Time Out

The living room was large and open, the main room of the house, with a kitchen and dining area off to the side, no doors except the one to the master bedroom.

Yet it felt like a prison. Especially where I lay on the sofa that summer morning, my gaze drifting aimlessly from the ceiling to the television, to the framed school pictures of my kids, to my desk with its two Dell computers.

I had been lying like that for several days, ever since the doctor told me I’d reinjured my spinal column after recovering from neck surgery. Any time I sat, stood or even so much as lifted my head, spinal fluid leaked from my brain, plunging me into waves of nausea and splitting headaches. “Bed rest is the only cure,” the doctor had said.

I was speechless. Bed rest?! “How long?” I’d managed to ask.

“Indefinite,” the doctor had replied. “We’ll know you’re healed when you can raise your head without pain. It could take weeks. Maybe months.”

It was the last, the absolute last thing I’d wanted to hear. I had already lost six weeks recovering from the surgery. I didn’t have another six to spend lying like a lump on my sofa. I was busy! I worked 80-hour weeks as a supervisor at Dell. That is, I spent at least 60 hours at the office, then came home and checked e-mails until I went to sleep. Literally. I took my laptop to bed.

On top of that, I was on my church vestry, leading the charge to boost outreach to teens in our small Austin suburb. I volunteered at the community theater, enrolled my kids in all kinds of activities and taught my girls’ Sunday school class. For some reason, the girls didn’t seem too thrilled to have Mom as their teacher. But it was one of the few times I got to see them all week, so I was sure, deep down, they appreciated it.

Free time? What was that? Once in a while I was lucky enough to get in a few hours of gardening. The doctor told me I had to lie with my head lower than my shoulders to prevent the spinal fluid from draining. That meant I couldn’t even hold a laptop.

Sprawled on the living room sofa that morning, I felt particularly helpless. E-mails were piling up in those computers. Weeds were pushing up in the garden. What would I miss at that month’s vestry meeting? Would the kids keep up with their homework without me to check?