When Life Hurts, Look for What You Can Still Do September 30, 2026 (Wednesday) Reiwa8 Day 34 of my hospital stay
Today is the last day of September.
Tomorrow, October begins.
After days of rain, the sky finally cleared yesterday evening. The sunset beside Matsuyama Castle was beautiful.
Today, I am sitting in the hospital cafeteria, looking out at the mountains while writing this.
After this, I am planning to work again on Questions 41 to 60 of the "Pharmaceutical Laws and Regulations" section of the 2023 Registered Sales Clerk Examination. This will be my second time going through them.
There are not many days left before the exam.
I know I cannot memorize everything.
Even so, I am glad I decided to try.
I came to Matsuyama in May. I bought an electric tricycle and practiced until I could ride it comfortably. I started going to Matsuyama City Station and visiting different gyms, even trying some of their programs.
Just when I thought, "Now I can ride my bicycle wherever I want," everything changed.
On June 18, I fell while trying to extend my hand to press the pedestrian signal button. I fractured the upper part of my left humerus.
I had surgery on June 25 and was discharged on June 27.
After that, I struggled to find a place for rehabilitation. Eventually, I was able to start outpatient rehabilitation at Dogo Onsen Hospital on August 5.
With my doctor's permission, I was admitted to the hospital on August 28 for intensive rehabilitation.
It has been a long journey.
It has been painful.
It has been very difficult.
During that time, encouraged by my husband, I started studying for the Registered Sales Clerk Examination.
I knew from the beginning that passing an exam like this after only a few months of study would be difficult.
But I was in pain.
There was not much else I could do.
And constantly thinking about the pain was exhausting.
So I decided to try.
Actually, I had bought a Registered Sales Clerk textbook several years ago on Mercari. I think it was from around 2019.
But after buying it, I had left it almost completely untouched.
I brought that book with me to Matsuyama, and finally opened it.
Then I discovered that five years of past Ehime Prefecture examination questions were available online.
They were free.
So I thought, "Why not give it a try?"
And that is how it started.
Something interesting happened as I studied.
Until then, when I went to a drugstore to buy cold medicine, I would look at the large advertisements on the packages and think,
"This is for a cold."
I would choose based on the price or the listed effects.
I hardly ever thought about what ingredients were actually inside.
But now, I find myself wanting to look at the medicines I already have at home.
For example, Lulugold cold medicine contains ingredients such as:
Acetaminophen.
Chlorpheniramine maleate.
DL-methylephedrine hydrochloride.
Dextromethorphan.
Potassium guaiacolsulfonate.
Caffeine anhydrous.
And now I can sometimes look at a name and think,
"Oh, I studied this!"
I have also learned that several ingredients can be related to coughing, while working in different ways.
Then I looked at an ointment I had used for back pain and muscle pain.
It contains 12% methyl salicylate.
I thought,
"Wait, I studied this yesterday!"
I also looked at Dolmycin ointment, which contains ingredients such as colistin sulfate and bacitracin.
Even the eye drops I use contain several different ingredients, including neostigmine methyl sulfate, chlorpheniramine maleate, taurine, and chondroitin-related ingredients.
I had never really looked at medicines this way before.
Now I am beginning to look at familiar medicines through their ingredients.
That alone makes me feel that I have changed.
And then I remembered something.
My interest in medicine did not actually begin with this fracture.
When I was 51, I attended night school for three years while working as a high school English teacher.
It was extremely difficult, but I kept going and eventually obtained my national qualification as an acupuncturist and moxibustion practitioner.
I continued working as a teacher until I was 60.
After that, I opened a small practice at home.
I remodeled one of my children's rooms into a waiting room and treatment room. On the first floor, I installed a projector and screen so that I could continue teaching English as well.
I continued doing what I could, even during the COVID period.
It was around that time that I first became interested in learning more about medicines.
But I never really managed to study it seriously.
And now, at 68, I am in the hospital recovering from a fracture, studying for the Registered Sales Clerk Examination, and finally opening a textbook that had been sitting untouched for years.
I do not know whether I will pass the exam.
I cannot memorize everything.
And I would not say that medicines have suddenly become fascinating to me.
But I can say one thing with certainty:
I am glad I tried.
When something painful happens in life, instead of simply looking down, I think it is important to look for something we can still do.
Perhaps that is something we can learn at any age.
If I had not fractured my arm on June 18, I might have been going to the gym, swimming, and dancing Zumba by now.
Life does not always follow our plans.
But because my plans changed, I finally opened a book that I had never really opened before. I began learning about ingredients in medicines I had used without thinking. I started looking at familiar things and asking myself,
"What exactly is this?"
September 30.
Tomorrow, October begins.
As I finish this long September, I will keep moving forward, one day at a time.
When life hurts, look for what you can still do.
That is something I want to remember.
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