The Body is Weak and the Mind is Unwilling

Tonight I got more of a glimpse of what this disease has taken and I once again felt completely useless.  Chris is preparing a message to preach in November.  There is a song that would go perfectly (at least I think so) with his message.  Its one of the songs I listened to this morning called The More I Seek You.  We looked this afternoon for sheet music for it and all we could find was a pathetic rendition of it...really pathetic and nowhere near the original music. The original music is not at all that complicated.  So, while Chris and the girls were at church tonight I decided I would sit down and dictate it.  I have to work at it a little more then some, especially with a Lyme brain, but between listening to the song, my knowledge of music theory and picking notes out on the piano, I was piecing it together.  Again, its not overly complicated because its basically broken chords.  As I would get some dictated I would try to play it and was a little frustrated that I was having difficulty playing it.  Keep in mind that I haven't touched the piano for at least 8 months and seriously for over a year and even then it wasn't what I used to be able to play.  It had gotten to a point where I would sit down to play, hoping to enjoy it, and winding up frustrated that my hands wouldn't play like they used to...it just wasn't smooth. At the time I thought it was my hands declining.
I had worked tonight on it for a while when I decided I wanted to add the vocal line. Not knowing who would be singing it or playing it I knew it would be easier if the person playing could see the vocal line.  The last couple times I had been on Finale (music scribing software) it had been messing up, locking up.  I couldn't figure out how to easily add a vocal line, so I copied what I had dictated and opened a new document. Every time I went to set up a vocal line plus piano accompaniment part it would put the vocal line below the accompaniment.   I finally figured out how to get the vocal line above the accompaniment (like its supposed to be), I went to paste what I had dictated and it wouldn't paste...it was gone.  I was bummed but not discouraged...yet. I looked at the clock and all said and done I had used up an hour and didn't have another one to spare.  I open a new document and began dictating again, thinking it won't take as long the second time around, especially as often as I had listened to the song to get the first dictation. But what I found discouraged me more then if my whole computer had crashed.  It was if I had never dictated it the first time. I had no recall, not memory of what I had dictated the first time.  I then began to get frustrated.  I just don't have the time and energy to redo something like this.  I don't like doing things twice as it is, but even more so now.  I have to ration time and energy so badly now.  Again, there was a mix of emotions because on one hand I had sat down and done something I hadn't done in quite some time.  When I taught piano I would ask students what they wanted to play for recital and then I would arrange most of them to fit their level of skill. It felt good picking the song apart, looking at chords and dictating it.  But, it was frustrating to see the decline in the way I processed the pitch and going back and forth between the recording and the dictation...I just couldn't retain it.
I was proud of what I had gotten done though I had nothing to show for it.  But frustrated that an hour was gone and I needed to get dinner ready before the family got home and I don't get time alone where I can work on something like this. Maybe I shouldn't be doing it?  I prayed and then I just sat there and listened to the song twice and sang to Him...at least I could do still do that...as far as I know I can...no one home to tell me stop because it sounded bad :-)
Even at this point I wasn't horribly discouraged. It wasn't till I got into the kitchen to fix dinner (rather warm up dinner) and one thing after another pointed to my inability to do things. I drop things left and right, I go to put something in the cupboard and jam my finger or thumb in the shelf because of poor eye/hand coordination, or I can't get something open, or its difficult to stir something.  Here it is just a challenge to heat up left overs.  And slowly I begin to feel useless.  Chris and the girls come home and I am really discouraged. As I start to share with Chris what happened, only then do I start to put pieces of the puzzle together.  I realize in talking with him that it wasn't my hands that made it difficult to play, though they didn't help with the pain and decline in agility, but it was my mind that was making it difficult to play.  This discouraged me even further as I feel like an invalid.  Can't keep house, can barely cook dinner (and God has prevented the house from being burned down or a finger cut off), and I'm seeing all that has been taken away.  Things dearly loved....things I made a living by. Gifts and talents God gave me and I have struggled understanding why I can't do them anymore.  As I'm spouting this off I remember my song from this morning....If you take it all away will my hands stay lifted and will my heart still sing.  In my heart I say "yes" but it doesn't change the sadness and the grieving to see it go or change.  Not liking the feeling that I'm not good for anything here on earth.  I need help in every area.  What good can I be for His kingdom like this?  I lack the understanding but my heart will still sing and my hands will still stay lifted.
The sad part is everyone will most likely eventually go through what I am going through. Its called old age. I just get to experience it at 37.  Stinky part is, if God does allow me to regain any of it back after the Lyme is in remission, I will lose it all again with old age.  It really has been an eye opener for me these last months as to how it might feel to get old.  From the time we are born we work to be independent and be useful and productive and at some point it peaks and we spend the last part declining.  Depression sets in for so many aged people because they no longer sense they are needed, or productive. The very things the defined who they were no longer work and they are left just being if they don't find something else.  As humans we don't handle "feeling useless" very well at all.  Society doens't have a use for us and we are casted away in some form or fashion when we lose our usefulness.  Where once our parents took care of us, we then take care of our parents.  Honestly, I believe that getting old is the cruelest aspect of life. My mind ponders why it has to be this way.  I'm waiting for God to show me the answer.  I do find great peace, after losing whatever I may in this life, that I will end up in heaven where none of it will matter and I can sit at the feet of Jesus and bask in his glory all the rest of my days. I know I will have to share Him there as well (see previous blog :-)  ) but I won't care because I will be in so much awe over Him.  Some day.....