Two weeks ago, I had carpal and cubital tunnel release surgery on my left arm. I had the same surgery in 2018, but undid the release while toting nail guns and drills working on the house build. Last time, the doctors completely sedated me, but this time, they opted for a nerve block.

            Nerve blocks are interesting, especially on appendages. My arm felt dead. I couldn’t make it move, no matter how much power my brain exerted. There were moments when I had a twinge of feeling, but then I’d look and my arm wasn’t even in that position. I can see how easy it could be for people to feel a phantom limb that gets removed.

            For those first several hours, I heaved my arm around like it belonged to someone else. Any attempt I made to reposition it in an upright place required extra help and strategic maneuvering. If I stood to walk to the bathroom, I had to keep it in a sling, or my arm would fall hard. I feared pulling my arm out of socket and paying for it later when the block wore off.

            Maybe the pain meds made me silly, or maybe I’m just a goober, but I stood in front of the mirror and slowly swung my dangling arm back and forth like the trunk of an elephant, complete with sound effects. (I make a pretty good elephant if I do say so myself.)

            As I heaved my arm around that evening, I thought about the dead weight I’ve carried on and off over the years. People. Ideas. Thoughts. Fears. Beliefs. Excuses. The list could go on and on. And the thing with dead stuff is it gets heavy after a while. It has no life of its own, but sucks the life out of the carrier instead. It serves no purpose; just hangs around needing constant attention and babying, slowly draining us of all our energy, hope, joy, and focus.

            Thankfully my dead arm woke up, but the dead weight we often carry around doesn’t. Are you carrying around any dead arms? Life-sucking, joy-depleting, purpose-stealing dead weight? If all you are doing is carrying it around, maybe it’s time to lay it down and learn how to live out from under the weight. There’s life waiting on the other side.