exhausted. Right now, deep inside, I fear that this cold will take all this from me, and more, permanently. Yes, the flu can be dangerous, but the common cold generally isn’t. Certainly not in the way other things I’ve been through are dangerous. It is simply not proportional that I should feel the need to reassert my ability to take walks, make soup, and write words in the face of a cold. I rest so vigorously when I am vigorous, why can I not rest when I am weak?

Because that is what I fear: weakness. Physical, embodied, my-body-lacks-the-chemistry-and-physics-it-needs-to-think-and-move-and-do-all-the-things-that-make-me-me weakness. And, to be fair, not without reason. But I dread that fear so much, that I will keep trying to prove to myself that I am not weak as soon as I begin to feel weak. Which—let’s be honest—is kind of hilarious. I mean, maybe I don’t have a frail constitution at all, maybe it’s just that I go into hyperactive overdrive as soon as I subconsciously perceive that I am coming down with something. That is usually the pattern. I’ll have a day where I did ALL THE THINGS and then come down with something that night or the next morning. I’ve always assumed that this is proof that I am delicately constructed, but I am realizing, literally for the first time as I am writing this here, that it is entirely possible that I so fear weakness that I subconsciously assert strength—by doing all the things—in the very early stages of illness when my body knows I’m sick but I don’t consciously know yet, thereby exhausting myself and making myself sicker when the illness blooms. This is uh…. well, this is exactly the kind of thing I would do.

It is funny. We’re all very funny with our little interior twitches, aren’t we? There is an obvious answer here, an obvious assignment even: make peace with weakness. Because the reality is that weakness is a fact of life for nearly everyone, at least eventually. If nothing else, if I am blessed with long life I will likely live to know a depth of physical weakness I cannot even imagine now in my late thirties. But I will still be me, because I am not just the things I can do. None of us are. That is, I think, the fear underneath my fear of weakness, if I cannot do such and such things, do I even exist? Yes. I do. I know that, but I don’t have the knowing of it. Weakness is not the thing to fear, misplacing the essence of who you are in your ability to do is what is to be feared. But as I said above, I am a slow learner, and must be told things multiple times.

But I have made it at last, to the stage of surrender and acceptance. Of my cold. Not soon enough to avoid antibiotics and a nasty cough (My lungs! They are so romantic! Constantly, they are trying to LARP Moulin Rouge!) but oh well. Anyway, I am not out of the tunnel yet. And while there is definitely a part of me that is kicking and bucking like a scared horse, I am going to stay in bed. My one concession is this: writing to you.

This has been more of a diary entry than a blog post, I suppose. One of the reasons I love writing so much is that it allows you to see your inner spirals and exit them. Or, at least to see that there are exits you could take. I understand myself better than I did when I started writing this post. Hopefully, I can make at least a small gesture towards putting to use what I’ve learned. Meaning, this time, I will actually convalesce. I will rest even as I’m feeling better, and relish the space. Third time’s the charm.

The art featured in this post is John Collier’s “The Sleeping Beauty”, 1921. Sourced from Artvee.