This picture is how I feel.  I have been placed in a set of burning coals.  The first few days, my exterior was so hot to the touch.  To touch me was to burn yourself, which so many have been willing to do to try and save me.  Now, the initial fire is put out, but the coals are still hot and the heat is penetrating deeper into my soul.   I think maybe there is this notion, that sometimes I believe too, that as each day passes, I will feel just a little tiny bit better - even just the tiniest degree, but it is not so for me.  I think my exterior has found some cool spots to nestle in among the hot coals and I can find relief for a time, but my core is still being heated.  I imagine that there will continue to be, for a long time to come, puffs of air from all around that give oxygen to the coals, heat them once again, and the pain will endure.  

Some days I can go the whole day with only tearing up throughout the day. Monday was one of those days.  It was about as normal as a day could go. Got Spencer ready for school, worked out with Jillian Michaels, showered, got the girls in their respective "tards" (see Dec. 14th post) and got them to ballet, ate lunch, visited with friends, went over health insurance options, got Spencer to soccer, got them all to bed, shamelessly watched "The Bachelor," and then took a big giant step and watched Dave's and my very favorite show, "Castle." 

Then other days, like yesterday, . . . . there is no normal at all . . .  just puffing coals.  Heat diving deeper.  Searching for a cool spot, yet strangely wanting to lay on the hot coals, hoping that by receiving their heat now, it will help extinguish the burn in the long run.

This quote from C.S. Lewis has resonated with me last night tonight.  It doesn't sound very hopeful, but I bet he wrote when he was in a similar state as me:

“Getting over it so soon? But the words are ambiguous. To say the patient is getting over it after an operation for appendicitis is one thing; after he’s had his leg off is quite another. After that operation either the wounded stump heals or the man dies. If it heals, the fierce, continuous pain will stop. Presently he’ll get back his strength and be able to stump about on his wooden leg. He has ‘got over it.’ But he will probably have recurrent pains in the stump all his life, and perhaps pretty bad ones; and he will always be a one-legged man. There will be hardly any moment when he forgets it. Bathing, dressing, sitting down and getting up again, even lying in bed, will all be different. His whole way of life will be changed. All sorts of pleasures and activities that he once took for granted will have to be simply written off. Duties too. At present I am learning to get about on crutches. Perhaps I shall presently be given a wooden leg. But I shall never be a biped again.” 
― C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed