Next Week, When I Feel Better...

Back in April I was in good shape. I was walking, swimming and doing intervals on the treadmill. I had just started horse riding again and had got up to rides of about half an hour. I'd knocked about 5cm off my waist measurement. And then I got Covid.

Due to living with heart failure, I was able to get antiviral meds fairly quickly. But even so, the virus took a toll on pretty much every system of my body. My senses were dulled. I was exhausted and shaky. I felt like I had been pulled apart and put back together incorrectly.

My doctor advised me to take it easy for at least a couple of months in order to avoid ending up with long Covid. No exercise, minimal work, naps if possible. It took me several weeks to start to feel sort of normal again. Of course then it was winter, so I was mostly trying to stay warm and catch up on work. Then it was kidding season, so most of my time was taken up caring for goats. Then, when I tried to work on my fitness again, I found it way harder than I remembered.

I complained to my doctor about poor sleep. She suggested a sleep psychologist, but getting in to see one proved to be impossible. Then she took another look at my last round of blood tests and noticed that I had signs of iron deficiency. After a follow up test to confirm, she suggested an iron infusion. I had this done a few weeks ago.

Before the infusion I honestly felt like my light was dimming. My energy levels were steadily decreasing, and when I stood up or tried to walk anywhere it was like I could feel the oxygen draining from my body. I had high hopes for that iron infusion, because around the same time my cardiologist found that my heart condition has worsened after many years of stability.

Now, being deficient in iron means that the heart has to work harder because the blood carries less oxygen. Whether the worsening of my heart function is due to Covid, iron deficiency, or just years of doing its job in substandard conditions, is hard to say. A couple of weeks after the iron infusion I was finally starting to feel stronger. I had big plans for the next few months. This was a week ago. Then on Tuesday I bent to pick up a bucket in the barn and felt a huge jolt of pain through my lower back.

I managed to sit down and phone my son who was in the house. He alerted my partner and my partner helped me back to the house while my son finished feeding the animals.

At that point I looked like this...

Absolutely defeated and in a lot of pain. This is not the first time I have hurt my back, and last time it took over a year for me to be able to touch my toes again.

I felt like it was all stacking against me. Iron deficiency and mobility issues on top of my heart problems. Will I ever be well enough to get on with my life again?

After two days of bed rest and periodic cold therapy, my back began to settle down. This past week has been a blur. I still can't put my own socks on, and anything on the floor might as well be on another planet, but I can walk normally and put on my long rubber boots and mostly dress and care for myself. I may have got off lightly this time, but it has given me a big fright, and I will be a lot kinder to my poor old back in future.

At 45yo, after years of living with a chronic health condition, I do not take my physical health for granted. I have finally got my mental health sorted and I hope to get a couple more good decades out of my body. There are tasks I won't be able to do this spring and summer, but with just a little luck I'll be able to keep working in my pottery studio and do what I had planned with my ponies.

For a moment I thought I had lost it all, but I have found a way forward. I keep walking, keep doing gentle stretches, and let time do its thing. Maybe I'll need heart surgery in the next year or so, but there is a good chance that after all the pain I'll be better than before. Finding a path through the setbacks is hard, being forced to go slow is frustrating, but as long as I can chart a course from here to where I want to be I can keep taking the steps I need to get there.