A cute rehabilitation story

I woke up on Thanksgiving morning, much like many other mornings, with my mind racing and no outlet in sight, the only exception was I couldn't escape into the the idiot box reality (which I must admit I since TIVO has been around, I am doing much more than before), but this really does not promote my creative process. I used to try to have my laptop set up, but since I am unable to turn it on and the inability to do so annoys me so much, I have decided to avoid having it set up most of the time. (Laptops, unlike other computers, need to have the button pushed to turn it on and because I do not have the ability to use my arms or hands this makes turn a laptop on by myself and possible.) Anyway, one might ask what tantalizing subject was racing about in my mind. The truth is I cannot remember; most of the things which were jumping up and down on my head, at least not anything I can relay here :-), but I do recall that I was full of piss and vinegar and eager to do something productive. More importantly, I also realized I have not been able to write with any sense of humor lately and discontinued to nag at me for the remainder of the morning. I don't know what has gotten into me, but I seem to be writing so seriously that I am almost put myself to sleep. Well, with that in mind, I did recall a funny situation which transpired during my initial stay in the hospital.

During rehabilitation I had to be fitted with a condom catheter in an effort to prevent me from having the more invasive catheters placed in my penis or in a suprapubic (I discussed this in a previous post). A condom catheter is a rubber condom that has a hole in the end into which the end of a urine bag is inserted. The fitting process, at least for the cheap versions of these condom catheters, requires a nurse to take the penis and liberally apply an adhesive so the condom will not slip off. She or he then applies a stretchy type of tape to the bottom of the condom, just adjacent to the base of the penis. At this time of my rehabilitation I had a certain amount of sensitivity in the penile region, although I did not get any sort of arousal from stimulation to this area. Moreover, it really doesn't matter if a quad has any sensitivity in the penis for him to have a spontaneous erection. These types of erections are simply reflexive in nature and do not indicate any level of arousal. In fact, spasms can cause erections and on one terrible occasion, I had spasms so bad that I had to sit in my room for an hour and a half with a tentpoled towel draped over my lap until it finally subsided. All of the nurses know spontaneous erections can and frequently does occur to quadriplegics, but forbearance is not one of their strong suits. This is primarily because they are not able to adequately fit a condom catheter around the penis if it is completely erect and this frustrates many. It is at this point that my antidote begins. On one particular day, I had a male nurse who happened to be training a new, good-looking female nurse. He was simply talking her through all of the procedure, for what seemed like the hundredth time, when I heard her complain, "This damn thing won't go down for anything." While lying in my bed listening to this exchange and knowing there was nothing I could really do about the situation, simply looked up at her with a sheepish gaze and said, "Maybe if you stop playing with it, it might not be that hard." You should have seen her face. First she had the deer in the headlights look and after she finally grasped what I was joking about, her hands reflexively covered her mouth and her face turned beat red. While her look was priceless, it was the male nurse, who was doubled up lying over my legs laughing ceaselessly, which really had me in stitches. I speak to this nurse at least once every few weeks and she still brings up the subject (no pun intended) to this very day.

Bad day for University of South Florida

Well, I guess we have another team that is unable to play in the cold weather. My alma mater, the University of South Florida, managed to lose against the University of Connecticut today in temperatures which were definitely below freezing. It took them out of contention for a BCS bowl, but they may be able to get another bowl bid if they can beat West Virginia next week. We need to keep our fingers crossed.

Lately I have been doing pretty well and the only difficulties I have been having is with my blood pressure. I cannot seem to sleep at the required 30° angle which my doctor wants me to, but I may try to take a sleeping pill and try again tonight. Currently I am involved in purchasing a manufactured home for my brother to rent from me and then I will be looking at moving. In order to accomplish this task, I will have to sell this house and that is something that I am not eager to do. It requires some basic touchup work, but this is something I had to rely on others to do and definitely is not a task I relish.

