Dear Stress

Dear Stress, Let’s break up. No, really.

 

I have a new definition of scary. Scary isn’t having twelve cents in your bank account for the next two weeks because payday came and went in the same hour. Scary isn’t Needing to eek a quarter of tank of gas for a few more days. Scary isn’t having to tell one of your kids their birthday isn’t going to happen in the same amazing week-long celebration as usual this month because of said twelve cents in the bank. Scary has nothing to do with money. 

Scary is thinking for the better part of a week that your world is crashing because Who Knows What is Wrong? Scary is staring down a second set of front-row seats to colon cancer. Scary is having no idea about anything, from what is wrong to how long will it take to fix, to is it fixable at all. 

 

Relief is finding out it is “just” needing to have a gallbladder out. Relief is finding out you need to figure out how to pay for the co-pay instead of figuring out how to pay for an ongoing fight with cancer or a funeral. Relief is knowing it’s a super easy and common surgery. Relief is realizing your entire body aches because it’s been tense for so long that it no longer hurts because other things are busy being more important and it’s your new normal.

 

My husband is my World. He is my best friend. He is my life partner. He is the father of my children. He grounds me when I spend too much time imagining what-ifs and not enough time worrying about today. He reminds me look forward to the “prize at the end” when I spend too much time worrying about today and tomorrow. It was terrifying imaging the “prize at the end” coming without him by my side to enjoy it. I would rather have no idea where my income is coming from with him, then have a life-insurance payout without him. I will happily pay into life insurance for the rest of forever and find out I never need it.

 

So, new definition of scary. Everyone told me they could hear the relief in my voice and see it in my posture when we found out it was only a minor surgery. I’m waiting for the other boot to fall, because it always does, but this week, I am reveling in the security that it only means a slight shift in diet, and not a huge shift in my world. 

 

Sure, it’s only forever, that’s not long at all, and some infinities are bigger than others, but right now, my forever is looking amazingly infinite.