All shingled up

This week, I’m laid up with shingles. It means I’m missing my last working week of the year, last coffee runs and lunches with workmates, Secret Santa, final catch-ups with friends before we gather with our families over Christmas. It makes me sad. I was eagerly looking forward to being part of those things. But it makes me glad to be sad. It reveals how much I love my life, working with a dream team of marvellous people, having a bunch of sensational friends I’ll miss seeing one last time this year. What’s not to miss?

But my body is crying out for rest. I’ve been neglectful thus far. My washing’s on the line, my desk organised and tucked away till next year. I hauled my bones up the street to buy Christmas cards yesterday. I’m sitting up writing instead of lying down and breathing more deeply – I’m finding it very hard to be still for any length of time. All the daily rituals I perform have become part of my body’s learned movements. To not have to perform them is a challenge.

Shingles is brought on by stress, which is worrying, because I wasn’t aware of feeling stressed. Now, I feel weak in my muscles and highly emotional, like I’m on the verge of tears all the time. It’s evidently sparked a compulsion to write about how it’s affecting me.

But I also feel driven by the urge to go with this flow, whatever it may bring. Keep breathing through it. Tune into my body with more dedicated attention, and listen up. I can see my whole self needs this week to realise the gap between the way I actually look after myself (shabbily) and the way I want to look after myself (nurturingly).

St Kilda sunset, November 2019.

A dear friend told me that in her culture shingles are a blessing in disguise, a message from the Fire Goddess to stop, cleanse and heal. Women gather round to help the patient release excess heat from the body, bring it coolness and calmness. I love this perspective, and her remedies are already helping to soothe my nerves.

Colour me thankful for this illness with its funny name. It’s enforced rest, and opened my eyes even wider to the love and support of my family and friends who’ve come round with supplies, opened their homes to me, sent me messages and called to check up on me each day. I’m feeling supported from all corners, and nestled in that warm embrace, I shall now put down the laptop, don my eye mask, and actually properly rest.

See you on the other side. Thank you for reading.