The Ebb and Flow of Starting Over

I’m finally coming back to myself. It’s been a long, painful, and exhausting several weeks. The day after my birthday I woke up coughing so violently I thought I was going to throw up. Not a pleasant way to welcome age 65!

For someone who hardly ever gets sick, this was a rude awakening. My first response was a mixture of irritation and incredulity. How could this have happened to me? I make it a point to take care of myself. I eat a healthful diet. I manage my stress. I’m an active woman. In fact, I’d just started a structured exercise program after healing from a month’s long injury, and was feeling strong and energized.

After several days of denial and being generally being pissed off, I grudgingly surrendered to sickness. I had no choice but to accept it, and let it play out. I told myself to hang in there. I reminded myself of the many times in my life I had to crawl out of a dark or painful place and start over. I reassured myself I’d be feeling better in a week. Then I could resume my life and begin the all-too-familiar process of recovery and rebuilding. Yet again.

But with each passing day, instead of feeling better, my cough grew miserably worse. My body ached, I was exhausted, ran a temperature, and generally felt awful. I couldn’t think straight, had zero energy, and couldn’t manage to do a damn thing. Except of course cough. Violently.

In the past, the coughs and colds I’d experienced were centered mostly in my head and sinuses. Never before had I felt this kind of heavy congestion—an ominous gurgling lurking in my upper chest, an inability to breathe deeply, and the sensation of nasty phlegm I couldn’t cough up. Although I tried to shake off a despondent attitude, my hope of recovering fairly quickly was waning as fast as my energy.

At the one-week mark, I was worried. It became clear that I needed medical intervention, and ended up at Urgent Care. The doctor said it didn’t matter whether I had the flu or Covid. The treatment was the same, and he loaded me up with prescription medication: Cough suppressant mixed with something that knocked me out so I could sleep. Expectorant and inhaler during the day. A five-day antibiotic pack in case I had a bacterial infection, and a pill for inflammation. This was more medication than I’d taken in the past 20 years! Still, I followed the protocol, hoping and waiting for the day I’d be well enough to begin my life again, and come out the other side.

The process of starting over can take many forms. It can be as simple as having to correct a minor mistake. More often, it follows a significant or consequential event. The usual scenario: Your life seems to be going along just fine. You’re relatively content or perhaps progressing toward a certain goal. Then, sometimes out of the blue, a tidal wave crashes over you. You’re laid off and have to find a new job. You get injured and have to rehab. You’re diagnosed with a chronic disease and are forced to change your lifestyle. Your new project fails and you have to come up with an alternative plan. You get a divorce and are confronted with living alone. You suffer the loss of a loved one and struggle to manage your grief.

In all of these examples, your life changes, and you have a choice: You either adapt, move on, and start over. Or you cling to pain, grief, or the past, and suffer. In my mind, moving forward and starting over is always the best choice.

The process of starting over isn’t always easy or fun. In fact, it can be darn right painful and frightening. This 65^th birthday sickness of mine reminded me that change and starting over isn’t the exception. It’s the rule.

I’m certainly no stranger to starting over, and I bet you aren’t either. I’ve suffered the trauma of emotional abuse, the grief of losing loved ones, the fear of financial insecurity, and bouts of physical pain. I’ve had my share of injuries and surgeries. Two years ago, I underwent total hip replacement surgery knowing I’d have to manage an extended, sometimes painful recovery. But each time these life events knocked me down, somehow, I managed to clamber to my feet, dust myself off, and start over.

Today, a full three weeks after the onset of my 65^th birthday sickness, I’m practically back to normal, except for an occasional coughing fit and a somewhat gravelly voice. I’m grateful I can finally take a deep breath.  I’ve restarted my daily walks although my legs and lungs are weak and I can’t walk as far as I used to. But, as I’ve learned over a lifetime, although I never like it, this slow march back to myself, one small step at a time, is inescapable.

Throughout the course of our lives, starting over ebbs and flows like the endless crashing of ocean waves. If you’re alive, you can’t avoid grief, heartache, sickness, physical pain, or loss. The key to coming out the other end lies in how you react when the thunderstorm hits and you’re tossed into the raging ocean. If you fight the waves, the rip tide will surely carry you away. If you choose instead to float with patience and acceptance, once the storm is over and the tide recedes, you’ll regain your footing and be invited, once more, to start again.

What’s been your experience with starting over? Please feel free to share in the comments below.