I'm back .....

..... or rather, it's back. The "it" in question is my brain. I was discharged from hospital a month ago, on September 22. My body was weak but I began to recover strength and stamina after the first few days at home. Of more concern to me was the brain fog that I experienced. It is a normal side effect of anaesthesia and I was told to expect to feel the effects for up to 6 months (one month for every hour of surgery time). In many ways, I was far ahead of schedule. My memory returned, I could do the Saturday crossword puzzle and I lost the feeling that my brain was too small for my skull. But I couldn't seem to tap into my creative abilities. I set up to play with paint and fabric and couldn't walk into the room to do it, I sat down to write blog entries and couldn't reach for the keyboard, I thought about writing new indoor cycling classes but couldn't begin to think about what they would be like.

All of that changed on Monday. I was working on a draft of an article I wrote prior to my hospitalization. I thought that might be feasible given that the creative work was already done. Within the first few minutes I had thought up an entirely new twist on the subject which improved everything. Yesterday morning I designed two new classes, from topic to music. And this morning I finally applied paint to fabric and am now writing a blog post.

I have much to share over the next week or two but I will start with this. 

Last Sunday, exactly 44 days after my surgery, I rode my bike for the first time. I did a 44 kilometre round trip from my home to the city. I attribute the sudden recovery of the creative part of my brain to that ride. I don't know the mechanism - improved blood flow, perhaps - but I don't think it is a coincidence that there was such a sudden improvement less than 24 hours later.