When I started this blog I said I would discover those situations in life that was not handicapped friendly. Some of which I have encountered are within my own home. I'd like to ask a question to start: Who decided that bathroom doorways should be more narrow that regular doorways? Shouldn't you have as much space as possible to get in to a very important room? A wheelchair can't manuever it. Neither can a walker. So this is how I do it (at the moment). I use a walker upstairs to get to the bathroom door where another walker is waiting for me, for the BIG TRANSFER.
But wait! What's that on the floor in the doorway? I never knew what a threshold was but I do now. It's that an inch slab of ceramic tile that I have to get over. Sometimes to my "dead" left foot it feels like it's more like a foot high. So here is how I approach this speed bump.
I enter the master bedroom via the walker. The bathroom is directly to my right. I close the bedroom door half way so I can place the walker behind it and I am parallel to the bathroom doorway. The bathroom walker is waiting. I place my left hand on that walker, brace my left elbow on the doorframe, lift my left foot over the threshold (if I'm lucky), all the while holding the bedroom walker with my right hand. The moment of transfer occurs when I lift my right foot into the bathroom while raising my weight from one walker to the other. Whew! I made it!
While the whole process only takes a few moments, there are times that it feels like I just ran a marathon. Dragging my left foot as I use the walker is exhausting enough but then to cross the Great Divide . . . No wonder I'm so tired. Depends are starting to look better and better! Just kidding.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Speed Bump #4
All of you out there who lather themselves with lotion after you bathe, you are to be envied. The whole shower experience is demoralizing enough. When it comes to applying lotion, well many days that just doesn't happen. Partly because I don't want to "ask again" for something I should be able to do for myself. And I can to a point slap lotion on my shins and say, "done". Those of you old enough, do you remember the Little Feat song, "Feat Don't Fail Me Now"? Well 50% of my "feet" do fail me so rarely do they get a treat of lotion.
One time when the dryness reached desert proportions, I broke down and asked hubby to put lotion on my legs/feet before I went to bed. Now understand, turning over in bed is a challenge when one leg is "dead" from the knee down. It now involves a lot of hip movement and gravity to roll from one side to another. Along with reaching behind me to grab the headboard. This night, however, the amount of lotion on my legs had me stuck on my back unable to turn left or right. The sheets were stuck to my legs and I couldn't unstick them. So there I lay listening to hubby sleeping peacefully. I was finally able to lift the covers with one hand, hold the headboard with the other, scoot the hips till one foot went over the other and then like a tub that finally overflows, I was able to roll/flop on my side.
I think I was able to get a few hours rest before nature called!
One time when the dryness reached desert proportions, I broke down and asked hubby to put lotion on my legs/feet before I went to bed. Now understand, turning over in bed is a challenge when one leg is "dead" from the knee down. It now involves a lot of hip movement and gravity to roll from one side to another. Along with reaching behind me to grab the headboard. This night, however, the amount of lotion on my legs had me stuck on my back unable to turn left or right. The sheets were stuck to my legs and I couldn't unstick them. So there I lay listening to hubby sleeping peacefully. I was finally able to lift the covers with one hand, hold the headboard with the other, scoot the hips till one foot went over the other and then like a tub that finally overflows, I was able to roll/flop on my side.
I think I was able to get a few hours rest before nature called!
Friday, January 21, 2011
Speed Bump #3
Today during school (did I mention I teach 8th grade civics?) I am being visited by someone from Assistive Technology. I find it really hard to accept that I am in the position of needing help but accept it I must. I obviously find writing (the old fashioned way) more and more difficult. Of course being right-handed and it's my right hand that I am losing use of is another irony I must face.
You know that cable show, "What Not to Wear"? Every time they talk about the terrors of elastic waist pants I want to scream, "How else am I suppose to get my pants up??" I really don't want to be that frumpy old lady in the scooter ads. When I turned 50 I thought I had to start wearing shirtwasit dresses to "dress the part". I remember someone asking me if I felt that way? The answer was no then and is still no today. However, I now need to look at ease when alone to care for myself. I've concluded if I try to look "sharp" from the waist up, who cares what I'm wearing from the waist down! Right?
You know that cable show, "What Not to Wear"? Every time they talk about the terrors of elastic waist pants I want to scream, "How else am I suppose to get my pants up??" I really don't want to be that frumpy old lady in the scooter ads. When I turned 50 I thought I had to start wearing shirtwasit dresses to "dress the part". I remember someone asking me if I felt that way? The answer was no then and is still no today. However, I now need to look at ease when alone to care for myself. I've concluded if I try to look "sharp" from the waist up, who cares what I'm wearing from the waist down! Right?
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Speed Bump #2
I always loved to cook. A secret dream was to own a restaurant. So often one child or another would come up to me in the kitchen and ask, "What's for dinner, Mom?" My answer so often was, "I'm not sure. I'm not done yet." Well not only do I not have use of my left foot, my right hand is weak and I am losing muscle in it. My index finger crooks and so utensils, knives, etc are now hard to use.
Dennis has taken on the task of cooking dinner and sometimes I sit in my wheelchair in the kitchen and "walk him through" cooking dinner. This past Thanskgiving, Sarah, our 24 year old, was doing the cooking but I wanted to do something. Eureka! Go get the old card table and put it between the kitchen and the breakfast area. Bingo! Wheelchair was now at table height. So I was able to do some things to contribute.
