Stir Crazy

I’m going insane. Slowly but surely, I am going insane.

You see, I’ve been without the ability to walk safely for several months now and I have been houseridden since September since I had surgery on my upper back. During that time my leg muscles have gotten stronger but alas — the nerves running to my legs have only gotten weaker and my balance has also suffered.

I live on the 2nd floor of a house that is anything but a place for a disabled person to live. I have the damnedest time getting up and down the stairs and it takes an effort. When I am downstairs, I either have to use a walker or I have to roll around in a wheelchair. This is a big departure for me, as I used to walk for miles just for the hell of it. Now I can’t bring myself to walk very well because my legs have given out on me.

So I’m forced to do up-and-down the stairs and around-the-house a few hundred times a day and that is the extent of me getting around, and it is driving me fucking insane. You are probably wondering “Why aren’t you going outside, John?” The answer to that question is because of the “stoop” that I have to get over to get out the door while wheelchair bound. Even WHEN I get out the door, sometimes I have my parents and brother carelessly parked so I can’t exit the walkway because their cars are in the way.

And when I get around the car? If I get around the car? Then it’s a matter of my own strength and my own determination to get down the block – which is a difficult task in a wheelchair when you have a hill that slants the sidewalk. I being a wheelchair novice, have the damnedest time trying to deal with that, and end up annoyed and just plain tired with pushing myself by the time I reach a certain point two or three houses away.

I am going oh so crazy. Six, five, four, three, two, one, switch.
(anyone remember Sharon, Lois and Bram? :tongue)

SO up and down and around and around and around the first floor is my flight plan if anything and even THEN — staying inside — I have too many things in my way or making it tough for me to get around — tables positioned a certain way, chairs in the way, my mothers sandals kicked out in the open, end tables, etc, etc, etc.

This house is no place for a disabled person and this thing that some woudl argue is a life, is not worth living right now. Purpose escapes me, the simple refuge of gettin gaway also escapes me. How I lust for the past… Walking for miles just for the hell of it seems so long ago. The shopping centers where I would go seem so far away now… So far away when you just can’t get out there on your own….