Thanksgiving

Last weekend was Thanksgiving, and my brother flew into town and drove me up to my sister's place in Virginia for the event.  For as long as I can remember, Thanksgiving has always been at my Aunt Koral's house in Maryland, and many of my aunts, uncles, and cousins attend.  Since I wasn't able to get up there this year, a lot of them agreed to come down somewhere I could go.

Jonathan and I drove up midday Thursday.  We had a little time before dinner, so I got to see my family for a little while before the rest of the guests arrived.

A pretty good turnout

The food was delicious, and I really enjoyed the company.  I got to spend some time with my favorite aunts and uncles who I haven't seen in a while.  I want to thank everyone for coming to see me.  It made my Thanksgiving very special.

After everybody left, I spent the night in the guest room in the basement.  That worked out quite well.  The bed was comfortable and easy to transfer to.  The bathroom worked out fine, and we really didn't run into anything unexpected.

Friday, Jonathan and I stayed through lunch.  The weather was fantastic, and we all spent much of the day on the deck.

Good times

Jonathan and I got back to my apartment Friday evening, and unpacked my stuff.  We had time to go get a delicious dinner at Tribeca Tavern, watch a bad movie and go to bed.  Jonathan's flight left early on Saturday, and I was sad he had to leave so early.  I hadn't seen him since the start of rehab, and I enjoyed spending time with him.

Unfortunately, after Jonathan left, I noticed my hips giving me more trouble than usual.  I think my HO has been progressing, and in the time from Saturday to Monday, the pain in my right hip has gotten much much worse.  It's pretty excruciating when I sit in my wheelchair.  I used to have some pain when sitting in my wheelchair, but now it's almost intolerable.  It feels like someone is stabbing a white-hot screwdriver into my hip joint and trying to pry it apart.  It used to be that I could get relief from the pain by sitting on the couch, but even that hurts now.  The pain even takes a while to subside when I lay down in bed. 

I think my hips have also gotten less flexible than they were just a couple weeks ago.  I feel like I can't sit up as straight as I used to be able to, and I have to curve my spine to compensate.  This leads to pain in my lower back.  Whenever I lift myself up, my spine audibly pops back into place.  That can't be good for it.

So I'm worried that I may be alarmingly close to the scenario I have been worried about where I can no longer take care of myself.  If I can't sit up, I can't do anything for myself.  I can't get out of bed, I can't go to the bathroom, I can't feed myself.  I don't know what to do.  If I'm going to be in this much pain, it's going to be hard to get anything done even if I can physically force myself into my wheelchair.

It figures, I just heard that IBM will allow me to continue to work part time on long-term disability, and now I'm not sure if I'll physically be able to do it.

Culinary Delights

The Ravens just won a close one against the Steelers, so I'm in a good mood, and I may as well update the blog.

I had a pretty good week this week.  The week itself was just like every other week lately, so I don't have much to say about it.  I got up, did some work, hung out with Gus and Evelyn, and generally followed my normal routine, but I also had some dinner visitors that really made the week memorable from a culinary perspective.

Monday, I went to a place called Sushi Iwa with Gus and Uyen and Evelyn.  I love sushi, so it was a good experience, and it was a little different than Thai's Noodle where I usually go.  Variety is always good, and it helped me confirm how good the sushi is at Thai's Noodle.

Tuesday, my old roommate, Julie, took me to Outback.  That was awesome because I hadn't had a steak since my accident, and I'd been craving it.  There are better steaks, but you really can't go wrong at Outback.  A memorable meal.

Thursday, my friend Katie, who you may remember as the occupational therapy student from rehab, came by and we went to Bonefish Grill.  Gus had been talking about rare ahi tuna steak on Monday, so I had been craving that.  Nobody does seafood better than Bonefish, and I was thrilled with the meal I got.  I think it was the most memorable meal I've had since I left the hospital.

Mmmmm...

Friday, my friend Jimmy came by for the evening and brought Five Guys burgers and fries.  Those are some of my favorite foods, and I was sad when they were gone.

So I had some good company this week, and I got out of the apartment quite a bit.  And I ate REALLY well.  On the whole, it was a good week.

Unfortunately, I am concerned that my HO is getting worse.  I think my right hip is losing the already minimal flexibility it has had.  It now hurts a lot more than it used to just to sit in my wheelchair, and that's new.  I'm not sure what I can do about it though, so I'll probably just continue to ignore it until I physically can't sit up anymore.

