If you are old enough, you may remember a tv series called “My Mother The Car.” It was canceled after one disastrous season, from 1965-1966, due to bad reviews and low ratings. Really? Was anyone surprised that the public did not buy into the premise that someone’s mother was reincarnated to become the family vehicle? (Some ideas are just so bad and so poorly delivered that they should die after one season.)
So when you read the title of this blog, do not think I am suggesting my wheelchair is a person or a reincarnated being. But it has become a friend. Or maybe it always was … but I have just come to realize it.
I remember clearly a few days after my injury when the hospital staff told me I was to be fitted for my wheelchair. “I could just borrow one, couldn’t I?” I thought. After all, I knew that in a year or so, I would be back up and walking. But they were insistent. Even if I only needed a wheelchair temporarily, they told me, it needed to be built to fit me and serve me the best. So I agreed.
Then I had to take lessons in wheelchair use: how to propel safely, so I didn’t damage my shoulders, how to turn, how to go up and down ramps and hills, how to transfer in and out of the chair, and how to pop a wheelie to get over obstacles. Again, I told myself these were skills I would only need for a short while.
That was 8 years ago.
Now I know that I am likely to need a wheelchair for the rest of my life. Those are hard words to write, but that is my reality. Even if I walk independently again, I may need my wheelchair to travel long distances. This summer, I had somewhat of a setback in my recovery, due to the kind of back issues many people my age face. My back hurts, and my mobility has suffered, so I am spending more time in my wheelchair than before. It has taught me that we never know how we will feel or what we will need in the future.