Thanksgiving eve and all is well

I haven't been able to get too motivated today. Unfortunately, the temperature has diminished significantly, at least for me, and this adversely affects me especially. For most people 64° is a wonderful temperature, but for me is a painful time and I cannot wait until the seventies arrive once again. The majority of my day will be spent reading a magazine and possibly watching a little more TV. The other night I watched Without a Trace episode "A Day in the Life" and I found it to be one of the more fascinating episodes. It was filmed in a manner which tried to demonstrate what one couple might go through during the process of losing a child. The normal stars of the series were not the primary focus and I thought this approach was refreshing. It was almost as good as the episode of M*A*S*H which was shot entirely from the perspective of the patient. I normally watch Without a Trace whenever I have a bit of extra time; primarily because it is not one of the stronger shows on television right now, however, I would definitely recommend this particular episode.
While I'm discussing television shows, I have noticed that several of the military shows and crime dramas seem to be moving in the direction of using the military pronunciation of the acronym ASAP. For those of you that do not know what I'm talking about, in the military ASAP is pronounced a-sap -- like you are a sap, Billy. I am curious to see how many people have also noticed this trend lately. To use some more military vernacular, it really gives me a major case of the ass when I am watching an actor playing a military person and they say they want something done ASAP and they do not pronounce it correctly. Sometimes I think these television shows need a retired military person to advise them. For instance, I wrote into the network responsible for the movie "Murder at the Presidio" to offer my services if they would like to make a military movie in the future. "Murder the Presidio" had such an interesting plot and it was completely destroyed by their inability to follow normal military customs. I could give numerous examples, but it is safe to say that the film would have been much more interesting if they would have hired somebody for a nominal price just to advise them. Hell, I would have done it for free. Just a trip out there to watch how it is done would have been worth the price for me.
I apologize if there are too many errors, but for some reason I am having difficulty with my voice-activated software. I am unsure whether it is the microphone for myself. I have noticed my voice has been a little gravelly lately and this is definitely not conducive to good writing. I am also becoming increasingly aware that my vocabulary is severely limited and many words which it previously thought existed, are really not words at all. It is possible I may have to consider getting a new microphone in the future, but right now I cannot really afford putting out a lot of money for items that I have currently. I hope everyone has an outstanding Thanksgiving. I am somewhat anxious to see what kind of trepidations we encounter as we try to prepare our first Thanksgiving dinner since I have been in the wheelchair. My mother had previously prepared all of them and she is just getting too old to be going through this process every year.

Where is my lucky coin?

Let me start by taking Cori for the inspiration. If you want to see her blog, simply click on the title.
A couple of years ago I was trying to determine why I had some really bad luck all at once and I discovered that my "lucky coin" (my 2nd Armored Calvary Regiment coin which I have carried since it was awarded to me in 1985) had been removed from the pouch where it is normally permanently affixed to my wheelchair.

The following is a small list of unfortunate occurrences which transpired in really close proximity to one another. I often wonder what the chances are of this many bad acts occurring so close together.
1. After leaving a Buccaneers game, my father and I discovered a tire on my van had a basketball size bulge protruding on the interior sidewall and would need to be changed by a professional. To this day I continue to wonder why I did not notice such a gross deformity in the tire prior to going to the game. If I had, I could have called for a tow truck just as we were leaving the stadium and it most likely would not have taken nearly as long. Hindsight is always 20/20, well enough second-guessing myself. To make a longer story short, we called a tow truck at 10:30 p.m. and after five or six phone calls it finally showed up around 3:30 a.m.. As one can probably guess, I require special transportation and this service is not normally available so late at night. I had to, therefore, wait for the mechanic to show up and get my vehicle going again. This was compounded by the fact that I had forgotten my medication, which was strangely enough normally located in the same pouch in which lucky coin normally resides. Since my medicine is primarily for spasticity, I was a twitching, jittery mess by the time I got home.
2. A couple of days later, during a thunderstorm, lightning struck close to my house and knocked out all of my telephones for several days.
3. Just 36 hours after getting out of the hospital following a routine two week caregiver respite visit, during which time I additionally had a normal colonoscopy performed, and as my brother was about to leave after putting me into bed late at night, my rectum began to bleeding profusely. Fortuitously the bleeding did not start until just after the lightning had struck, mentioned in item #2, knocking out my telephone service. My brother, not wanting to leave when I did not have the ability to use the telephone, was, therefore, able to use his cell phone to call 911 to save my life. I shudder at the thought of him being gone when my telephone service was interrupted. I simply would have bled to death. The final result was I ended up spending a significant amount of time in ICU and had to have a couple of blood transfusions.