This week, my brother will fly in on Wednesday, and drive me up to my sister's place in Virginia on Thursday.  That should be an interesting experience.  Wish me luck.

Work

It's Saturday again, and I'm going to finally update my blog while I watch a meaningless college football game.

My mom wants me to go up to my sister's house in Virginia for Thanksgiving, but I wanted to make sure I'll be able to get in to the house and do all the things I need to do.  So Gus and Evelyn and I took a road trip up there on Thursday to examine the facilities.

Overall, it's pretty good.  I can get in the basement easily, and with my new wheels I fit through all the important doors.  I can get in the downstairs bathroom, and I can get in the downstairs bedroom.  The downstairs couch is pretty low so if I transfer on, I can't get back off.  I can't reach the sink because I can't roll up close enough, but I expected that.  I took my commode that goes over the toilet.  To get it to fit, we had to lower it significantly.  That makes the transfer pretty sketchy, but I guess it will work.

To get upstairs, I can go out the downstairs door and roll around to the front of the house on the street.  Unfortunately, the driveway in front of the house is incredibly steep so I can't roll up by myself.  And once I get to the top, there's still a big step up to get in the house.  It would be nice if there was a ramp, but Gus proved he can lift me up one step if we're careful.  I find that technique pretty scary, but I guess I don't have a choice.  The upstairs couch is also too low.  So Thanksgiving should be interesting.

The other thing that happened this week is I found out that IBM may not let me continue working part-time when I go on long-term disability (LTD) in December.  I've been on short-term disability (STD) since my injury in April, and I started working 3 hours a day back in August.  Doing some work gives some structure to my day, and gives me a little bit of social interaction every day, and I didn't realize how important it is to me until they told me they might take it away.

I'm still waiting to hear whether IBM will let me continue to put in some hours while on LTD.  If they won't, then I'm going to go crazy while I wait for my HO surgery.  I'm still hoping they might be able to do that in January, but there's no guarantee.  It might be May or even later.  There's no way to know yet.  I can't imagine doing nothing while I wait.  I will literally go crazy.  So I'm holding my breath.  Hopefully I'll find out this week.

Fun

Lately, I've been lucky enough to have some fun, and I guess I should tell you about it.

One of the bad things about being stuck in a wheelchair is that I can't get into most of my friends' houses.  It turns out that most houses require you to navigate at least one or two stairs to get in.  That's not really an option for me.  Fortunately, last weekend, Gus built a ramp over his garage stairs so I can get in.

It's kinda steep

The ramp is a little on the steep side, so I need a big push to get up, and coming down is pretty exciting, but at least I can get in.  So last Monday, I went over and had pizza and watched Monday Night Football.  It was pretty fun to get a change of scenery.  Also, Rosati's pizza is pretty good.

Watching football on a different couch

Last week, I went looking for somebody who wanted to see Argo in the theater with me, and Andy agreed, so we did that Saturday.  That was fun, but also on Saturday, I got a call from my brother-in-law.  It turns out this weekend was the Martinsville NASCAR race.  I had lost track of the date, but for the last 12 years, twice a year, whenever NASCAR races at Martinsville, I have gone up to Hillsville, VA to meet up with a group of friends from all over the east coast and waste several days drinking and wasting time.  Anyway, the Martinsville group decided that they wanted to waste their Saturday by driving 3.5 hours one-way to hang out with me for a few hours, and then drive 3.5 hours back.  So that's what they did.

Mark T., Matt, Curt, and Chris

Jon and Rocco

We spent some time hanging out in my apartment, and then we went to the wing place near my apartment.  I had a great time, and it made me wish I was going with them back to the cabin, but I had a great time hanging out with those guys.  It was easily the most fun I had this week.

So I've had a pretty fun week, and I thought I'd share.  Hopefully this week will be good too.

Mark B. and Mark T.

Surgery News

Once again it's Sunday night, and I find myself waiting for the late game to start.  Bengals at Steelers.  Probably won't be a great game. In the meantime, I'll tell you about my appointment with the surgeon while I wait.

On Thursday, I finally met with Dr. Dahners about my HO surgery.  I was expecting him to tell me to come back in 3 more months for another CT scan, but he basically just asked me when I wanted to have the surgery.  He said I could do it as early as November, but after thinking about it, I told him January.  I wanted to wait until after the holidays.

