Day 43: Next Line Therapy
The day began in a familiar blur. Caffeine lingering in my bloodstream from the amazing matcha lattes & 6(!!) cups of tea the day before, making sleep half-caught and half-lost. I woke up with 1 eye watering from the ache of the neck lump, as though my body was grieving before my mind had the chance. It’s still doing it as I write this.
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There were small sanctuaries, tho: a meeting with Mia, and then tea and tomatoes with the amazing Carole. We spoke of ghosts, oracle cards, premonitions, the invisible threads that tug at our lives. Time zoomed by before I realized I was going to be late! Being with Carole stopped me from over worrying about what was coming. A miracle!
Before I left, Carole slid the most awesome Smizz looking bracelet onto my wrist. It was a little gesture, but it felt like being held. A hug with me. I didn’t know yet how much I would need that for the rest of the day.
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I biked to the hospital fast enough to measure the journey in songs, not miles (1.5 songs civic to south block waiting room! Fast!)
My consultant, someone who has been with me through 6 years of this story so far, took his time. Clearing his throat. Shuffling papers. Concerned about my hospital admissions. Examined my neck / lumps - his finger tips Trying to get ahold of me.
He Spoke with the kind of gentleness that makes heaviness feel a bit lighter. Bundled in care.
He took a run up & said I think i need to refer you to a specialist centre.
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Next line therapy.
The phrase lingers. It feels both clinical and strangely poetic, like a stanza I never meant to write. I can’t help but wonder: if this is the next line, what will the rest of the poem become?
Uncertainty has its own gravity. It asks me to stand inside it, to live alongside it, even as I long to step past it.
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I left with new tests, and new centres, new specialists on the horizon. But in this moment, there is only the space between what has failed and what has not yet begun.
I left with endless paperwork, that I stuffed into my backpack & pulled out my poetry notebook. I sat down & wrote this poem.
And still, the day carried on like nothing had happened. Onto my bike, into a safeguarding meeting, to an iced chai in the middle of town. Friends and strangers passed, pausing to ask how these apts had gone, to hug, to remind me of the soft web of people who keep me tethered.
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By evening, I was trading heat packs for cold for the neck/lumo/ear pain, got caught in the rain, the sky breaking open above me.
It didn’t feel like sadness so much as solidarity. A reminder that the world keeps moving, keeps weeping and blooming, no matter what news I - or anyone else - carry in our pockets.
Next line therapy. Specialist centres.
Maybe it is less about treatment than about living into the mystery of what comes next.