rivka

[This is an entry I had in mind for yesterday, but with one thing and another I never got to it.]

The 27th of December marks the five-year anniversary of my artificial hip. Happy anniversary to us! It's been a stable and rewarding relationship, and I hope that we may look forward to many more years together. They told me before surgery to expect 15-20 years of use from it, but then they also told me afterwards that I have an exceptionally good placement. It may last longer.

The 27th of December also marks the second-longest time I've ever gone without major surgery. Actually, I probably passed that mark some six months ago; I'm not entirely sure of the dates of the operations I had when I was a baby. I believe that by the age of two I'd had three surgeries. Then one each at ages six, seven, nine, ten, thirteen, nineteen, twenty, and twenty-three. I'm twenty-eight now and I haven't had surgery since the 27th of December 1996. I don't even have any surgeries looming on the horizon. Not until I have to have the artificial hip replaced sometime around age forty.

Tears are welling up in my eyes right now. But wait, there's more: there's a bottle of codeine in my medicine cabinet, and the date on the prescription is January 1997. I haven't needed more than one or two codeine pills since then. My custom crutches have been in the back of a closet in my last three apartments, and I've never needed to use them. And when I take my cane with me because I'm going to be doing something strenuous, like an art museum, I'm prone to leaving it behind. I'm not used to carrying it anymore.

I don't think there's anyone reading this who knew me Before. Many of you who are particularly dear to me are people I met fairly shortly After, when I was still struggling with my immediate post-surgery recovery. Probably some of you danced with me at the virtual party I gave in alt.callahans when the doctor told me I could stop using my cane - which was long before I could really dance outside of virtual space.

If you know me at all well, you've seen me have hip pain. You've had me ask you to fetch something or lift something, you've seen me take ibuprofen, you've noticed my limp, you've allowed for my shortened walking distance, you've seen me sit out to rest after a couple of dances. You've seen me talk about pain and disability issues online. If you know me very well, there are places you know to avoid touching: the front of the hipbone, the more sensitive scars.

But most of my current friends have never held my hand at a hospital bedside. Most of my current friends have never heard me weep from physical pain, have never seen how gracefully and instinctively I handle crutches, have never had to make plans that center on me not having to walk even a single city block. You haven't seen the depressive effect that chronic codeine use has on my mood and personality. You've never had to tie my shoes. You've never had me shrink from a caress because my nerve endings were so raw I couldn't bear to be touched. Those things are not a part of my life anymore. You can know me, share my deepest secrets, be the person I turn to in need, love me, sleep with me, marry me... and not have to see those things, not have to know those things, not have to plan for those things.

Because of this. This unutterably beautiful ball-topped titanium spike, with its matching plastic socket. They gave me one to hold, at the presurgical appointment; it was cold and smooth and surprisingly small. I had no idea what it would do. What we would do together. I didn't dare to hope that it would be like this. I didn't imagine that someday my days of severe disability would be so far behind me that I would have whole intimate social circles who hadn't seen them. It seemed too much to ask.

My dear right hip,

It's been five years, and I love you more today than I did the day we met, more than I did when we first began to learn what we could do together. Sometimes I get bogged down in our day to day annoyances and limitations, and lose sight of what you've given me. But what we have is beautiful, more so than I ever could have imagined. You free me to be more myself. Thank you so much.

Love,
Rivka