Must...not...write!

I shouldn't be blogging. I shouldn't be typing or writing, either. Because I hurt my wrist, I got it into my head to put a STOP on that until it heals. It's not like I'm in agonizing pain, or anything, but the pain DOES flare up from time to time. I have been taking pain killers (Tylenol, ibuprofen) and wrapping my wrist in an ice pack from time to time, but the pain is still there. I'm beginning to contenplate sleeping with a wrist brace (I can't put an Ace bandage on it myself and I don't think my daughter could efficiently help me wrap it with the bandage, either. It's like my mitten dilemma: I can't wear gloves because of my left hand, so I wear mittens. I can't wrap the bandage on my wrist myself, so I have to wear the brace instead. I guess that would be the next best thing?). These are measures I am taking to ensure it will heal (hey, I'm no doctor -- I'm figuring out and learning this stuff as I go!), and holding back on the writing and typing is one other thing.

And, for a while, my wrist wasn't acting up when I was writing. But this morning, I had 15 minutes to kill and, wouldn't you know it, my muse INSISTED I write stuff down! I was trying to focus on reading instead, but all of those words just kept cluttering my mind. It became URGENT that I write them down!

So I sat down to write. But I figured, just a little bit. I'll only write a little bit. Just the things I can't chance forgetting later.

Yeah, right.

I ended up writing a whole freaking chapter. Sigh! (Wow, how weird it feels to feel disappointed in myself that I wrote a whole chapter. LOL)

Granted, I didn't go into heavy detail with the chapter. I made notes on where to insert quotes, where to insert examples of something and I only went over the main points to cover in a bulletin list I'm including. But, still! That was a definite no-no.

And as I was writing, my wrist started to hurt again. I tried to pull myself away from the writing, but it didn't happen. I couldn't stop writing! Even when it hurt! (Good grief, it wasn't like I was trying to stop a bomb from going off, or something! Sheesh!) Thankfully, though, I brought the chapter to a close and just stepped away from it. I didn't go over it for edits or to see if there was anything I left out. I just put it away.

I am thinking that is what I should do with writing in general, just to ensure this wrist thing doesn't get worse. "Put it away." Lock it up in a drawer for a week and take a break from it. Take a break from the writing and the typing AND the blogging.

The challenge comes in actually trying to DO that. Maybe I should consider this an opportunity to catch up on my reading, catch up on a bunch of movies I have YET to watch and just catch up on any other thing that needs catching up on. (Anybody got any good movie or book suggestions??) It will be hard NOT to write. It'll be almost impossible NOT to revisit the computer to do the blogging thing or check email. But I know I have to do it all the same.

I have to take that break. I will give it a week and see how that works out.

And now I have typed too much as it is, so I will close here.