Walking Spirit

The week began with an open house for my parents neighbors. After church on Sunday we went back to my parents house and where many of our neighbors stopped by to join us for desert. After the accident they rallied around my family, as did many others, helping with errands, food, and many other miscellaneous tasks.

During that time I'd get to visit briefly with many of them. They'd see me laying on the couch or exercising on the floor. I enjoyed their visits as it was a rare opportunity to see people who knew me when I was a kid and, to meet the new neighbors who have moved into the community since I left home. However, very few of them have seen me since I moved back to my house and continued to recover.

When we arrived home from church I decided to try walking up the ramp from the driveway into the backyard. This was a first as that ramp is at a steep angle and isn't exactly level. (This is due to the shape of the land in that place, not the craftsmanship, which is superb. It was built last winter by a combined effort of neighbors, members of the congregation, and other close friends.) We left the wheelchair in the car and it stayed there the entire day.

The legs stayed on from about 8:00am until 7:00pm. It felt so free to be able to move about the house without the wheelchair. There wasn't any pain, just a little discomfort every once in a while. The discomfort comes mostly from the occasional phantom pain, which would be there anyway. Sometimes the angle I'm sitting at has an impact on the comfort because it will put more pressure on one area of my residual legs but that is easily corrected. It was great to share that day with the people from the neighborhood.

The rest of the week continued in that fashion. When I went to get my hair cut the wheelchair stayed in the car. I had to maneuver some steps, sit in a barbers chair, and get up from the barbers chair. It was also the first time that I wore long pants. (The kind with the zip off legs that can also be shorts.) I decided to give these a try in order to prevent hair clippings from falling in my joints.

We brought the wheelchair when I went to U of I, where I practiced more stairs. It did come in handy to rest in after going up and down without the crutches, which really helped my momentum, but we left it in the car when we went to lunch. You should know that the thing with not using the crutches on the stairs is not a new thing. I don't actually use them during that process as long as there's a railing. Due to my bull headed nature (thanks Dad) previously I had always kept the crutches with me because there's not always going to be someone with me to take them.

Though it did help me to increase my momentum I think the real lesson is that I need to let others help me. Sometimes I want so much to be independent that I make things harder on myself by pushing others away. It's one thing to be able to do something myself, it's something else entirely to refuse assistance when it will make things easier.