Confessions...

[stevebody]

Some of you may remember that I spent a fair amount of time being rather aggressively contentious in these forums during the past 12-18 months. I sorta feel compelled to tell you, now, that what I did was use you guys; some of you rather shabbily.

Judye's doctor pulled me aside, shortly after she was released from the hospital, and told be bluntly that I was going to go through the stages of grief and that the most difficult and persistent one was going to be anger. He made it clear that, despite my best intentions, it was likely that some of it would slop over onto Judye, unless I found somewhere to put it. He suggested a lot of things - exercise, boxing, golf, letters to the editor - most of which were simply not possible at all, given who and what I am. The clear message was, though, that I was to keep it out of Judye's life, at all costs.

I had visited this forum and the one on the Spectator site and knew that the exchanges sometimes became heated, so I signed up, logged on, and picked fights. On both sites. I'm aware that I probably did peoples' perceptions of me irreparable damage but I can't claim to be sorry because it worked. It was, in fact, a perfect venting place and - especially on Spectator - I locked up with several people who were every bit as fractious and hair-triggered as me. I've posted a similar message on that site , saying basically the same things.

FYI, people who know me usually say that I'm a very nice, patient, non-confrontational guy, which was not always the case. But you guys made it possible for me to avoid spewing the same stuff to peoples' faces that I spewed here. I left this forum feeling calmer, less bottled up, and far more ready to face the amazing grind of what Judye has had to go through. I suppose a "thank you" would seem weird but that's what I owe you. I did, for a fact, have a tremendous amount of anger, guilt, and frustration, ranging from the daily sorrow of watching her struggles to the free-floating, irrational guilt that I should have or could have done something, anything to prevent what happened to her.

So you know, Judye has gone from her surgeon telling us, the night of her accident, that there was a "1 in 1000" chance, at best, that she'd ever recover ANY function or sensation below the site of her injury to walking an average of 80 feet a day on a walker. She's slower that molasses on a cold day and it isn't graceful, but we'll take ever blessed foot of it. It has all come about because of a kind of courage, tenacity, and gumption that I have never seen in anyone in my entire life. She is sometimes ill-tempered, she can't comparison shop worth a damn, and (worst) she can't remember any wine, ten minutes after she's tasted it...but she's the very epitome of bravery, to me, and whatever part I've had in her small miracle is only possible because I've tried to follow her example.

I don't expect anyone who thinks I'm a jerk to change that opinion. I believe in lying in the bed you've made. But please know that I owe you all one and that you won't confront anything like that from me again.

Peace.