surgery

Today I'm meeting my surgeon. This is a first - I've never had surgery before hence I've never had a surgeon. I've met surgeons. My best friend's father when I was growing up. Various people at parties. But no one who would be slicing into me in the near future. 

A quick aside: I'm very queasy. I couldn't do animal dissection when I was in junior high. I've been a vegetarian for 20+ years
I'm a firm believer that anything inside a body isn't meant for me to see. 

I'm nervous. Which has been happening a lot lately. This isn't just low level anxiety. This is my entire abdomen clenched and churning. My teeth grinding. My lungs constricted. 

This is fear. 

Fear of the unknown. Fear of a stranger slicing into me. Fear of being chemically knocked unconscious. Fear of not being in control. 

I love being in control or at least the illusion that I am. And while I've learned to ease up on that in a major way, stress ramps it way back up again. Which is a huge mind fuck because the angst is about situations completely out of my control. It's a classic lose/lose situation. 

I haven't found my way around that yet. Although I do know there is no way around. I have no choice but to live it. To get through it. To feel what I feel and know that I'll be fine on the other side. 

Sometimes though, I lose track of the other side. 

Oh. Maybe it's not waiting to get there to be fine. Maybe I'm fine here, underneath it all. 

Or maybe it's not a matter of fine. Maybe it's learning to live in it is what it is.