August 13, 2006
Today we did a little of this and that. Janet Rogers and John Hinrichsen came by to fix the futon frame, shortening it a bit so the top of the futon is even with the top of Gary’s wheelchair seat. I found the theraband that Gary had been given at Shepherd and Gary took the hint and did his exercises (I did them with him). Joe called and we talked about the house, the state of the garage, and how good the cats looked (the only other time Gary and I both left them (for about a week) they were fat as hogs when we got back, having done a lot of stress eating, apparently. Tigger, by the way, is getting more and more used to the wheelchair; Blackjack still won’t come near it; Tigger loves the hospital bed when Gary is in it – or rather, he loves lying next to Gary in it; we have to keep an eye on where those claws are kneading, making sure it isn’t happening on Gary where he can’t feel. We are also re-experiencing how Tigger likes to be in Gary’s face when Gary is eating – a habit we’d hoped Tigger had gotten out of (he doesn’t get in my face, evidently not being into rice and zucchini); the cats and I have, however, quickly re-established the habit of going for a little cat walk around the outside of the house before the cats’ meals are served. Okay, you’re probably sick of hearing about our cats ;-)).
Our big adventure for the day was a trip to Lowe’s, which took us a couple of hours. We bought stuff like waste baskets (deciding our remodeled house deserved something more high-class than cardboard boxes for that purpose), airtight food containers for pet food and ours (we’d had the cats’ food in an airtight plastic clothes bag, but that has disappeared out of the pantry), a couple of different latches to experiment with for the cat barrier, a small halogen desk lamp for Gary’s use during the night, a stool for me to sit on at Gary’s bedside when I am helping him with his stretching and so forth, and castor cups for the hospital bed which currently slides even with the wheel locks on (only, we’re now not sure if we’re going to use the cups, because the kind we got would make it very difficult to move the bed at all should we decide we need to). At checkout at Lowe’s, we discovered the credit card swiper (what is the official name for that?) isn’t quite accessible. First of all, it was bolted to the counter, though the part Gary needed to swipe his card through and sign could be lifted out of the holder and brought to him. The pen was still attached to the holder, however, and it didn’t reach very far, so Gary had to do some maneuvering of his chair to face the counter sideways in order to sign. I noticed that the checkout person announced over the speaker that another checkout aisle was open to take the people waiting in line behind us (grin).
We are still working out the best (or even a good ;-)) way for Gary to transfer out of the car – the transfer in is going fine. We had noticed that the technique he had first been using to transfer out (with both feet first placed outside the car) had been efficient, but he was getting bruises from it on his lower left leg, evidently from banging his leg on the car. So then we went to a one-foot-in-one-foot-out technique, which takes us a lot more time; he thought it good enough, but I pointed out that he needs a lot of my help with it, so if his goal was independence in this kind of transfer, we might want to try to come up with another way. Neither of us had any ideas at the time I brought this up, but then when he transferred out of the car to go into Lowe’s I noticed that at the last part of the transfer he would have had a better body position had he had both feet in the car – I told him this, but I also told him I couldn’t guarantee that that position wouldn’t inhibit the start of the transfer. When we got home and we prepared to do the transfer out of the car, he said we might as well try my suggestion – we’d tried all the other possible foot placements. So we did, and it worked great! (“By George, I think you’re onto something,” Gary said halfway through the transfer.) The position not only allowed him to make the transfer in just a couple hops, but his angle was such he kept on the board without needing major help from me – maybe he would have needed none at all, but we won’t test that theory until he’s consistently done it successfully with minimal help from me. Anyway, time will tell if this is the technique that will work, or if that was a fluke, but we are hopeful.
After our shopping spree, Gary needed a nap and I meditated. As dinnertime rolled around, Gary suggested we divide up the chores differently. For instance, since he can’t maneuver his chair to get the dishes in the dishwasher, rather than me do most of the cooking and him do most of the cleaning up, as we’d done before, he said he’d help out with the dinner preparation then rinse the dishes in the sink afterwards. Tonight we had planned on tostadas for him, so he got ingredients like taco sauce and lettuce and tomatoes and cheese from the fridge then sat at the table and sliced tomatoes and grated cheese while I warmed up the beans (canned, I confess) and the tortillas.
As we went through the stretching routine later in the evening, Gary pointed out that one nice thing about the situation we found ourselves in was that we did a lot more things together, that the shopping trip had been fun, whereas before if he’d had to go to Lowe’s, it would have been a chore. I was reminded of how things are when you’re dating – you do everything together, and even the most mundane stuff is more fun that way, whereas when you divide up the chores, things may become more efficient, but you may lose that fun element.
So, you can take a lesson from that if you want to ;-).
Today we did a little of this and that. Janet Rogers and John Hinrichsen came by to fix the futon frame, shortening it a bit so the top of the futon is even with the top of Gary’s wheelchair seat. I found the theraband that Gary had been given at Shepherd and Gary took the hint and did his exercises (I did them with him). Joe called and we talked about the house, the state of the garage, and how good the cats looked (the only other time Gary and I both left them (for about a week) they were fat as hogs when we got back, having done a lot of stress eating, apparently. Tigger, by the way, is getting more and more used to the wheelchair; Blackjack still won’t come near it; Tigger loves the hospital bed when Gary is in it – or rather, he loves lying next to Gary in it; we have to keep an eye on where those claws are kneading, making sure it isn’t happening on Gary where he can’t feel. We are also re-experiencing how Tigger likes to be in Gary’s face when Gary is eating – a habit we’d hoped Tigger had gotten out of (he doesn’t get in my face, evidently not being into rice and zucchini); the cats and I have, however, quickly re-established the habit of going for a little cat walk around the outside of the house before the cats’ meals are served. Okay, you’re probably sick of hearing about our cats ;-)).
Our big adventure for the day was a trip to Lowe’s, which took us a couple of hours. We bought stuff like waste baskets (deciding our remodeled house deserved something more high-class than cardboard boxes for that purpose), airtight food containers for pet food and ours (we’d had the cats’ food in an airtight plastic clothes bag, but that has disappeared out of the pantry), a couple of different latches to experiment with for the cat barrier, a small halogen desk lamp for Gary’s use during the night, a stool for me to sit on at Gary’s bedside when I am helping him with his stretching and so forth, and castor cups for the hospital bed which currently slides even with the wheel locks on (only, we’re now not sure if we’re going to use the cups, because the kind we got would make it very difficult to move the bed at all should we decide we need to). At checkout at Lowe’s, we discovered the credit card swiper (what is the official name for that?) isn’t quite accessible. First of all, it was bolted to the counter, though the part Gary needed to swipe his card through and sign could be lifted out of the holder and brought to him. The pen was still attached to the holder, however, and it didn’t reach very far, so Gary had to do some maneuvering of his chair to face the counter sideways in order to sign. I noticed that the checkout person announced over the speaker that another checkout aisle was open to take the people waiting in line behind us (grin).
We are still working out the best (or even a good ;-)) way for Gary to transfer out of the car – the transfer in is going fine. We had noticed that the technique he had first been using to transfer out (with both feet first placed outside the car) had been efficient, but he was getting bruises from it on his lower left leg, evidently from banging his leg on the car. So then we went to a one-foot-in-one-foot-out technique, which takes us a lot more time; he thought it good enough, but I pointed out that he needs a lot of my help with it, so if his goal was independence in this kind of transfer, we might want to try to come up with another way. Neither of us had any ideas at the time I brought this up, but then when he transferred out of the car to go into Lowe’s I noticed that at the last part of the transfer he would have had a better body position had he had both feet in the car – I told him this, but I also told him I couldn’t guarantee that that position wouldn’t inhibit the start of the transfer. When we got home and we prepared to do the transfer out of the car, he said we might as well try my suggestion – we’d tried all the other possible foot placements. So we did, and it worked great! (“By George, I think you’re onto something,” Gary said halfway through the transfer.) The position not only allowed him to make the transfer in just a couple hops, but his angle was such he kept on the board without needing major help from me – maybe he would have needed none at all, but we won’t test that theory until he’s consistently done it successfully with minimal help from me. Anyway, time will tell if this is the technique that will work, or if that was a fluke, but we are hopeful.
After our shopping spree, Gary needed a nap and I meditated. As dinnertime rolled around, Gary suggested we divide up the chores differently. For instance, since he can’t maneuver his chair to get the dishes in the dishwasher, rather than me do most of the cooking and him do most of the cleaning up, as we’d done before, he said he’d help out with the dinner preparation then rinse the dishes in the sink afterwards. Tonight we had planned on tostadas for him, so he got ingredients like taco sauce and lettuce and tomatoes and cheese from the fridge then sat at the table and sliced tomatoes and grated cheese while I warmed up the beans (canned, I confess) and the tortillas.
As we went through the stretching routine later in the evening, Gary pointed out that one nice thing about the situation we found ourselves in was that we did a lot more things together, that the shopping trip had been fun, whereas before if he’d had to go to Lowe’s, it would have been a chore. I was reminded of how things are when you’re dating – you do everything together, and even the most mundane stuff is more fun that way, whereas when you divide up the chores, things may become more efficient, but you may lose that fun element.
So, you can take a lesson from that if you want to ;-).
posted by Peg Daniels at 8:26 PM
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