Bonnie Recovery

My Eye Saga Continues; Otherwise all is GREAT

I saw Doc Kelly about my eye.  It is not healing.  The defect gets a bit smaller, and then gets a little bigger.  He suggested that we stitch the eye again.  But he does not do the procedure with the amnio (placenta tissue}.  I’m skeptical that just stitching it will do the trick... at least not for a long time.  An eye surgeon in Wilmington trained as a corneal surgeon, but no longer does replacement surgery.  At one time she did the amnio procedure; Kelly’s office is checking to see if she still does.  Our only other alternative is to go to Boston;  I do not want to do that though Daniel thinks it is best.  And so we are in limbo again.  ugh.  The good/bad news is that my eye does not hurt.  No pain is good, but unfortunately the reason for no pain is that I am losing the feeling on both eye balls.  I don’t know what this means.

I’m making some progress on the book.  With my tax extension running out in ten days I have turned my attention to getting our 2009 filing done.  I have been avoiding this primarily because last spring I elected to stay with Quicken for the PC, using Virtual Machine for that on my Mac.  It has never run flawlessly or with any speed; now I can’t get it to run at all.   At 4 am yesterday morning I decided I had to do something.  My categorizing expenses is way behind for 2010 and I have some re-categorizing to do on 2009 transactions before I can finish the taxes.  In February Quicken for the Mac came out with a “new version” that is really a subset of 2007 version and far less than the PC.  This week I re-examined the reviews; there were more positive reviews than initially.  Reviews by Mac people were actually complimentary of how Mac-like it is now.  I do not even use the features that Quicken Express doesn’t have.  I’m reminded of a Chrysler I bought once because it had all these “features” like a trip computer.  But the DRIVE was terrible.  I’m hoping that Quicken Express will drive well; I can forgo features I don’t use.  I need to “hang out” in Quicken to keep up to date on categorizing.  I have fond memories of hanging out in Quicken a lot when I was in the hospital.  I paid bills with it then and loved the sound of the ching ching (like a cash register) whenever I sent a bill to be paid.  Sometimes I was finishing up a payment when they doctors came by on their rounds...”what is that??” they asked.  I guess they don’t use Quicken.  I’m looking forward to ching chinging again starting tomorrow. I do live in hope.

On Saturday mornings since we got home we've been in Wilmington to see Abi (3) and Luc (almost 5) play soccer.  This is Luc's third year of playing organized sports and he is getting pretty good  He almost always knows which way to his own goal.  Abi just started.  She doesn't quite understand she is supposed to stay on the field until the coach sends her to the bench.  And heading toward her goal is accidental.  She is so cute with bows in her pony tails we can't do anything but smile.

The kiddos spent the week here last week.  It rained every day.  One day we had 9” in 3 hours; the total for the week was more than with hurricane Floyd.  But our roof didn’t leak.  We have a lake under the house, but we can see where we need sand to better protect our property. 

On the first day after the rain the standing water was clean enough that we let Zac put an inflatable raft in it.  He was out there being Huck Finn for TWO HOURS.  He was yelling and just having a fine time. 

Abi and Luc got to go to the ocean twice with Daniel.  They love going to the water and Daniel loves to be there with them.  We were busy all the time, in fact so busy we never even turned on the Wii.  Both boys played with our computers.  We read lots of books, including one written by Teri Silvera about puppy pen pals.  They were enchanted with that and talked about when they may have pen pals.

Zac is loving the phone we gave him for his birthday.  He is into texting big time of course.  It is great to have text conversations with him.  And he calls people, mostly Mom & Dad of course. 

<Zax's first phone call.

He is enjoying having his phone to call whenever he wants, though of course he can’t have it at school.  He really eanted a phone.

Daniel and I took him to see the stage play of the Buddy Holly Story on Sunday.  We were indeed dancing at least in our seats.  As the show went on more and more people were jiving out.  In the end we were all up singing and dancing.  Zac was puzzled that we were all singing so happily right after they play tells of Holly’s tragic death in a plane crash.  It was good for all of us to experience that grief (I would have been crying if I had tear ducts) and also the joy of his music and his life.  (though the final song, American Pie, is about him, but not his).   I’d forgotten how much I love live theater. 

My plants are slowly accumulating back home after spending the summer on Becky’s farm.  I love having them here.  Our salads are good these days.

Daniel’s hip is worse than ever.  He will be seeing a doctor as well as a chiropractor about it.  He has much more pain than I do these days, but he is up and moving and thinks that he feels better when he is active. 

We are enjoying sunsets on the ocean.  (see our impromptu lake in this pic too)  

This is definitely the best time of year here.  Let’s hope that I can get my eye fixed here.  Life is good here.  Hope yours is too.

 

Love to you,
Bonnie for BandD



 

Mobility!

