Broken

This week, the three most vital things in my life decided to break down all at once. My husband, my smartphone and my back (not listed in order of importance.) (Or maybe they are...).

First to go down was DH, who put his back out and now has some sort of evil sinus-y head cold-y thingie. Unlike most men, he does not ever suffer from Man Flu, he suffers from the "my right arm just fell off but let's all pretend like nothing happened" syndrome. It takes an act of god to get this man to take care of his health issues, plus he has a pain threshold whereby probably even HE would not notice if the arm did in fact fall off.  Unforunately for me, *I* am the one who suffers when he is unwell - what can I say, when you get used to someone being able to function no matter what (even with only one arm intact), it makes you just a wee bit dependant. Plus it freaks you right the hell out when the guy who can survive a nuclear war says, "I think I might just need to lay down for a moment." 

As far as DH is concerned, the only people who "lay down for a moment" are dead people. So you can see my just...slight...bit of alarm here. Plus the LAST time he felt a little 'ping' in his back, it was a week and several thousand dollars in shoddy American medical bills before it was sorted out (but that's a story for another day.) Plus I'm absolutely shit at giving sympathy, and I didn't need to be reminded of that.

Second to go down was my smartphone. You would think I could cope without this thing, right? It's a PHONE after all. Um, no. My life is in that phone - or more accurately, my ability to manage my life is in that phone. I am a ridiculously over-the-top communicator, and this device being broken almost rendered me mute (oh now there's an  overstatement for dramatic effect!) The phone itself decided to throw a tantrum (and my work email and texting capabilities in specific were being petulant children) and this was making me CRAZY.  When you find yourself Googling the solution to your phone problems, and you find yourself trawling through endless forums about specific phones, desperately hoping you will find one which does NOT say "the only answer is a factory re-set"...you've got a problem. Actually I would have said it's the people who design and participate in said forums who have a problem, but I'm so damn grateful to them, I want to kiss their pathetic little have-no-life nerd asses.

Third to go down (because things break in threes, don't they?) was my back. I've blogged before about my hip dramas, but yesterday my back also decided to get in on the act. I haven't had any (real) back issues in a long while, and so this one was a particularly frustrating thing to deal with. I am no good at being no good - in fact for a moment there I almost (okay I did) suffer from Man Flu in every sense of the word. Oh, the whining and moaning! I unfortunately do not have the same pain threshold that DH does (quite the opposite) - I am in fact a big fat wuss.

It took less than 48 hours for all of these things to mostly solve themselves. DH is still crook but he's DH, so he'll cope, right? The phone got fixed thanks to not only the geek forums but my own geek-ability to understand what the hell those forums were talking about, and the back is on the mend thanks to a great physio and some even greater anti-inflammatories (and a very nice chocolate ice cream on a stick. And a Slurpee. Or three.)

Just a few days ago (before all these dramas began) I commented to Biz Guy that I thought I was calming down about a lot of things, that I was just getting less manic and insane about life in general. That I've had these three dramas happen, dealt with them all, and didn't either eat a whole packet of Oreos or fall into a heap is testament to that calmness.

What can I say, it only took me 36 years to fully embrace the basic truth of life: shit happens.