Menopausal Mother

    Most people are familiar with the "Five Stages Of Grief" made popular by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in the early 70's. Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance are all part of the grieving process.

     While battling a nasty head cold this past week, I realized that these five stages are applicable to what I'm feeling as I trudge through my coughing-sniffling-sneezing phase. I sound like a barking seal and have been holed up in my house for days because the cough is as loud as an air raid siren. No one needs to see me in my ratty bathrobe that has pockets bulging with used tissues. If I didn't know any better, I'd swear this is how a zombie apocalypse begins.

     I've also been taking that "feed a cold, starve a fever" saying way too far. I don't have a fever, so I feel justified in stuffing my miserable, aching self with a stack of pancakes and a warm bowl of mac & cheese. There's a reason these gastronomic pleasures are called "comfort foods." This is also why I'm living in my bathrobe lately….because chances are my jeans won't fit.

     If you've already been slammed with this season's new illnesses, I'm sure you'll relate to these five stages of a head cold:

DENIAL:  "I don't have a cold. It's just my allergies acting up. And the only reason my body aches is because I overdid it at the gym yesterday. There's no way I'm getting sick right now---only two days before my vacation begins. I'll just drink a gallon of orange juice, pop some throat lozenges , and go to bed early. I'm sure I'll be fine in the morning."

ANGER: "Who the hell gave me this cold?!? No one else in my family has been sick. I'll bet it was that guy hacking up a lung behind me in the 10-Items-Or-Less line at the grocery store. This is all his fault. How dare he set foot in public. He may have started a flu pandemic! If this coughing gets any worse, I'm going to put myself in an isolation tank for two weeks. At least it will get me out of doing housework for awhile. I'm far too weak to push a vacuum."

BARGAINING:  "Dear God, if you wipe away these cold symptoms right now, I promise to stop cursing so much at bad drivers. I'll even build a habitat for all the ferrel cats in the neighborhood. Better yet, I'll make dentures for all the elderly crocodiles living in the Everglades. I promise to do anything you ask, if you just make this head cold disappear."

DEPRESSION: "10 days and I still can't get out of bed. According to Web MD, I have a rare disease that comes from exposure to the dust on a rhino's horn. Although I have not been to a zoo in five years and as far as I know, no one on the block has a rhino stashed in their backyard. I'm exhausted and drowning in nasal spray. My gawd, I'm going to die right here in my recliner….in my ratty bathrobe, with two Vick's Inhalers shoved up my nostrils. If I die tonight, the mortician won't need to embalm me because I'll have enough cold medicine in my system to keep my body preserved for years."

ACCEPTANCE: "Okay, I'm not dying, even though I look and sound like I have the Black Plague. I just need to adjust to breathing out of my mouth and having a head that feels like it has been filled with sand bags. At this point, I'd be willing to convert to Scientology if it meant having one phlegm-free day.

     Now that I've been through the five stages of a head cold, I've forgiven the stranger who shared his germs with me at the grocery store, bargained my way into a larger size pair of jeans and decided that there will be no more trips to the rhino exhibit at the zoo.

   
      As I'm waiting in the emergency clinic to get my injured hand stitched up, I'm wondering how the heck I got here in the first place. FACT #1: Baby gates, pugs and glass mugs don't mix. FACT#2: I'm a klutz.
     I rarely get sick or have injuries, but when I do, I go big. When I was a little kid, I pestered our family German Shepherd one night while he was eating.... and he decided my face looked like a pork chop. Four stitches just below the eye taught me never to come between a dog and his Alpo.
     In high school on the eve of an important band competition, I got bit by a spider on my arm. I knew if I told my parents, they would never let me go to the out-of-town competition, so I kept my mouth shut. The next morning the bus driver had to stop frequently to let me ralph on the side of the road. All dignity was lost at that point, but for once I didn't care how green or disheveled I looked to the others on the bus. My arm felt like it was on fire and all I could think about was finishing the competition and getting back home.
     When the contest ended later that day, I pulled back my sleeve to reveal angry, red tracks drag racing up my arm toward my heart. "Um....excuse me....is there a doctor in the house?" The green infection that the doctor drained from my arm looked like something an alien would spew after eating our GMO enhanced foods.
 
