Balance

F. Scott Fitzgerald said, 'The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.' I make no claims to a first-rate intelligence but, since the accident, my life has been a complex balance of two opposing world views.

On the one hand, I am grateful. I am grateful in ways I have never previously experienced gratitude. I am grateful to be able to move, to get up by myself, to walk around the house and gardens; I am grateful to be able to switch on my computer and check my emails without being dependent upon someone else; I am grateful to feel the warmth of my daughters' hugs and the weight of my kittens when they curl, purring, in my lap. If ever there was a time for thanksgiving, these past few weeks have been it.

Slightly more than two weeks ago, I spent many hours strapped to a board in a trauma unit in Burlington, Vermont, as news of my injuries gradually filtered back from doctors. There had been endless x-rays and CT scans and, initially, discussions covered all my various injuries - the lacerations across my head, my possibly fractured left elbow, the pain across my right hip and pelvis. But the second CT scan of my upper spine changed the debate. Iola and Maya love playing a card game called 'Top Trumps'. The sets of cards might be animals from the rainforest, or characters from movies - say, Star Wars or The Lord of the Rings - or superheroes (and I can't write this without acknowledging the irony that the first result in my Google image search for Top Trumps produced Superman. Christopher Reeves broke his first and second vertebrae, whereas I only smashed my 6th and 7th. I was lucky). Each top trumps card has a quantified score for a range of categories. In terms of my injury, the spinal fractures top-trumped all my other injuries.

Being strapped to a board: for 18 hours is surreal: I stared upwards at the same small square of ceiling and, occasionally, faces appeared in the tiny square of my vision. One of those faces, in the early hours of Friday morning, was a youthful looking orthopedic surgeon with very blue eyes.
'You've broken two vertebrae in your neck,' he stated.
I knew this - a nurse had already told me. Vertebrae - little bones - not like breaking a femur, I thought. Not like breaking something big. I had imagined I would need to wear a collar for a few weeks and everything would fuse back where it should be. I tried to nod, realized I couldn't, and mouthed the word 'yes'.
'So, we're going to operate today. We need to stabilize things. We're going to fuse the 4 vertebrae - C5 to T1 - together, insert steel pins and screw these into the bone.'
I think I said something very foolish, such as 'Are you sure?' or 'Is that a good idea?' or 'Will I still be able to do yoga?' In fairness, I had been lying on my back hoping the pain would soon stop and I would be allowed to go home, while the surgeon had been looking at x-rays and CT scans and wondering how his team could put me back together without paralyzing me.
'What are the risks of the operation?' I asked, trying to sound grown-up, trying to sound in control of what was happening, as though this was all familiar to me, as though this discussion was nothing more than a confidence trick where, if I said the right thing, the prognosis would miraculously change. I expected the surgeon to say something about infection or the risks of general anesthetic.
'If the spinal cord is damaged,' the blue-eyed surgeon said, 'you'll probably retain some sensation and movement in your upper shoulders.'
'My shoulders?' The words dripped slowly into my consciousness as though a tap was leaking somewhere. 'I'd be quadraplegic?' And the words twisted around my mind so that I was thinking about The Who and Quadrophenia and wondering if I'd used the right word, while the doctor told me that was a real risk.

That day was harder on Nathan than me. When he visited later that morning, he had to sign the forms on my behalf because my hands didn't work. He had to acknowledge my awareness of the risk I might become paralyzed; he had to talk through every possible detail while we drafted a living will together. I only had to stare at my tiny square of ceiling, while he had to take in the entire picture and then live out the long hours of the operation later that day while I was unconscious.

And, I am grateful. Grateful in ways I never imagined, grateful for things I have previously always taken for granted. And, on the other hand, I am also frustrated and cross and in pain. I am unable to unpack the boxes in our new home, unable to climb the mountain, unable to throw the ball for the dog or split wood or knead bread. It is quite possible I will never be able to ride my bike again because of the stress it would put upon my neck. It is likely that I won't know for another year whether the nerve damage pain in my hands will resolve itself, or whether I will just have to learn to live with the pain.

But, to return to Fitzgerald, I don't have a first-rate intelligence, I am no genius, and the two perspectives can't successfully coexist in my mind. Writing this, I realize how small a thing my frustrations are, because really I am just very, very grateful. And that thought top-trumps everything else.