Another day I asked Dennis if he knew if we still had the electric skillet. The next thing I knew I was making home fries in the skillet on the card table. The one "drawback" is that I need a sous chef but Dennis or Matthew are more than willing if it means mom is back in the kitchen! So tonight I gave Dennis the night off and made dinner. It wasn't me standing at the stove but it was great to get back in the kitchen!
Dennis has taken on the task of cooking dinner and sometimes I sit in my wheelchair in the kitchen and "walk him through" cooking dinner. This past Thanskgiving, Sarah, our 24 year old, was doing the cooking but I wanted to do something. Eureka! Go get the old card table and put it between the kitchen and the breakfast area. Bingo! Wheelchair was now at table height. So I was able to do some things to contribute.
Another day I asked Dennis if he knew if we still had the electric skillet. The next thing I knew I was making home fries in the skillet on the card table. The one "drawback" is that I need a sous chef but Dennis or Matthew are more than willing if it means mom is back in the kitchen! So tonight I gave Dennis the night off and made dinner. It wasn't me standing at the stove but it was great to get back in the kitchen!
Monday, January 17, 2011
Speed Bump #1
I was always an independent person. My mother died when I was 16 years old and my only sibling, my brother, when I was 38 years old. I have been known as the care giver most of my life. My father will be 99 years old next month and he has more mobility than I do. The hardest thing to accept is that I need help, that I am no longer 100% independent.
Thankfully my husband of almost 29 years, Dennis, has taken on the job. When my brother was dying of cancer and under hospice care, the reality was that I was the primary care giver. I was the one who gave him morphine in his catheter and stayed up waiting for oxygen to be delivered. So after spending most of my adult life caring for others, including three children, this was the first big hurtle. I haven't been always successful and I certainly haven't always found the humor in the situations.
But a constant adjustment it will be. Thankfully my family now remembers more times than not to make sure when they move the walker or wheelchair out of the way that they then move it back within reach. Very frustrating when it's just that inch out of reach, teasing you and saying, "Nay, nay,nay". Almost as frustrating as making sure you have enough time to get in to the bathroom not to mention having the balance/strength to get "situated". But those stories I'll save for another day.
Thankfully my husband of almost 29 years, Dennis, has taken on the job. When my brother was dying of cancer and under hospice care, the reality was that I was the primary care giver. I was the one who gave him morphine in his catheter and stayed up waiting for oxygen to be delivered. So after spending most of my adult life caring for others, including three children, this was the first big hurtle. I haven't been always successful and I certainly haven't always found the humor in the situations.
But a constant adjustment it will be. Thankfully my family now remembers more times than not to make sure when they move the walker or wheelchair out of the way that they then move it back within reach. Very frustrating when it's just that inch out of reach, teasing you and saying, "Nay, nay,nay". Almost as frustrating as making sure you have enough time to get in to the bathroom not to mention having the balance/strength to get "situated". But those stories I'll save for another day.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
To anyone interested
I am new to the whole wheelchair community but I am permanent a member. I have recently been diagnosed with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS or Lou Gehrig's Disease). It is estimated that I have witnessed the progression of this disease for two years. All I know is that for the last two years I have gone from tripping/falling, to a cane, to a walker, and now a wheelchair.
The idea of a blog came to me after my first trip to the mall in a wheelchair. I was struck with how other shoppers viewed my existence and how difficult it was to get in to some of the smaller stores. I left that first time feeling depressed that I couldn't get into some stores and my 14 year old son had to leave me outside to wait for him to shop. Horrors! He'd have to come as close to the doorway that the alarm system would allow him to show me what he wanted to get or how a pair of jeans fit.
In the meantime I was subjected to looks by adults and children alike. Perhaps I was feeling insecure. I use to walk all over this mall and now I can't. Also the ALS has not progressed to where I "look" like I belong in a wheelchair. You can't tell that I have no use of my left leg below my knee or that I haven't been able to wiggle my toes in two years or ever again!
All I know is I was left with the impression that I was in everyone's way NOT the other way around. Being pushed around was frustrating to say the least. Especially when those around you make YOU wait while they pass.
So the idea of this blog is to comment on how our world in spite of ADA regulations is not always handicapped accessible or should I say handicapped friendly. I will discuss those interesting "speed bumps" those of us in wheelchairs have to maneuver around everyday. Hopefully with humor but hopefully I discover the speed bumps I put in front of myself.
Mlee
The idea of a blog came to me after my first trip to the mall in a wheelchair. I was struck with how other shoppers viewed my existence and how difficult it was to get in to some of the smaller stores. I left that first time feeling depressed that I couldn't get into some stores and my 14 year old son had to leave me outside to wait for him to shop. Horrors! He'd have to come as close to the doorway that the alarm system would allow him to show me what he wanted to get or how a pair of jeans fit.
In the meantime I was subjected to looks by adults and children alike. Perhaps I was feeling insecure. I use to walk all over this mall and now I can't. Also the ALS has not progressed to where I "look" like I belong in a wheelchair. You can't tell that I have no use of my left leg below my knee or that I haven't been able to wiggle my toes in two years or ever again!
All I know is I was left with the impression that I was in everyone's way NOT the other way around. Being pushed around was frustrating to say the least. Especially when those around you make YOU wait while they pass.
So the idea of this blog is to comment on how our world in spite of ADA regulations is not always handicapped accessible or should I say handicapped friendly. I will discuss those interesting "speed bumps" those of us in wheelchairs have to maneuver around everyday. Hopefully with humor but hopefully I discover the speed bumps I put in front of myself.
Mlee
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)