“Your cold would explain why your adrenal glands are all over the place,” my Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine looks at me, the expression on her face best described as dumbfounded, “but why your liver is acting up is beyond me.”
“What does my liver represent?”
As I squeeze the metal handle I give my eyes the same command while I lean over to peek on my doctor’s sheet.
She’s doing another “organs measurement” that involves me holding on to dear life (and a metal handle) and her pricking my toes and fingers with a metal-pointed pen until a machine bleeps.
After every bleep she scribbles her findings under previous outcomes of a similar measuring – with a different coloured pen.
I love this woman. Or well, at least her dedication.
She covers her pinky inky pen and answers: “Liver represents frustration… and anger.”
“Ahhh,” I nod in recognition, “Yeah, that makes sense.”
We now stare at each other and her confused look grows.
“Well,” I shrug, “The thing is…”
I breathe frustration!
It’s:
- Dad complaining about his back aches being “the most important thing to focus on right now” while we’re visiting my mother who’s recovering from a stroke;
- Dad not pulling his weight at home, dumping every chore on me like it’s an Olympic Sport and he’s in it for the gold;
- Dad complaining about not being able to visit Mom when I have a client call after an already busy work day, but refusing to ask my sister to drive him;
r.h. Sin
“She’s strong but she’s exhausted”
- Same sis not visiting Mom until the weekend while I try to squeeze myself in at least seven thousand impossibilities to see her daily;
- Other sis still AWOL, despite repeated e-mails, and thus leaving us hanging once again;
- Me openly wondering if Crazy Sis has ever really taken care of any of our parents at all;
- Me realising the answer to the former question is a cold-hearted no;
- Me catching myself praying regularly to “please increase the hours in a day to at least 35”;
- Me having 1000000000 things to do and 0 time to do it;
- Me desperately falling in love, but seeing my date-time being snatched away by others to perform all-important tasks nobody else can be bothered to do;
- Everybody leaving me to fix everything, to run everything, to organise, plan, contact, cater, wash, entertain, explain, catch, smooth, return everything without complaints, and me, somehow, not toppling over.
I exhale and loosen my grip on the handle – when exactly did my fingers turn white from squeezing it too strongly? Oops.
The tiny office is quiet for a tiny time. My doctor looks at me, the expression on her face no longer dumfounded, but kind and understanding.
“You know what,” she says after a few seconds that feel like forever, “You lay down. I’ll heat up some thyme oil and massage your back and shoulders. That will be nice and relaxing for you.”
We share one more meaningful look before she concludes:
“I think you deserve some relaxation.”
Elle Vampa 