Sunday, March 28, 2010

Pain and parenting

Like most parents I have moments when I doubt that I am a reasonably good father and more or less loved by my kids. In all honesty though, most of the time I know that it is not true and whatever issues I might have are very far away from creating a situation where my 2 boys do not like or love me.

Pain however is not a good companion to parenting, at least for me. I guess that people react individually to pain but I am well aware that I become a grumpy, irritable and not very likeable person when I am in pain or sick. Even worse if it is both sick and in pain.

So for more than a week my dear beloved Mia and the boys Bradley and Eric has had to live with a man who, when not being passed out by medics or exhaustion, is likely to ignite and shout for nothing, who hates lying on the sofa the whole day even though that is the best position/cure for the pain and generally gets out of line on a regular basis.

Good then that I do whatever I can when I am on the ups and not the downs. I like cooking. So I spent the better part of Saturday making a cake, pancakes for lunch, preparing a pizza for dinner (Mia did everything but the dough though and she is really good at that) and then collapsing on the sofa. Today we went to the local car race course Donnybrook to watch karting carrying a cooler box with hot dogs and cold drinks/beers. That it took around 3 hours before I had to go home is another story.

I guess all we can do is to do our best and be aware of that it is not always enough and then try to make up for the bad moments on the good days.

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

The sofa

Am stuck on the sofa since Friday following surgery on the left foot. To be more precise, surgery inside the sole of the foot. And I can think of few more inconvenient places to have stitches etc as it effectively renders me immobile.

It is tricky, most tiring and occasionally painful to move around. I am, of course, expected to keep it dry and reasonably clean, not so easy to achieve either in this case. So the sofa it is and now being on the fourth day I am sick and tired of it. It does not help that power disappears for hours at a time ever so often.

Internet from home, with a 3G-modem, is giving an at best "fast as dialup" experience but at least I can just keep it on and try and wait it out. Sometimes it just stops, sometimes it is quite good. Try to work as best I can but even that not too easy since the painkiller/anti-inflammatory medicines I take make me rather drowsy.

Can not wait for Friday when this is supposed to come off!