Together but Apart
Surgery is a pain, literally... and even more so when it has to do with female areas. You already have to get over the fact that doctors are involved in every aspect of your cycle when you go through infertility, but walking into a cold room and positioning yourself on the operating table (complete with stirrups I might add) you start to feel like you no longer have any "private" parts.
All this aside, I'm finding myself in a weird place after having this surgery. I confirmed with my doctor repeatedly (actually my husband did since I was still "out of it"), that absolutely no uterine blood was shed during my surgery. So the blood that I am seeing is from other areas, and is not blood that will make me a niddah. The doctor said no intimate contact until the next visit, so I am finding myself in the position of being "allowed" to my husband via taharat hamishpacha, but "forbidden via doctors."
I've had "non niddah" spotting from other procedures before, but never this strong or for this long... and they haven't forbidden relations until now. I guess I'm starting to see how the harchochos are supposed to help us. The first few nights my husband slept in a separate bed so he wouldn't jostle me, and last night he slept in the same bed with me. It was easier to resist wanting to hug and cuddle with him when he was not right there next to me. Even knowing that if he were to hug me and accidentally hit my suture area it would SMART (which it did) didn't keep me away.
Still, I sort of feel like I am living in a parallel universe for a little while. It's weird to change a maxi pad and then go off to hug my husband. It's reminding me a little of my first marriage (where I did not keep taharat hamishpacha), and I am deciding definitively that I like life with the practice — despite all the rules and hurdles — much better than my life without it. Maybe it's just me, but day-to-day life seems more spiritual that way.
I guess this experience is helping me to appreciate what I have, by comparing it to what it could be... so I hope that next time I actually am bleeding niddah, I won't be so bothered by having to be separate from him. We'll see...
Comments
Speedy recovery, Shifra! Both for your physical health and to get you out of your weird parallel universe ;)
Interesting perspective, for sure. I wonder if your husband is also finding it harder to stay away because there are no harchakot.
I very much second fB's good wishes!!
Shifra, I was in the same exact position recently, and I started a post on the topic but haven't had a chance to put it up yet. I think I will post my own instead of commenting here, and we'll see how they compare.