A few weeks later it dawned on me that when all of the above incidents happened I did not have my coin on my wheelchair or near me. I still remember the shock in my brother's face as I explained to him the series of misfortunes which befell me in 1995, sans my "lucky coin." Just to let you know how superstitious I am, I carried this coin the entire time I was in Desert Storm and I personally believe this is the reason I made it out unharmed. But that's another story.
The following are a few of the things which happened without my "lucky coin" being around in 1995.
The first incident occurred during a graduation ceremony. My battalion sergeant major (the senior sergeant in a battalion) thought I was scratching my scrotum when I was simply just trying to make sure my pants were aligned with my shirt. I know, that is somewhat OCD, but when you're in the military, obsession with rituals becomes, well, an obsession. I believe it goes without saying he was foaming at the mouth as he continued screaming at me for quite some time. After he finally decided I had had enough, I was able to explain to him that due to the enormous distance I was standing from the spectator's stand might have given the misperception I had been scratching my scrotum, but I assured him I had not been. While this may not seem that important to many people, it was one of the first times I had ever had a senior sergeant (NCO) berate in front of my peers and subordinates.

Just a few months after the graduation events, I lost my first and only competitive board competition. This is a competition where sergeants (NCOs) answer questions with hopes of becoming the sergeant or drill sergeant of a quarter. Boards of this type are highly competitive and very demanding. I went up against three very talented and smart sergeants which I had no problem losing two, but it was the overweight sergeant, who wasn't even in a leadership position, that won the competition. When one of my privates (privates are what I referred to as my subordinates although, I forgot to mention I was a drill sergeant at the time) later described this particular drill sergeant as a ignorant, obese, chocolate chip eating fraud of a drill sergeant, it even cemented the ire which this initial defeat brought on me. I have also neglected to mention this particular drill sergeant was a female. I was initially reluctant to mention this fact because people might think I am misogynistic, but I really did not care if people think I am a male chauvinistic pig. I know some of my female privates thought I was, but this was because I felt they were superior soldiers and deserved more attention. A few of my above-average male privates tried to point this out to some of the ones that were complaining, but I don't think they understood until later in their career. Anyway, getting back to the board, there was another female sergeant that happened to be going for another particular position of distinction (Fort NCO of the Quarter) and I would not have felt bad about losing against this superior sergeant. Frankly, she was much more prepared than me and would have beat the pants off me in a competition. I would, however, your mess if I did not mention that I would definitely not mind having my pants beat off me by this particular beautiful woman :-).
I guess this goes to show you paralysis just doesn't really individual to much.
The last misfortune which I experienced was by far the worst of my life. To put it simply, it was the bicycle accident which resulted in my paralysis.



Note: the preparation for a quadriplegic to undergo a colonoscopy is quite a bit more intrusive and significant than the average able-bodied individual. For those of you that would like to know more about this, do not hesitate to ask and perhaps I will put a blog out about that specific issue.
(I will probably need to review this later and change it significantly.)

I hate when that happens

Just today I had one of those awful things that occurs when dealing with computers nowadays. I was just finishing up a blog which I had started the other day and was just about to save it and then posted to my blog page, when the system (Dragon NaturallySpeaking) crashed the entire computer. I guess I will learn to save my changes more periodically. Hopefully I will get to it tomorrow, but I am a little aggravated, therefore I am going to wait a little while.

