Parking Place

Where I park at college

I hope everyone has had a great holiday season. I had two weeks off of school and was just starting to de-stress and wham... here we are back at school already.

By 8 this morning I was driving in the horrible frozen world that is Winnipeg It is  -17 F or -27 C. right now and it has been cold for a couple of weeks now. I got to school to realize that my Handicap parking pass for the college had expired over the holidays. There were no day only parking spots left either. The parking attendant told me to pull to the side of the parking lot and go renew my permit inside and then come back and park the car in a handicap spot. It was the first day of class for the term and there were so many students paying up for new courses and getting their IDs that the line was the length of the hall.

Class started and I was still in line. I was still in line an hour later when some of my class members walked past during coffee break. The guy behind me in line told me to go sit down somewhere and he would save my spot. He was worried that I was going to keel over. There is something really wrong about standing in a line for and hour and a half in order to get a handicap parking spot!  Maybe it took three minutes to pay for the pass and then I went to move the car. I'm paid up for 3 more months.

I missed two thirds of my class. This was first day of a new course called "Dealing with Loss and Palliative Care".  I am dreading the course already so I guess that means  I still  have a few issues I need to deal with.

Yup the holidays are over.

Experience a Disability

My class  participated in an assignment this past week called ”Experiencing a Disability” and this event has created a lot of reflection on my part. 

This major project required everyone in our class to pretend we had experienced a stroke that left our dominant side unusable. My class of 15, after dividing into teams of three or four, visited 7 different stations and we tried to carry out a variety of activities sometimes with further physical challenges attached.

Me in pink and two of my new friends.

I had a meltdown days before the event.  I couldn’t understand how this was all going to work for me.  Panic set in and my inner dialogue took off at top speed.

•  I already have left side (non-dominant) weakness so if you take away my good dominant side will I wind up falling down a flight of stairs?

•  If I have these extra disabilities it puts me facing more physical struggles than others in the class so No Fair!  

• I already know what it is like to have a disability so why should I have to do this for marks? 

• Will what has been an everyday reality for me and some of my friends turn out to be a joke or playing make-believe to my classmates? On the other hand, perhaps the class will get a better understanding about stroke as well as other disabilities which I am sure is the true intent of the exercise.

On reflection I realized that none of that was what my anxiety was really all about. In reality I am terrified that someday I will find myself right back in a hospital unable to talk or move again.  Having my movement or vision reduced, are the things my nightmares are made up of and that was exactly what was being asked of me with this assignment. I had to take a leap of faith and face some of my fears. I talked to the teacher and told him I needed to be sure that I would be safe and he reassured me that he would never let anyone be at risk but that I did need to participate and see how I could contribute.

 

On the day of the workshop my group of three started off at a station where we were to pretend to have had a dominant side stroke and that we needed to use a cane. We were told we also have vision issues so the other two got eye patches covering one eye each and I got glasses that clouded over one eye completely and left only the bottom 1/3 of one lens clear.  We were to place marshmallows in our cheek to mimic speaking difficulties. We had directions to go down to the lower level and go to the library, find a particular book and then find a video with a particular call number. Write down the name of the book and of the video using your non-dominant hand. Next go to the cafeteria and order a drink or snack.. still with marshmallows in cheek, eye patches on, using the cane and still not using one arm we had to get those drinks back upstairs.

Experience is a good teacher.  I aimed our little group straight at the elevator that is designated for disabled students, I got the librarian to help at one point and I asked for a cold drink in a plastic bottle with a lid because I know better than to carry a hot coffee in a paper cup. When we were  walking I kept my cane in my stronger hand because I wasn’t going to risk a fall while learning about disabilities.

Other activities done in the class room included putting on a shirt and doing up the buttons with the non-dominant hand. Picking up pennies with gloves that mimicked arthritis as well as playing some games like connect four and bingo wearing the gloves.  How about serving and eating Jello one handed and with an eye patch on then mixing up flour and water to make a batter? What about getting toothpaste out of its tube and onto a toothbrush or tying shoes with one hand?

 You know what? It turned out to be a good experience for the most part. All that occupational therapy and physiotherapy has paid off, because even with my weaker side I could do a lot of these activities simply because I already know many tricks of the trade for doing these things. Restricting my good hand and letting me use only my spastic left in therapy apparently has also paid off!

The final station was not as big a success for me. The goal of that one was to use a wheelchair to get to a bathroom and then without using the dominant arm and leg, transfer to the toilet and then get your pants back up and get back in the wheel chair and return to the classroom.  To begin with I did not have enough strength in my left hand to get the door open to get out of the classroom. Bad start. Trying to scoot an oversize wheel chair with my weaker, and I might add less coordinated, leg and arm was a huge issue. I got myself to the washroom stall eventually but I was unable to pull myself up to do a transfer with either hand. No pretending. I had hit my endurance limit.  I slowly worked my way back to the room wheeling using both arms and I was kind of glad to be sitting down. A guy in a wheelchair of his own gave me a  knowing and defiant glare and basically did a wheelie in front of me.. the show off. At another time I might have been embarrassed or perhaps irritated but I was too tired to give a darn at that point.

I must admit I liked hearing the other students saying it was so much harder than they expected it to be.  The next day several classmates said they had needed to nap when they got home after the workshop. Yup that is my normal daily reaction too.

My good stroke friend Dave D. likes to talk about The Lessons Learned so here we go.

