November 13 is World Kindness Day. At The Tuesday Ten Link-Up, we are honoring the day with kindness posts. If you stop by often, you might realize one key characteristic about me: I am independent stubborn. Since having surgery to repair a hernia, I am unable to go “full speed ahead” or do everything myself all the time. Where I am used to doing several things at once, I must slow down and focus on one task at a time. I feel so much better, and I can feel that my core is stronger, BUT I also feel it the second I’ve done too much. Hernia surgery will teach a person many lessons about being kind to yourself and accepting the kindness of others. These are my Ten:
- I am used to doing everything, doing it a certain way, doing it all at once, and pushing beyond fatigue. Military Wife.
- Sometimes, no one is around to help. Sometimes, learning to do a new thing on your own, realizing you are capable of more than you imagined builds Strength and Wisdom
. - In contrast, stopping when I feel the slightest discomfort, admitting limitation, and doing only one thing at a time is frustrating when I’m used to doing so much more.
- My dad came with groceries, did the cooking and laundry for a week, bought a few more staples while here, AND made me breakfast every morning during my first week of recovery.
- Our church family took over with meals after that. We just finished the leftovers. I’ve only added a few things, with minimal effort (crockpot here, some vegetables, already cooked rotisserie chicken).
- Though an annoyance, perhaps a blessing in disguise that the military doctors “missed” the hernia, because Peter is not deployed. Though he was on-call last week, for the most part, things were manageable.
- I’ve learned to ask for and accept offers of help. When a friend says, “The kids and I want to come visit,” then folds four baskets of laundry and tells you not to do anything, THAT is a big kind of love – shown by acts of service.
- The kids generally are very sweet and helpful through this time. Madilynn goes from extra snuggly to just out of reach… she figured out I’m not supposed to lift her.
- I didn’t realize how much I’d been ignoring the signs that something was wrong, compensating for the hernia until a couple of months ago. Sometimes being SuperMom means admitting something needs fixing, and you can’t do it alone.
- As I look forward, regaining physical strength and endurance, I know I need to take it slowly. I also know the changes I make for health and fitness from this point forward need to stick better than in the past. Building slowly seems like the best way to create lifelong habits.