Inclusion and acceptance of diversity is the best lesson for children

It was a fantastic Veterans' Day, of which I had the pleasure of enjoying the fantastic company of nephew and niece, as well as many of my neighbors. It was at this festive occasion that I witnessed a simple act which led me to write this equally simple blog. While I am acutely aware that I am treated differently because I am in a wheelchair, I know I do not receive discrimination from those who know me. This buoys my spirits, but it is the site of seeing many of the neighbors in my community, in addition to the majority of the children, going out of their way to treat a beautiful, young girl, who happens to suffer from multiple sclerosis and has the added detriment of having recently moved into our neighborhood, as a welcome member of our village. If you could have seen the smile on this young girl as she sat on a blanket with four other patient, but eager to help, young girls, it would have made your day also.
This act may not seem that grandiose an effort, except the fact is many other neighborhoods would not go to any effort to make sure this young girl was treated well at all. I know when I was young my parents continued to harp on me not to look or stare at people in wheelchairs because it was rude. They also prohibited me from asking the parents or the individual what was wrong. And the truth is this still goes on the day -- over 15 years after the acceptance of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). In an effort to combat this problem, there are many of us wheelchair-bound people that are trying to break the stigma of teaching children not to ask questions and to simply look the other way. Questions by children are usually harmless and simply put; they are just eager to know what is wrong with another individual, they do not consciously judge the individual -- this is usually the result of some sort of learned behavior. I constantly get asked a multitude of questions by the children in my neighborhood and about everywhere else I go. The reason I get asked so many questions is because I have a rather unique driving mechanism which fascinates children. I use this opportunity to answer the children in the best way possible and I honestly believe this openness in addition to my encouraging their parents to allow the children to ask questions, has led to an increasing acceptance of people with disabilities -- at least in my area. This acceptance is also fueled by increasing adherence to the ADA, which enables more disabled people to be in the public eye more often, in addition to the mainstreaming of disabled children into able-bodied classrooms. Children growing up around other children with disabilities are more likely to accept them as equals and understand that their limitations may lead to increased development in other areas. Simply put, the attitude which I witnessed today is Grrrrreat! Diversity should be embraced not shunned.
I asked for your indulgence with the errors. For some reason I have not been able to dictate very well and is having its effect on my writing ability. I will try to get back and review this later on next week. Good night for now.
Quadius

Still a little under the weather

As I posted a little earlier I am suffering from a slight UTI and this is causing some fatigue difficulty. I'm not going to attempt to make a long detail blog or see how many people have commented on my posts in the past few days. I'm hopeful I will be back to full strength on Sunday, but in anticipation of not being at 100% I am making arrangements to see if I can sell my Buccaneers tickets. It is a shame primarily due to the fact that this is the only name the Buccaneers will be playing at 4:15 p.m. this year.

Clarification on Back Once Again

I have noticed in reading over my blog "Back Once Again" that for some reason I consistently indicated I was incapable of changing out my catheter and eventually able to insert a smaller one into my stoma. This is not the case. My caregivers are individuals which change my catheters and perform all of my other daily routines, as far as personal hygiene, feeding, bowel program, etc.. It is simply oversee their actions. I just want to clarify this particular issue.

Infection seems to be ruling -- at least right now

Well, I guess I the verdict is in an I do have an UTI. Even though I am feeling a little bit better, I plan on getting a prescription of antibiotics tomorrow. Although I did take antibiotics for a possible UTI in September, this was primarily because my sediment was getting almost unmanageable and my stinky urine was inhibiting my personal freedom, it was deemed not to be a full-blown UTI. This is my first official UTI in well over five years and considering my last one was caused by a procedure at the hospital, I have not had an infection which was the direct result of my actions at home in seven years. I guess I am doing pretty good and hopefully it will be another seven years until I contract another one. I am eager to get this behind me and get my bowel program back on track so that I can get my mind to return to the right groove. I can honestly say that I have not been 100% myself since I graduated in December 2004 from the University of South Florida. My, semi educated, guess is that this is the direct result of my not having very many long-term goals left anymore. Right now the only thing I am focused on is moving within the next six months and this is not necessarily all good news. Although I am here to move into a new house, I am a bit anxious about what I will be able to get for my current house. I'm also equally concerned that my new neighborhood will not nearly live up to the expectations I have given the fantastic community in which I now reside. I have some of the most wonderful neighbors and it isn't many people in the United States that can truthfully say they know more than 80% of the neighbors within their own community.

Once I am back on my feet again, metaphorically speaking of course. I will be glad to answer any questions which individuals might have about my situations or anything else they might wish to inquire about.