I need to go to Boston to get the amnio/eye stitch procedure done again.  From my last post you know I have NOT wanted to go.  Yet, the defect in my eye continues, and with it danger of serious infection.  The defect has been as much as 5mm wide, though with lots of moisture (drops and ointment), it was down to just over 1mm on Friday, but then back up to over 3mm on Tuesday.  My eye doc here does not do the amnio (placenta) plus stitching procedure; the eye doc in Wilmington who used to do it no longer does.  My options are Duke or Mass Eye & Ear.  We’ve elected for me to go to Boston. 

The earliest my surgeon there could do it is Oct 28 with a pre-op visit on the 26th.  Daniel and I still plan to drive to Boston for appts the week of Nov 16th.  Daniel has many doc visits that need to keep him here, and so we have decided I will go alone.  Thankfully Margi and Peter are willing to take me in while I am there.  It is a most busy time for them; I know I will be an inconvenience, and I’m grateful that they are so welcoming.  I can’t stay in a hotel by myself because of very small yet real possibility that I could fall or otherwise need help. 

While I have dreaded this “extra” trip to Boston, I now find I’m eager to do it.  I have reframed the whole thing as an exercise in my MOBILITY.  Admittedly, I’m still a dependent person (one who can’t stay by herself; I wear a LifeLine button when Daniel goes as far as Wilmington).  Yet, I am more independent.  I can and do drive myself most everyday.  Unless it rains I won’t rent a car in Boston, but will do “wheelchair walking” and use public transportation, which is ultra wheelchair accessible in the populated areas of Boston/Cambridge where I’ll be.  I’ve checked out the T-website and routed my self for my various trips.  What had been a hassle of going to Boston is now an adventure for seeing the autumn colors and navigating my way independently much of the time as well as spending quality time Margi and Peter.

That is the end of the “news.”  The rest of this blog entry is a retrospective on how I got to this enthusiasm about MOBILITY and some “ponderings” on mobility for people like me with chronic serious illness. 

My new horizon on mobility started when Betsy suggested that I bring my wheelchair on our California trip so that we could cruise around Santa Rosa.  I believe she expected that she would be pushing me in the chair.  With both my Mom and Daniel’s, I had often wished they were in a wheelchair so that I could push them to move as fast I would like.  The alternative is walking very slowly with someone like they were then ... and I am now.  Moreover, I get oh so tired being on my feet.  I always use an electric cart in grocery stores.  I smile and tell people who see me walk to it that I “can walk, but not shop” without a cart. 

Rather than being pushed in Santa Rosa, I pedaled myself -- mostly walking my feet and using my arms on the big wheels when I went uphill.  It is great exercise for legs and not too bad for arms.  We had a great time walking all over.  I think I’ve written that our trip to the Charles Shultz (Snoopie) museum; it was the museum touring I’ve ever done because I did not get tired of standing as I always have in museums. 

Betsy is a great coach and model of physical activity [check out her sitting on one knee in the picture above].  She is up early in the morning for ninety minutes of yoga in an extra hot facility a short walk from her house.  I didn’t go to yoga with her, but I make her pool trip each afternoon.  I love walking in the pool as I’ve mentioned in the blog before.  Pool walking makes me long to be the “normal walker” I used to be.  My pool in NC is a 45 minute drive from home; I have explored how many ways that I might get more pool walking into my life.  As much as I love pool walking, there is no way it will be a major part of my life. 

 

With Betsy’s encouragement, wheelchair walking became my new way of both mobility and exercise, a practice I can do anytime Daniel carries my 33 lb wheelchair down our front stairs.  It has been years since I was as mobile as I became in Santa Rosa where I could walk (wheelchair walk) to most everything (like the mall).  I can’t say enough how exhilarating to be so mobile after years of one level, and now a higher level, of disability.

Daniel and I spent some days with Alice and “Alice’s Daniel.”  Alice is a virtuoso of wheelchair mobility.  I think that I have mentioned that Alice dances in a professional dancer in a wheelchair dance company.  She is amazingly strong.  Like me, she can “walk but not shop” without the chair.  But the difference I saw between her conditioning and mine astounded me.  My disability is less extensive than hers, but she has the muscles and stamina.  I had begun to use my wheelchair more at home because of her observation of how much farther energy goes when one is not trying to walk everywhere.  But my wheelchair was an “at home” appliance for me.  My experience in Santa Rosa showed me the value of using my wheelchair more. 

Alice showed me the muscles I could have even with my disability.   My ambition for mobility expanded.  It may seem ironic that I was talking about more mobility with the chair.  All my physical therapy had been about getting OUT of the chair and walking.  The result of believing that I had to walk to be strong was limiting me in more ways than I can name.  I am so grateful to Alice for showing me a new horizon ... by how she looks, what she does, and the language with which she describes her wheelchair experiences.  In a recent email she makes this observation about experiencing the chair: 

“Over the past weeks, I have come to a new practice of enjoyment of the physical.  Prior to dancing, I have begun searching for how my chair feels on a given day.  I've begun looking at how my body orients itself in the chair and how it swings through each push.  I'm looking for the float at the end of a stroke, the moment when the flint of the wheels resonates within my body.  When I can find this freedom, I am ready to face the world.  When I can find this freedom, I am ready to face the world.”  [Alice is a Ph.D. in English Literature and is one of those rare people who appreciates her experience what’s physical and also has the linguistic skills to help us appreciate our own.

