Tag: Ed

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Holding the Ladder

When Ed and I were first dating, Ed talked about his love for skiing. He went on a big ski trip every winter, and one of our first dates was with his ski buddies. We met them for dinner so that they could look at pictures from their recent trip to ski in Utah.

Ed was so eager to have me learn his favorite sport that he took me skiing as soon as he could. Which is not easy here in the Midwest. Due to a fear of heights, I ended up blubbering in the middle of the ski hill, terrified to keep going down. Ed patiently talked me down that ski hill.

Unlike me, Ed seems fearless. Remember the time we both rode the zip line? Ed showed abandon as he careened over Beaver Meadow!

I, on the other hand, waited until the very last minute to zoom the zip line. I was trembling in my boots and could barely get up the courage to climb up the pole. But with Ed’s encouragement, I was able to do it.

On a camping trip, after climbing to the top of a bluff in Wisconsin, I walked closer to the edge to see the view. Ed suddenly yelled at me, “STOP!” Imagine my surprise! He’s back by a tree, and while I was nowhere close enough to the edge to actually fall off, I could clearly see Ed was very nervous. I asked him what was wrong, and the truth came out. Ed is afraid of heights.

“What about skiing?” I asked him.

“That’s different!” Ed replied, but I really didn’t quite understand.

Last week, Ed was on the roof, meaning to clean out the gutters. He came inside, shaking his head. “I just don’t know what to do,” he says. “Maybe I need to pay someone to clean the gutters.”

I was surprised to hear these words come out of my frugal husband’s mouth. “What’s stopping you from doing it?” I say.

“I’m afraid,” is the answer. Oh. That pesky fear of heights.

“Let’s go,” I say, and I follow Ed outside to hold the ladder for him. That’s all he needed. Even though we both knew I really wasn’t doing much good by holding the ladder, just having me out there made Ed feel better.

It’s nice to be able to hold Ed’s ladder for him. Sometimes it seems like Ed is the one who is always supporting me; I’m the one with the crisis, I’m the one who’s falling apart, I’m the one who’s needy. Holding Ed’s ladder reminded me that we’re partners in this marriage. He needs me, too. I hold his ladder; he holds mine.

Whose ladder do you hold?

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A S-tick-y Situation

This post is coming to you from a new laptop! Ed went out last Friday and bought us a new Gateway since our old Dell has slowed down to a snail’s pace. Isn’t he the BEST?!?

I think Ed might be feeling sorry for me. I haven’t been feeling well lately, but now I’m started to feel better.

A couple of weeks ago, I had just taken a shower and was toweling off when I noticed something. It was a freckle that really shouldn’t have been there. A freckle that stuck out from my skin. A freckle that wasn’t a freckle after all…it was a freckle with legs. Turns out that freckle was a deer tick. As my brain was panicking, I carefully looked myself over and found a couple more ticks, yanked them off, and then ran downstairs to check Lily and Emmy. I found three deer ticks on each of them. I’m shuddering as I type this…ew, ew, EW!

We had just spent the weekend hiking in the woods down in Kentucky, which is where I think we got the ticks. The girls’ pediatrician put them on antibiotics just as a precaution against Lyme disease. She suggested I see my doctor as well, since the ticks were embedded in our skin for two to three days already. (Excuse me while I shudder some more — EW!)

My doctor put me on an antibiotic as well, only I was to take the super-duper killer of that nasty Lyme bacteria, while the girls took amoxicillin since they are too young to take the super-duper antibiotic. My system did not respond well to this medication. I felt like such a wimp. I’ve weathered cancer, for heaven’s sake, and chemo, and two Cesarean sections, and this antibiotic whipped me.

The first morning I took doxycyline, I felt more nauseous than I ever have before. After telling myself, “I won’t throw up, I won’t throw up,” I finally threw up my breakfast. Me, who never threw up once during chemo! My nausea was so bad that the doctor prescribed an anti-nausea medication. Then there was heartburn. The Saturday night after I had started taking the medicine, my chest was burning so bad that I couldn’t sleep. The next day, I noticed that I was having a lot of pain when I was swallowing food. The pain continued to get worse, right in the middle of my chest. On Tuesday, I begged my doctor to let me stop taking the doxycyline. She agreed. By Thursday, every time I swallowed, pain stabbed throughout my chest and into my back. Either the heartburn or the medication had damaged the lining of my esophagus. I called the doctor again, and she prescribed a medicine to help my esophagus heal. And all this was happening because I was taking medicine to prevent Lyme disease…I was never actually sick! I’m finally able to eat without pain, and the constant heartburn feeling I was having is gone.

Ed had some deer ticks on him as well, but his doctor didn’t prescribe anything. Ed is supposed to be watchful and check in with his doctor over the next couple of weeks.

Meanwhile, the girls have started school and I began a new, part time job. I supposed it’s a good thing that time just keeps rolling; I barely had time to feel sorry for myself. So there you go…an explanation at last!