Back once again

Let me start this post by expressing my pleasure at seeing some comments on my recent blogs. Due to an unfortunate combination of health difficulties I have not been able to keep up with my blogs over the last 9 or 10 days. I'm not sure if I will get much more done until the end of this week. My troubles started the day after Halloween, when I discovered I needed to make an emergency trip to the bathroom; unfortunately unplanned bowel troubles can cause not only significant discomfort, but very serious complications to a quadriplegic’s schedule, also. I know I have already cover this briefly in my blog titled "The Literal Pain in the Ass of Being a Quad", but sometimes things need to be aired out, if you know what I mean. Due to the complications it was extraordinarily late in the afternoon and I decided not to even bother getting up for the day. I have not written about this previously, but just getting out of bed is much more complicated for quadriplegics that it is for able-bodied individuals. At least it is in the case of high-level quadriplegics that are unable to perform any of their own care. It goes without saying that my day was completely shot. And how was I to know what my next day would have in store? (I have considered writing a blog on quadriplegic bowel programs, but it is definitely not a topic for the majority of people. However, for those of you that are interested in how normal quadriplegic handle this situation, go to the following web site: http://www.patientcenters.com/wheels/news/bowel_bladder.html#bowel )

My next day did not get any better, in that it started with the inability to change out my catheter with a new one. I ended up having to have a smaller catheter inserted, which significantly decreases my ability to expel not only urine, but sedentary deposits that are contained within the urine. This constriction could potentially cause the catheter to clog inadvertently and due to the smallness of the catheter it is much more flexible and easy to become kinked. This is definitely inimical to my lifestyle; therefore I made my way to the hospital to see if they could rectify my situation. The medical staff, nonetheless, wanted to wait until Friday and I ultimately acquiesced. On Friday my catheter was moved up one size, but the physician assistant (PA) who performed the procedure did not seem to want to listen to me when I told her the catheter was in my bladder. I try to elaborate by explaining to her that I can feel my bladder rather well, especially pain. Disregarding my protestations, she continued pushing the catheter in until it was causing significant medical problems, autonomic dysreflexia. By the time I left the hospital I had a headache, due to high blood pressure caused from the autonomic dysreflexia, as well as a severely traumatized bladder. I probably failed to mention I have a suprapubic instead of a routine catheter in the urethra (penis). A suprapubic is a stoma, or a hole, which is over the pubic region and goes directly down into the bladder and therefore does not have to go through the urethra and offers quite a bit of freedom for a quadriplegic. Well, anyway, I had thought I might have some discomfort in the stoma, but had no anticipation of the difficulties I encountered. The pain which I suffered from my initial complication, on the previous Wednesday, did not even compare to what I experienced on Friday and Saturday, following this rough PA. It is now self-evident I have contracted an urinary tract infection (UTI) at some point in this saga. Now I am fighting temperatures and extraordinary bouts with fatigue. I am, however, getting better, especially considering that I was able to do something on the computer today. Hopefully I will be feeling considerably better by the end of the week, since my doctor wanted to wait until Thursday to prescribe antibiotics. He chose this tactic because he did not want to prescribe the wrong antibiotic and does not believe in throwing antibiotics at every infection unless I am in dire need of the medication. I am happy in the fact that I have a doctor who consults with me prior to making his final pronouncement. The reason everything took so long was because the hospital which I go to for care is not open on Saturday or Sunday, except for emergency care. Urinary samples additionally must, or at the very least should, be allowed to develop a culture so the doctor can prescribe the proper antibiotic, if the body is not able to fight off the infection sufficiently. The hospital staff did look at my labs and my white blood cells were elevated in the blood, but the urine did not show a significant amount of red-blooded cells. This, in combination with the fact I was feeling better on Monday, contributed to my doctor's final prognosis.

I hope I have not bogged everyone down with minutia and I apologize in advance for all of the errors. I have not been able to project my voice very well lately and it is affecting my voice recognition software's accuracy. I am trying to catch most of the errors, but I will probably have to review this tomorrow or the next day and make edits as necessary. By the way, I have previously done blogs on voice activation software in February 2005. If you're interested look at them and see if you have any questions. I'm going to close for tonight and hope that I have not overdone it today.
If you do happen to see many errors, they may be gone by tomorrow. But don't count on the grammatical errors being corrected any time soon.