Here is a link to wheelchair dancing, though I'm not sure this is Alice's company:   Wheelchair Dancing Company  [This is NOT Alice's company; she puts a YouTube link to a picture of her and the company in her comment below.]

When I was in Santa Rosa, Betsy and her husband Gene suggested that I might like a stationary bike.  I could drive 1.5 miles to the Oak Island Rec Center and use their bikes; I wouldn’t want a bike in the house.  I could wheelchair walk there.  If I did that, why would I then use a stationery bike?  A stationary bike was a possibility, but not what I thought I’d really like or use often. 

After Alice’s we went to LA to visit my son Ron and his new family, Amber and Landen.  You may recall that Ron is a dedicated biker, often doing 100 miles on a weekend.  He had bought Amber and Landen new bikes.  We spent the weekend with re-runs of the Tour de France playing on the TV.  The show featured the beautiful French country-side.   The joy of a bicycle for me has always been the scenery, enjoyed so much more at bike speed than car speed.  I longed for my bike and a ride in the sun; I wondered if I could ever ride a bike again. 

I wrote the long post about our western trip while sitting on the hotel patio, looking up at the awesome Zion red mountains.  Daniel was inside in pain.  By 2pm, I had to decide whether I would go to Zion Park by myself or not.  I elected to go.  It was a life-changing experience for me.  I rode the handicapped accessible bus to the end of the canyon, then wheelchair walked the riverside paved path, about 2 miles round trip with an elevation gain of about 60’. 

Wheelchair walking is definitely the best way to see and photograph scenery.  I passed people who are not used to walking a mile and were tired.  I was using my leg and arm muscles, but not carrying all my weight.  Going uphill was challenging ... and fun.  I was tired when I got back to the bus.  On the way down the canyon, though, I decided to wheelchair walk the last two miles back to the visitor’s center.  SO MUCH FUN. 

 

I took some fine pictures. It was so easy to spot good scenes because I sitting and felt I had plenty of time to compose. I was mostly able to look at the scenery rather than drudging down a trail as I used to do when I was tired, really too tired to be doing what I was doing.

My Sodhopper Mocs were perfect for pedaling me along.  Though they got really dirty on those dusty paths.  I wheelchair walked a total of 4 miles that day.  I am still bragging about it. 

On the drive home I started thinking TRIKE.  Amazon was selling a good looking bike, delivered free with prime, for less than $250 then (it is now back to $340.)  I ordered it to be delivered to Jen’s house so that Ron, who would arrive by plane in NC sooner than Daniel and I by car, could put it together for “GrandBe.”  [Amazon Link]

I LOVE this trike.  Of course, any change of life purchase like this calls for more purchases:  helmet, lock, bike bag, drink holder, flag, water poncho, gel seat cover.  Ron declared that the bike was very well made, amazingly so for what I paid for it. 

Daniel had been concerned that a trike would be dangerous for me because of the many alcoholics who travel faster than the 45 mph speed limit on the road in front of our house.  Daniel was impressed with the quality of the bike and now that he sees I don’t ride on the road in front of our house, he is helping me with the trike and loving that I am riding it.


I ride the bike the five miles round trip to eye doc and shrink.  I intend to ride it the 3m round trip to rec center to use weights.  It is a short ride to the grocery and post office; the basket is BIG to hold groceries and packages to return.  I am having a great time.

I will shortly be ordering a 16lb. aluminum wheelchair as a second chair to keep in the car.  It will have hand brakes so that I can occasionally use it as a walker (since there will be no room for a walker in the car with the chair).  I was a poll watcher on Thursday and Monday; Daniel took me and I wheelchair walked home (1.5 m).

I am determined.  I understand the perspective of so many disabled people, VETS in particular, who overcome major disability to live in the world.  What has changed for me is perspective.(Was it Alan Kay who is a point of view is worth 50 IQ points?)  Both Betsy and Alice showed me new horizons that I could see ARE AVAILABLE TO ME.  I will soon be 67, and I have thought of myself as old.  BUT I intend to live another twenty years and I intend to LIVE those years.

Thank you for looking with me at issues of mobility in my life and in the world of disabled people.  The more I am with “seniors” the more I see that all of us are headed for disability if we live that long.  I’m seeing that disability can be managed, but it can take some unconventional thinking ... such as seeing a wheelchair as a way to increase strength and mobility instead of a metaphor of loss.

Love and peace to you, our wonderful friends,
Bonnie for BanD

ps:  I’ve ordered the new wheelchair. It is on its way here right now.