Injury to my index finger

This is my reflection about injuring my right index finger that I want to share with you.

There is a lot to learn from this, and think about others around you who are also suffering from their physical or emotional health.

The night that it happened I need to scream out and swear and get angry.

Unfortunately, I couldn't as others were sleeping in the house and I didn't want to wake them up. They needed their sleep.

So, I had to manage by myself.

It was very painful and it was hard to control the bleeding.

Hindsight is so easy but at the time I could not be bothered to take any painkillers or find any decent dressing.

I thought it was just a tiny wound and it would be fine with the plaster, And all I could find were kiddies plasters.

As the initial anger settled I had to think about first aid, physical and emotional.

I allowed myself to feel all the negative unhappy emotions and I went to bed feeling very sorry for myself.

During the next few days I allowed space for grief reaction, rather than fighting it.

I needed to process what had happened and accept the reality of the new situation.

I laughed about it and joked with others around me.

I could laugh at myself, as more than 48 hours later, I acknowledged that I needed to seek medical attention rather than doing it to myself.

In fact, I probably slowed down the healing by sticking a simple plaster on it.

My daughter laughed at me as I made such a fuss.

My house and kitchen were not as clean as I normally keep it but I had to let it go.

I had to keep the dressing dry and clean for as long as possible, 72 hours.

There was nothing I could do but accept the reality of my situation.

The human body is excellent at healing itself and there is nothing we can do to speed it up.

We have to accept the reality about situation rather than fighting it.

There is a problem so we must find a solution.

(One solution was to get my daughter to do the housework which proved to be very difficult.)

We have to accept that other people's standard of work it's not the same as ours.

I learned to be grateful for whatever tiny work my daughter did for me.

Life is hard life is not easy.

We have to accept the reality of what happened.

Life is forever changing.

And this too shall pass.

And thankfully it has as my finger has healed and I have a fantastic scar to show for it.

Allow time and space for physical and emotional healing; both are important.

We can deal with the physical healing as it is here in front of us.

But we ignore and try to forget the emotional side of us.

It was a tough time, but by allowing myself to let out the internal pains I have recovered.

Let's talk, here is the link to my diary: https://zcal.co/elizabeth-rozario/Lets-talk

#dying #ageingparents #bereavement