My Blanket

Sometimes I think I am reverting back to childhood, a time that was easier and where there were all those wonderful little helps to make us feel better. On TV on Sunday I saw a study about how if we hold the hand of someone we love, we'll feel less pain. I've tried it. It works.

Little children have teddy bears, brightly colored pictures, toys and sometimes special blankets, like Linus from Charlie Brown's comic strip.

A couple of years ago a special person bought me a very, very soft turquoise bathrobe. There is a satan patch over where one's heart would be that says, "Peace be within." This bathrobe is great to curl up in.

Then the following year, some friends gave me a very, very soft turquoise blanket, same color and material as the bathrobe. No satan patches, but it is monogramed with my initials. The last few months it has been with me constantly. I put it over my lap when I watch TV. I take it to bed at night and curl up in it, and sometimes I find someone who I share the bed with is curled up in a little corner.

A very good friend sent me a teddy bear last summer. Soon after I received it I developed an asthmatic bronchitis condition, as if I didn't have enough medical conditions. I got medication and read what to do. Going out and getting new pillows and washing bedding in very hot water was easy. But one online suggestion was taking all the stuffed animals, putting them in plastic bags, and putting them in the freezer for 24 hours to kill the allergens lurking there.

I looked into the eyes of that teddy bear and could not put him through that ordeal. I recovered from the bronchitis anyway and vow to never get that condition again.

And now I keep chocolate close by, as recommended by some of you here. I surround myself with books I intend to read and keep my laptop handy since it has anything I might need.

And the wheel chair I vowed I would never depend on has also become a security blanket in my life. It gets me where I need to go. It folds up and I am able to get in and out of it easily. I'm thinking of giving it a name.

So those are my thoughts for today. I am having difficulties sleeping through the night. Turning over in bed hurts, and not turning over hurts the parts of my body I have not moved in several hours. I get up and wander the house in the wheel chair, and hope to find a way to adapt to this new problem.

And as I wander, I have my blanket in my lap, wrapped around my legs. It is a little cold out tonight after all.

I like that blanket of yours, Carol. Finding comfort may come from strange sources. Whatever works, use it.

A comfort blanket, eh? When you are all grown up, your daughters will have to cut off a tiny piece of the blanket for you to carry around to ween you off dragging it around with you.

Dear Shelagh,
I know people who have cut a little corner of the satin off the blanket that their child used as a comfort. Do they think the child does not know how deminished his comfort is? No, they do not think of the child at all. They just do not want OTHER people to see their kid dragging around a comfort blanket.


I wonder about these things. I suppose if you are going on to 70, someone may take charge to alter your comfort blankie to a small bit because you are close to 70 and it may look like a little odd in this day's high-tech whirl.. But, why do it at all. A comfort blanket is something that smells like you, goes with you everywhere, never complains (until it has to be washed) and you can depend on it to be there to comfort you. It is the job of the comfort blanket, after all.

Love,
Betty