Hurd Update Wednesday (1/14/2015): I haven’t been doing much after 5:30 p.m. because of pain; but yesterday evening I had an event at church. My leg ended up being uncomfortable the entire time. It amazes me how just a slight level of pain is so draining. I didn’t do much except go to the church and walk in and sit down. But I was beat by the time I got home. I was still tired and had some residual pain this morning. I also had a knotted muscle in my back and the tendon in my left hip was screaming at me in pain, so I decided to not go to the gym to swim today. Instead I worked the muscle loose with my Theracane and then went back to bed and got a couple more hours of sleep. My leg still hurts but the extra rest really helped. I’ve already decided that I won’t be going back to the church for another event scheduled for tonight if I can avoid it. I just can’t face the pain. Compared to many others, I know that I don’t have much pain. Quite frankly, I don’t know how they can focus and continue on with their life. I assume that there are quite a few people whom we interact with each day who are in some kind of pain and not doing well. It might be physical pain; but it could just as easily be emotional, mental, relational pain too. We really don’t know what is going on in someone’s life; so be careful not to judge. Give a little grace. Be observant and ask if everything is okay if you sense something is not right. It never hurts to ask if there is anything that you can do to help that person either. Just knowing that you noticed is often enough to bring a moment of cheer into that person’s life. “Somebody noticed me!. Someone cared!” Tomorrow on Thursday (1/15) I am turning in my current leg and getting a new one which they hope will solve my pain issue. If this new leg doesn’t work, they already have a “Plan B” in mind. So if the new one doesn’t solve my problem, hopefully the next one will. The difficulty of getting my leg to fit properly allowing me to enjoy a relatively pain-free day of activity reminds me of Thomas Edison when he was attempting to create the light bulb. He faced failure after failure after failure. I’ve read that he had over 10,000 failed attempts; but he wasn’t discouraged. Each failed attempt got him closer to finding the one thing that would work. Now that is perspective! I want to have that kind of attitude and determination. Everything that I try that doesn’t work gets me just that much closer to the thing that will work. My new prescription glasses came in. Wow! What a difference. The vision in my right eye is still compromised but it is much clearer than before. Unfortunately they got the glasses wrong. They are supposed to be tri-focal but they made them only bi-focal. They made the bi-focal lens giant, filling up the entire space where the intermediate, tri-focal lens should be. I should get the replacement lens by next Monday or Tuesday. I’m wearing the new, incorrect glasses for now. My prescription has changed drastically so I am having a bit of vertigo with them. I can’t easily read a computer screen either (that’s what the intermediate lens if for). But the new upper lens for distance works great! I am also having to re-adjust my head angle. My old glasses were so bad, I had to tip my head back to use the intermediate lens for distance and the bottom “reading” lens for using the computer. Now it feels like I am tucking my chin way down to look through the proper area of the lens. Weird! Hopefully I will get used to them soon. I’ve been trying to get some replacement parts for my wheelchair. It amazes me what a hassle it is to do so. All that is wrong with my chair is the arm rests are cracked and broken. Seems simple enough—I need a set of new arm rests. I was given the wheelchair and it is an older model but it is still in good shape otherwise. Since insurance didn’t pay for this wheelchair for me, insurance is balking about buying replacement parts for me. They don’t have any trouble buying a completely new chair for me; but a few relatively inexpensive parts—no! Does that even make any sense except in our throw-away American culture? When I first got the chair, I spent money out-of-pocket (I didn’t have insurance at the time) to buy the calf support attachment for the left leg that had been amputated. As I recall, it took over a month after ordering it for it to come in. I was told that a month’s delay wasn’t too bad compared to if it went through insurance. Since I paid cash, I got the equipment I needed much sooner than if insurance was paying. I don’t consider one month as fast. What a crazy system! I feel sorry for people who need parts or durable medical equipment that have to wait and wait. So my word for the day is PATIENCE. Meriam-Webster Dictionary defines it as the act of bearing pains or trials calmly or without complaint. Okay…I still need to work on that! Take a deep, cleansing breath…
Posted on: Wed, 14 Jan 2015 22:51:56 +0000