I'm tired. Tired of sick animals, and feeling like I'm never getting anything accomplished. Winter days are so short, by the time I'm done morning chores and setting things up for the day it's 11 or 12. My back has been giving me problems for weeks--probably since I fell while carrying buckets. That is what I really need to take care of. Anyone who has dealt with chronic pain will know how that really tends to affect your mood, energy, sleep quality and tolerance for stresses. I think I wake up somewhere between ten and twenty times a night.
Last night I had a dream where I wanted to take Winston up the mountain, but of course he was lame, so I couldn't go. The worry I have for my animals and things I can't fix is permeating my sleep and pretty much every waking hour. The dream ended with the snowy ground opening up beneath me and falling to my death into a crevasse. Maybe it's the full moon, maybe it's the spirulina I started taking or the mushrooms in our miso, but these dreams are brutal!
Granny Rose had surgery a few weeks ago, and it was pretty awful. We drained her ascites, but then we found little nodules on a few organs, and a strange mass. The problem was that the vet needed to have a better look in there, but the piece of equipment she needed was missing, and pretty much at the same time Rose's comb was going dark, and even though I had been breathing for her the whole time, she apparently wasn't getting enough oxygen exchange. I asked that we just wake her up, since the anesthesia wasn't going well and she wasn't going to be able to spend more time trying to get an idea of what was wrong in there. Miraculously we were able to wake her up after some super fast sewing and a long recovery with extra oxygen. It was very stressful. She is doing pretty well, probably because the fluid is gone, and a few yucky lash eggs were removed. But she will probably fill up again, and when her condition is going downhill we will euthanize her.
Fern is having bowel problems, and I have no idea why. I have few to no options for diagnostics.
The medication that has helped Oakley the most in the past is finally off backorder, so we ordered enough to last almost a year. I'm hoping that with this support his poor damaged lungs will be less like a petri dish and so prone to infection.
So my diagnosis for myself is that I have compassion fatigue that is compounded by having no idea where my life is headed, what I should focus on, and that's just one more unknown that isn't sitting well. I need to be working towards something, and not be constantly thwarted like I feel so much with Oakley's health and training. Don't get me wrong, I like challenges, but when I'm not in a place to take them on, then they are burdens and failures, not challenges. G wants to send me to Iowa for a permaculture design course. We will see. Maybe I should have taken him up on his offer to send me up north for the winter photography course I usually do. Because as much as those courses are extremely mentally and physically challenging, being out there and doing that sort of thing is actually healing for me, and very exciting. I definitely am lacking in wilderness time. It was much easier to get that while living on Vancouver Island. I could manage my needs more easily there. Here, there are just too many people, too much sprawl and so-called civilization.
Compassion fatigue is not a good thing to have in the winter time. But I know I have a lot of things around me to help me come out of it.
So today I will start with getting an appointment to help my back. Maybe some music in the barn, groom the horses, spend some time with the sheep, and the best calming technique I know: sitting with Captain Jack and Kitten in front of the wood stove. But then I'm back where I started--if I take this time for me, then who cleans the house and brings in the firewood before G gets home?
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