Let Me Introduce Myself

Hi! I’m Chick. Chick is a teenage nickname I got in the early 70’s from my mom and her sisters which I’m using to re-introduce myself for the next part of my journey. I’m turning 68 this year and retired at 55 from a 31-year career at a major grocery manufacturer. I’ve been married to the love of my life for 35 years who is 10 years older than me and in the moderate stage of Alzheimer’s.  We met in sobriety (45 years for me, 41 years for him) and moved in together 40 years ago. We have 3 sons, approximately 2 years apart. His son, Todd and my sons Tony and Clayton. Tony recently died of liver failure due to alcoholism. Todd and Clayton are still around, working on their own dreams.

I had spine fusion surgery a little over a year ago. While rehabbing from that, my chronic SI joint issue in my left hip flared up. I suffered from massive nerve pain and was eventually referred to a Pain Clinic. I started a regime of oxy and eventually dilaudid narcotics and became pretty non-functional in my life. I asked Alice to come work for me and help me out. She said yes, but she would be functioning as an “end of life doula”, not only for the end of my husband’s life, but mine too. It’s been a great journey together and she has put a lot of time and effort into helping me regain my life, physically, mentally and spiritually. After awhile, the narcotics weren’t working so good as I had built up a pretty good tolerance and they were just making me sick. So, I crashed off them cold turkey, ended up in the emergency room. Now my body was really decimated from the pain, inactivity and the harsh reality of detoxing from narcotics. Over the course of the last two years I had lost about 35 pounds due to stress. During the last 6 months I dropped another 15 pounds and was about 15-20 pounds underweight. Good thing Alice was in my life. With her help with emotional support, nutrition advice, and getting me exercising, first in the pool, then the gym floor, I’ve gained 10 pounds and gotten a lot stronger. I actually have visible biceps. I’ve never seen them before on myself. Go figure.

A big part of my motivation for working out of the position I had put myself in, besides just getting some quality of life back and being able to care for my husband, goes back to the first day I met Alice when she told me about the non-profit she was starting to provide resources and experience to others to heal from trauma due to physical, sexual or emotional abuse. Part of what she was planning was a 50-state motorcycle ride to bring awareness and national attention to what she was doing. I told her that day, that I wanted to be a part of what she was doing. I’ve had two goals in life that I hadn’t achieved yet…Taking off and riding for a year or two across the US and to work with other women who are trying to walk or run away from abuse and create a better life for themselves. I’ve been there, done that, and always felt I had something to offer.

Thus, came about “Chick and Alice.” This is our joint endeavor to make both our dreams a reality. The ride is planned for 2027, the year I turn 70. We have many things we want to do on the trip in addition to riding and seeing the sites. There is lots of planning and personal work we both need to do to get ready and actually be successful at it.

Part of what we’re doing is to journal our journey and share it on this blog. I’ve never been one to journal, but I’m finding It’s actually fun and somewhat therapeutic to sit down and journal what we’re doing along the way.

More to come….