Peppermint Christmas Ornaments

Here's a story from my past, one that brings back fond memories of peppermint candy canes. To this day, we always have peppermint candy canes on our Christmas tree in honor of this particular episode.

My husband and I had been married for about two years, and he was having a major orthopedic surgery during the Christmas holiday. You can imagine why we chose Christmas time, can't you? We had no children then to celebrate Christmas with, so that wasn't an issue. And we had already met our out-of-pocket deductible for our medical insurance. It was a totally practical choice. Another advantage we later learned was that the hospital was almost empty on the few days surrounding Christmas day. That resulted in a lot of attention from the nurses.

After the surgery, my husband had for physical therapy each day. Simple tasks such as getting in and out of bed and walking across the floor were very draining to his already low energy stores. To motivate my husband to push through the pain, I hung a posterboard on the wall at the foot his bed. Onto the posterboard a sketched a crude Christmas tree outline. Then I taped mini, peppermint candy canes all over the tree.

When he got up for physical therapy, he would walk past that poster and snag a candy cane or two as a reward. How sweet it was for him to savor the candy cane back in the comfort of his hospital bed after a grueling session of physical therapy.

To this day, we joke about the mini candy cane Christmas that we spent in the hospital. It was a hard time, but looking back, I remember it as a precious memory.