Wallet? What wallet?

"Why do I feel so spacey and forgetful? I feel like I live in a cotton ball", I asked my doctor this morning at my appointment. She said that it is the Oxycod, the medicine I take for pain. I have been taking it now for about three weeks, starting from the surgery. It is morphine based. I like it so much because it totally takes the pain down, and has no side effects... or so I thought.

Twice today I called Robert, and twice I had to hand up right after saying "hi" because I completely forgot what I called to say. I did call back afterward when I remembered, but my mind is completely on s l ow-m o e. In many of my conversations, in Hebrew or in English, my brain just stops, mid-thought. I have to focus lots of brain energy to get the next word out, and hope the person I am talking to doesn't think I am a total stupido. Talking to my doctor today, it was like talking with an almost dead battery, through a cotton ball of a brain. I kept apologizing, but she was totally nonplussed.

After the appointment, I ate the fruit and the sandwich that I had with me (techina on yummy whole wheat home-baked bread), hoping that being hungry was the problem (I was on a short fast for my 10:00 am blood test). I went on to the only other "errand" I planned... but in retrospect, I should've gone home. Two things for one morning is too much for me at this point.

But, I was determined to get Azriel's tricycle for his birthday present. So after the trike was chosen, I had a very nice time talking to the shop keeper about our children. I paid, and carefully put the credit card and receipt away. She helped me get the trike into Kermit.

Then I spotted a store nearby that I wanted to pop into. As I was browsing around there, I get this call on the cell from some man who asks me "is your name Sarah Rachel Klein?", and asked my address. I was a bit thrown off, but I played along (maybe this was the lotto guy telling me I won? Don't you love how these thoughts fleet through your mind?). Then he said that he has my wallet, and asks if I am still in the neighborhood. In short, he came to the store I was in and retured it to me. He said he called my cell phone by finding the number on a receipt in the wallet. I gave him a heartfelt bracha (blessing) for himself and his family, the new year, everything I could think of.

THEN... and this is the amazing part folks...
It happened again.
I paid for something in that second store, and started to walk away... WITHOUT MY WALLET!!!!!!! It was sitting there on the counter top where I paid!!!!!! The people in that store just witnessed the man returning my wallet a mere 15 minutes beforehand. I had my hand on the door handle, and the little Yemenite woman who owns the store says "oh honey! Your wallet!" After my look of utter disbelief and shock, she suggested, so sweetly, maybe I should take a nap when I get home.

I did exactly that.

I got lucky today. I realize I have to be very careful while I am on this medicine. I have to keep life very simple; three places in one morning (health clinic, tricycle store, the other store a few doors down) is way too much. I *know* that, but it just kind of happened.

I am recovering from surgery. My body is warn down from other surgeries, plus a few years of pain, and there is heavy trauma to the area that needs to heal. I am taking a narcotic (temporarily) medicine for the pain. The medicine causes me to be very forgetful, and to feel like my brain synapses are just barely touching each other. If I want to get off that medicine as soon as I can, I have to give my body time to *HEAL*, so it'll hurt less. I need more time to heal than someone else with the same surgery.
I have to overcome what I want in order to give myself what I need.

Knowing it, saying it and writing it. Three directions to get past foggy brain synapses. I gotta just slow down. It's not worth pushing it. I *know* that.

I *really* know that.