      My freshman year of college I decided to get sporty (or at least look like I was) and invited my roommate to play Frisbee on the front lawn of our dorm. I'm about as athletic as an elephant on the U.S.  Olympic Swim Team, but I had an ulterior motive--- to attract the attention of some M.U. males who strolled across our campus. It was all fun and games until my 150 pound friend tackled me for the Frisbee and fell on my left arm, snapping both bones in half. Good thing shock set in when I saw the middle of my arm curve into a backward "L" like a misshapen piece of pasta. A metal plate, five screws and one pin later, I had a bionic arm that set off all the alarms at the airport.
     Fast Forward two years---same college, different friends. I slipped down a flight of icy stairs and busted up my ankle. Back to the same hospital, cast and crutches complete. My fall had absolutely nothing to do with the "hunch punch" served at a certain sorority party. I figured I might start a new fashion trend that spring when I attended a formal affair---nothing speaks sexy more than a college coed hobbling through a line dance with a cast on her leg.
     A few months after my graduation, I ended up in the same E.R. for a third time with a fractured elbow from a fall in a parking lot.

     Things remained quiet for several years until I decided it might be fun to experience labor pains. My mother popped out babies faster than a bubble blower, so I assumed it would be the same for me. WRONG. Four kids and four c-sections later, I am the proud owner of a belly that looks like I have a road map to The land Down Under stamped across my skin.
   
      And then there was the infamous Night Of The Living Dead experience. Imagine a romantic anniversary celebration at a resort with candles, flowers, champagne....and a wife with her head in the toilet, yacking up Kung Pao Chicken and imported Italian chocolates. I had one of those creepy, out-of-body experiences where I gazed down and saw myself curled into the fetal position (with an uncanny resemblance to a gray, uncooked shrimp) on the bathroom tile. The paramedics arrived just in time to pump my body with the elixir of life and cart me off to the nearest hospital.

     You know that part in your wedding vows where you SWEAR you'll stick by your spouse through sickness and in health? I gave that vow a run for its money that night in the hospital. What didn't come out of my mouth came out the other end and even the nurses refused to handle me since the doctors were unable to identify what virus I had. I knew it was bad when the staff kept coming in with masks on their faces and spraying my area with disinfectants and air fresheners. The Hubs never left my side and cleaned me up when no one else would. That, folks, is someone who takes their vows seriously.
   
      Today as I leave the emergency clinic with eight stitches, I wish I could tell you that the nasty condition of my zombie-looking hand was due to a bar fight. And that the other guy's face looks much worse than my hand. Sadly, my accident can only be blamed on my klutziness. Hopping over a baby gate with a glass mug in my hand while trying not to step on two, sleeping pugs is a recipe for disaster. I have to keep reminding myself that despite all my booty shaking in Zumba class, I am long past the age of twenty and not nearly as agile. I tripped and fell when my toe caught on the gate, causing me to land on the shards of glass from the broken mug. I never realized how badly a hand injury bleeds---my kitchen looked like the inside of a slaughterhouse.
     As the doctor stitched me up, he apologized for the scar it would leave. I laughed and showed him all the others I have. The way I see it, each one is a new story to share with the grandkids some day.
     And in typical blogger fashion, I took pictures of my bloody, stitched-up hand for the blog post that was already taking shape in my head.
     When we left the emergency clinic, I told The Hubs that I thought I deserved chocolate for my ordeal. He smirked and said that at my age, what I REALLY needed was a Life Alert necklace.
     I've survived not only these injuries and illnesses but multiple hurricanes and plenty of car accidents....so bring it on, Mother Nature and Murphey's Law. This Queen of Klutz might take a fall but she always lands back on her feet.



****Meno Mama is featured over at The Sadder But Wiser Girl blog, revealing her reasons for being called, "The Squirrel Whisperer." Stop by and say hello!