• I still have some emotional trauma issues lingering related to the brain injury but at lest I am aware of them and know I need to work on them
• My fine motor skills on the left side are better than I thought. I’m so glad I really worked on it with guitar, typing, crochet and any other hand exercise I could find.
• My gross motor on the left could be a whole lot better as could my stamina. I want to see what is possible so I just made an appointment with a new physiotherapist.
• We should be willing to ask for and accept help when needed
• I am willing to do stuff like wedge a plate of Jello against my chest in order to spoon it up one handed if that is what it takes. 
• My class is really a great group of people.
• I still have a lot to offer.

HAWMC Day 29 Six Sentence Story

Six Sentence Story. 

In this day of micro-blogging – brevity is a skill worth honing. Can you tell a story and make it short and sweet? What can you say in six sentences. Check out some here: http://sixsentences.blogspot.com/    

I was trying to shop at the grocery store about a year after my stroke with my cane and my groceries in the cart and me gripping the handles of the shopping cart as if it was a walker.  I was trying to be independent and do something that normal, average people can do every day. I reached up with my good hand for the whipping cream on a higher shelf. The ever-present vertigo and dizziness won out and I fell awkwardly into the dairy section cooler. I was hurt and couldn’t get up. A small child came toward me and her mom screamed at her to stay away from that nasty drunk lady.  I knew without a doubt that my life was not normal or average anymore.

Vacation Time

Bob and I,  along and our adult daughters, are going on a trip to Hawaii tomorrow morning! I am soooooo excited. We have been planning this for months and I can hardly believe the trip is finally here. The girls are only staying a few days for our tropical family vacation and then Bob and I will be staying for another week on our own little second honeymoon.

 Our daughter found us a good deal and booked us into a couple of different exciting locations!

I must admit that I have had a lot of anxiety about this trip and a lot of trouble getting organized, but now it is too late for me to do anything different. No more lists. No more shopping, no more planning how to pack or planning where to stay. All I can do is get on that plane.

I went back and forth about just how I was going to manage physically on this trip.  I have not been using the walker for months now, but I also have not been doing as much walking or challenging moving as I was a year ago. I am finding that my new knee brace is a really big help but I don't think it will be enough. The knee brace makes my knee feel a lot better, but when I wear it I find that my ankle gives out much faster for some reason.

My family will do all they can to help me but I still can't imagine how I will carry my luggage, stand in lines and still do all that I want to do and only hang on to my cane.  We decided that I am going to take the walker, and the knee brace, and the ankle brace and yes the cane!

I am ready for adventure!



clip art from http://www.rosiepiter.com/

Crutches and Canes

I went with to my daughter's physiotherapy appointment today. She is 9 weeks past her awful accident and out of her cast now. Her broken ankle and her ribs are feeling better. She still needs to be on crutches and she is starting to put a little weight on her foot.

Emily's physiotherapist was talking about how she wants to get my daughter moving as soon as possible to prevent secondary problems from an unnatural gait; things like back and hip problems and to get her off the crutches because they can be hard on her arms and shoulders. She said once Emily is weight bearing on her foot there will be a whole lot more work they can start to do.


What can you do after about 2 and a half years of a lopsided gait?

Things are getting better for me too. I find that I can take off walking at a good pace as long as I have my cane in hand, and I can celebrate that I have only needed to use my walker twice in the past two months. I do live with my left leg cramping, tired ankle and a bit of a limp. My right hip hurts as soon as I walk more than a few feet. I will be getting a new physiotherapist at Easy Street soon and I think I have found a few new issues to work out.

There is a free dance class at the In Motion @ The Library this week...
I don't think I am ready to Zumba Dance quite yet, but I trust anything is possible in the future. For the moment maybe I can learn to walk a little less lopsided.

Look out Fred Astaire... I have a cane and know how to use it. Maybe I will get a top hat for Christmas!

My Very Sore Finger

I have a sore finger on my good hand. It is a real problem to me.

It started off in August when I got a little thorn in my middle finger of my right hand. I was at the cottage, gathering and cutting branches into smaller pieces to fit in the fireplace and one of the branches was a hawthorn and they really do have thorns! I thought I got it all out but it stayed irritated. I thought maybe a tiny bit was still in there and would eventually work it's way out but it just kept not healing and then it seemed to be getting more painful and bleeding easily and getting bigger. I talked to the doctor about it at my regular appointment and he said it just had to take time and heal. Two weeks later it was much bigger so I went back to the doctor.

Don't click on the following link if you get queasy very easily. It was now something called a Pyogenic Granuloma. Basically I have pea sized cluster of capillaries that are probably a benign growth. Most likely it is a weird inflammatory response to a local trauma. It is amazingly painful to touch and bleeds like crazy with the littlest bump. My doctor told his nurse to hold everything he was going to be busy for 10 minutes and went to look it up. He came back with a picture atlas of skin diseases and was all excited. Next he called in his partner saying "Hey wana see a Pyogenic granuloma?" " Oh that's what it looks like!" while they compared me to the book. They decided "Wow, it's a big one.". Hmmmmph.

First they tried burning it with a chemical cauterization and told me that I should come back the next week. Nope didn't work. Okay lets try liquid nitrogen and freeze it off. (cryosurgery) Nope, still didn't work. The next suggestion is we need to freeze it and scrape it off and out, and cauterize the bottom.

They now need to send the sample for biopsy, still assuring me it is not likely to be serious but that we do need to take care of the ugly thing. My doctor can't really do it in the office because I react very badly to local freezing, so I am being referred to a plastic surgeon. It is going to be more than a month to even see the guy and who knows when he will actually do the surgery!

I tried hard to express that the stupid thing is not just a yucky looking bump on my finger. I use a cane in that hand in order to balance and stay upright and this is actually affecting my mobility. I can't keep a good grip on the cane so now I need to go back to using my walker full time again.

I can't believe how slowed down I am because of a little sliver!