A Harsh Dose of Reality

Approximately two weeks ago, I had an unfortunate thing happen to me. It was really quite depressing, sobering, and scary. I dealt with it at that time, but I'm still having lingering feelings about this experience...some two weeks later.

As I have mentioned before, I was born with my disability. I am completely independent, and I pride myself on all of the accomplishments that I have had in my life. But every once in awhile, my disability just "smacks me in the face." This is what happened:

My wheelchair sucks. I have the ability to use crutches, but I use the wheelchair about 99% of the time. I try to lead a fairly active lifestyle, so I tend to treat my chair pretty harshly. In doing so, I have had to have my wheelchair into the "shop" for repairs on several ocassions. I need to get a brand new chair, because my current one is about 8 years old. So it is time.

I have had an issue with one of the axle plates on my wheelchair, for quite some time now. The axle plate is where I attach the wheel to the frame. I developed a hairline crack into that plate 8-10 months ago. I kept putting off going to the wheelchair repair place, because I just didn't feel like being bothered with it.

About two months ago, the hairline crack had grown to be a quite large, and it was actually impeding my ability to move around in the chair. So, I showed it to one of the Industrial Tech. teachers at my school, and he actually welded the piece together. That, btw, is one of the perks of being friendly with the industrial tech. dept. :)

His weld held perfectly for awhile, but I noticed that the aluminum was starting to fatigue. Then I noticed that the plate had completely cracked, and that, pretty soon, my wheelchair would be impossible to roll. So I had my plans to stop by the wheelchair store on the Friday of that week, because I couldn't wait any longer.

I know that that is a ton of backstory, but I wanted you to understand the whole situation.

So it was two weeks ago, Thursday, when I was rolling out to my car at about 6:15 in the morning. I wanted to get to school fairly early, because I wanted to get something graded that I had left at school

I rolled out to the parking lot, and I rolled to the back of my car to put something in my trunk. I closed the trunk, and started rolling to the front door of my car when..."CRACK!" The axle plate completely snapped, and I came crashing down on my left shoulder.

I haven't updated my blog in over a month, and I'll have a whole separate entry related to some worries that I have had about my shoulder, but all of my weight landed squarely on the shoulder. Instead of the physical pain, the first thing that set in was PANIC. I thought, "Oh shit, I'm lying flat on my back, and there is not another soul out here on this parking lot. What am I going to do?"

I briefly considered crawling back into my apartment. However, if I would have done that, my knees would have been bloody from crawling on the concrete and asphalt. Then I noticed a woman coming over to help me, from several cars away.

She asked me if I needed any help. For a brief second my pride got in the way, and I told her that I was fine. She asked me a second time, and then I told her that I needed help.

I remembered that I had a spare wheelchair inside my storage closet. So I gave her my key, and I told her where she could find my spare. A couple minutes later, she came out with my spare chair.

Now a spare chair is a necessity for a disabled person. But my spare is in horrible shape. The tires are flat, and the seat has no support...but I needed to be able to move.

The woman asked if she could do anything else for me, and I told her that I would be ok. I thanked her profusely, and she went on her way to work.. Then I realized that I would not be able to go into work that day. My shoulder hurt, and I needed to get this wheelchair mess straightened out.

Before I did that, I put my good tires on my spare wheelchair, because they were interchangeable. That allowed me to actually roll around. I went inside and tried to call for a sub. It was beyond the cutoff time, so I had to have our secretary get a sub for me.

I was in no mood to do thorough lesson plans, so I threw some crap together, and I sent an email to a couple of my coworkers. Fortunately they were great, and they filled in the "gaps" in my threadbare plans.

I'll have to wrap up this story....I ended up going to the wheelchair place right after they were open. I realized that my spare wheelchair had a perfect axle plate on it. So I had the wheelchair repair dude harvest the part from my spare, and put it on my everyday chair. After he did that, then I told him that I wanted to start the process of getting a brand new chair. We scheduled a meeting, and I'm happy to say that I should have a brand-new chair in a month or two. :)

Here's the sobering part for me. I stayed busy that morning, but when I got back home, I started freaking out. I realized how helpless I was, splayed out on that parking lot, and I realized that no matter how much I try to be independent...I'm still very dependent on that damn chair.

I then thought about how fortunate I was with all of the following circumstances:

1. I was by my car.
2. I had close access to my chair.
3. A good samaritan helped me out.

That made me think about the night before, and how I had been rolling around The Loop...all the while being a huge distance from my parked car. I tried to think about what I would have done, if my chair would have broken on me while I was a mile or so away from my car...and many miles away from my spare. That thought literally gave me chills.

I'm not sure what I would have done. I would have made it work...because I had to. But, the whole incident still bothers me, some two weeks later. I hate that feeling of helplessness, and I hate it when I am reminded, like that, about my disability.

I still love my life. But I'm a little more cynical and pessimistic now. I keep wondering if my wheelchair is going to hold up on me...or if it is going to break on me now. Fortunately the chair seems pretty solid now...but it will ALWAYS be in the back of my mind.

One final thing. I have a TON of things that I need to write about. I haven't updated this in over a month, and my goal is to do a lot of posting in the near future. Don't worry, they won't all be marathon posts, like this one. :)