This past Sunday, July 15, was an anniversary for me. Not the kind that you receive gifts for, like a birthday or wedding anniversary, but an anniversary all the same, one that I expect I will continue to observe for the rest of my life. And like a lot of holidays on the calendar, it is closely paired with another date: Memorial Day/Veteran’s Day, Flag Day/the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving/Christmas, Christmas Eve/Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve/New Year’s Day, Christmas/Easter, Mardi Gras/Easter, Hanukkah/Passover, etc.
For me, the paired dates are April 8 and July 15, both in 2012. April 8 was the date I was in a major car accident that could have taken my life. July 15 was the date I was finally released from my tour of North Texas hospitals, nursing homes, and rehabilitation centers. I guess I could add a third date to that list, October 29, 2012, the date I was released from outpatient rehabilitation, but that date didn’t have the impact (no pun intended) of the other two.
At the time of the accident I had very little experience with doctors and hospitals other than routine treatment for an occasional bout with allergies or a sinus infection. I had pneumonia several years earlier and had to miss work for seven days, but even that was really not a big deal. I just stayed home, took my medicine, and slept a lot. I had previously had three broken bones, a toe, and both pinkie fingers, and those were three separate injuries. Other than that, good health.
That night in April, in an instant, I had a broken right femur caused by sliding sideways into the gear shift, a broken left wrist caused by the exploding airbag, and a broken left ankle, cause unknown, just the force of the impact, I guess. Emergency medical technicians worked to stabilize my injuries before getting me out of the car, then took me across the intersection to a field where a waiting CareFlite helicopter took me to Harris Methodist Hospital in downtown Fort Worth. I was there for most of the month of April, including the first three days in intensive care.
Next, I went to Heritage Oaks Nursing Home/Rehab in north central Arlington where I spent a month trying to build up my strength. Most of the residents were elderly people who had had strokes, but there were a few residents who were about my age, although they, too, were recovering from strokes. I was the only one of the residents I met there who was healing from a car accident.
In early June of 2010, I moved to the HealthSouth Rehabilation Hospital in south central Arlington. By that time I was able to move myself from the bed to a wheelchair and then back to the bed. The therapists there were real slave drivers, in a nice sort of way. They really worked us, but again, most of the residents were older than I was and many were in much more serious condition. By that time I was a lot stronger, and I got even stronger propelling myself up and down the halls in the wheelchair. I still wasn’t able to put any weight on my left ankle because some of the bones were still being held together with a screw, so I couldn’t do any standing. My physical therapist could not understand why I wasn’t able to stand up on just one leg, but I told him, “It’s called a lack of coordination. I couldn’t stand up without using both legs before the accident.” I still can’t. So since he couldn’t get me to stand, he had me left weights to strengthen my arms.
At the end of the last week of June, I returned to Heritage Oaks for another stay. I needed to have surgery to remove the screw in my ankle, and HealthSouth doctors determined they could do no more until the surgery was done. This time at Heritage Oaks I was much more independent, although I was still in a wheelchair. I could get myself into and out of bed, go get whatever I needed from the nursing staff, maneuver myself into the bathroom, and take a shower by myself. I was there a little more than a week. I had the surgery on a Thursday afternoon, and the following Monday, I moved one last time.
This time I went to Arlington Rehabilitative Hospital in northwest Arlington. The nurses, doctors, and therapists there were very nice and quite competent. They specialized in working with stroke victims, and they did get me a lot of practical instruction on how to do things around the house: load the washer or the dishwasher, maneuver through a narrow bathroom door with a walker, go up and down steps and curbs. However, a lot of the skills they would ordinarily have taught me I had already learned at Heritage Oaks and HealthSouth.
Finally, on July 15, I was released from that hospital to go home. I certainly couldn’t do much on my own at first. My principal exercise was in walking from the back of the house to the front and back to my recliner several times a day. But I started outpatient rehab and began to do things with my friends from church again. In early August, I bought a Hyundai Santa Fe to replace the Saturn totaled in the accident and went back to school when school started.
So Sunday, as I thought about the ways my life has changed in the two years since I ended my hospitalization from the accident, I noted a lot of changes. I’m not fully recovered, and it looks like I may never regain all the abilities I had before the accident. The broken femur stretched the nerve that affects the ability to raise and lower the front part of my foot by flexing the ankle. The doctor thought that would eventually come back, but so far it hasn’t. I’ve figured out a way to compensate most of the time, but I still have to be careful that I don’t drop my toes, stumble, and fall. I have fallen once that way, and I’ve tripped and caught myself many times. So I’ve had to slow down. My left ankle still swells if I stand up too long or walk too far. And my left wrist is still weak and may eventually develop carpal tunnel problems.
While I usually walk with a cane, I’m notorious for putting it down somewhere and walking off without it. Once, in the spring, I was standing by the classroom door when the fire alarm rang, and I was halfway out of the building before I realized the cane was still in the classroom. Oh, well. I made it outside and back with no mishaps. Some of my friends see that as a sign that I may one day not need the cane, but others, those with less respect for their elders, say it’s just proof that I’m absent-minded.
I’m gearing up to start my third year of school after the accident. This may be my last year to teach in public school. I’ve been thinking I might retire and collect my teacher retirement, while teaching in one of the private schools or community colleges in the area. I might do some writing, or I could just be a substitute teacher in Arlington and Mansfield. That would save me a lot on gasoline if I could work closer to home and eliminate the daily 56-mile commute.
Looking back, I can see how far I’ve come in two years, and I’m still hoping to improve further. I’ve also become more sensitive to the needs of people with disabilities. In the fall of 2010 I went to the State Fair of Texas with the assistance of a motorized scooter I rented at the fair. And in that scooter, to most of the people at the fair I was every bit as invisible as Harry Potter’s cloak of invisibility made him. I tried to buy my lunch at one of the indoor booths at the fair and was ignored until my sister DJ happened to pass by and asked, “You still don’t have your food?” She ordered for me, and I finally got my lunch. Fair-goers stepped in front of me and cut me off from the rest of my group all day, only noticing my presence if I was unable to stop in time and bumped into them. (No, I didn’t do it on purpose, but it was tempting.)
I’ve become vocal about the rights of the disabled, especially businesses that don’t have enough handicapped spaces or that pile merchandise in the aisles so that the aisles are too narrow to navigate with a walker or wheelchair. Maybe once I retire, I’ll get involved with some advocate groups.
So on this second anniversary, all in all, I think I’m doing pretty well. I’m still able to work, although really enjoying my summer vacation, and I’m starting to look ahead to life after high school—at last, 43 years after most of my classmates left their high school days behind.
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