Then he sent me for some blood tests.  I got a call on Friday telling me the chemical that indicates conditions are right for bone creation were too high, and that January is the earliest they could try the surgery, but they'll have to test me again and see if the levels are low enough then.  So maybe I'm having the surgery in January and maybe I'm not.  We'll see.

I learned some stuff about the surgery.  Dr. Dahners said he looked at the CT scan and I've got a lot of extra bone in my hips.  The bone in front of the hips is blocking my movement.  He said they will have to do one hip at a time in two separate surgeries.  He said I'll lose a lot of blood, and they don't want to give me a blood transfusion because it increases the risk.

He said they won't be able to remove all of the bone, but they can get a lot of it and I should get some of my range of movement back.  I don't know how much.  We'll see.

I will probably be in the hospital about 3 days after each surgery, and the time between the surgeries will depend largely on how well I recover.  Best case would be one month, worst case would be "several months" which I interpret as 3 months.  Again, we'll see.

I'm hoping they'll put me back in rehab for a while after the surgeries, but I expect I'll be pretty injured afterward, so I'll probably need a lot of help until I get better.  I'm hoping I can still count on my friends during that time, and I think my family will probably make time to come help me.  I think it's likely to be unpleasant.

Either way, I hope we can get this party started sooner rather than later.  I'm ready to get my flexibility back.

Escapism

My life here is mostly boring and repetitive, and when it isn't, it's extremely stressful.  I look forward to every break I get from it.  Recently, my favorite escape, and the thing I look forward to the most every week is football.  It's something I can do alone, and I can happily sit on the couch all day and watch.  The Hokies aren't very good this year, but I don't care.  There are other good teams to watch, and I'd rather watch the Hokies lose than do just about anything else.

For the first time, I've also really developed a love for the NFL.  I especially enjoy watching the Ravens.  Not just because I'm from Baltimore.  I really enjoy the way they play the game when they're playing well.  The Chicago Bears are also fun to watch this year.  I love watching good defense.

Apart from football, I've been starting to go a little stir crazy lately.  I've hardly left my apartment since I got here in June, and it's starting to wear on me.  The fact is I'm scared to go very far from home.  Here in my apartment, I have access to everything I need, and I know I can handle just about any situation that might arise.  When I leave home, I have no control over the environment, and if something goes wrong, I have few options.

That said, I don't want to be a shut-in so I've decided to try to accept more invitations and get out more.  I mentioned in a previous post that I went with Mike and Sue to Trivia Night at the bar.  We finished 4th.  I'd like to do more short trips like that.

Gus and Uyen invited me to go to the state fair with them this week.  Initially, I told them I didn't think I'd enjoy that, but later I decided I should try it.  I'm so glad I did.  It worked out that my sister was in town that day with my nephew to pick up some of my furniture, and the weather was perfect.  I had a great great time.  Maybe the best time I've had since I've been out of the hospital.

Funnel cake is the only real reason to go to the fair

The kids had fun, and I got to eat a whole ton of fair food.  It felt good to be out in public, but it was also very comforting to have the right people with me.  It was also nice to see my nephew.

Out in public

This was my most ambitious excursion yet, and it was a huge success.  Here are the rest of the pictures.

My mom wants me to travel up to Danville, VA to my sister's house for Thanksgiving.  I have some serious concerns about that.  I'm worried that I'm going to end up spending a lot of time in the wheelchair which will be painful, and that it will be difficult to do the program when I'm up there.  I already know their bathroom door is barely wide enough for my wheelchair.  Then, after the program, I need to get on a bed to put my pants on.  I don't know if the bed they have will be easy to transfer to and from.  I think Gus is going to drive me up for a short visit so we can investigate the facility before Thanksgiving, but it looks like that's where I'll be for Turkey Day.  I don't know what I'm worried about.  What's the worst that can happen, right?  Of course the answer, as always, is that I could poop my pants in front of everyone I know.  That's pretty much always the answer to that question.  We'll see what happens.

Catching Up

The longer I go without writing, the more pressure I feel to write a long post, so it becomes a daunting prospect to write everything I think I should.  But I have to do it sometime so here we go.

I'm starting to get into a bit of a routine.  Pretty much every day, I know at just about every given moment what I'm supposed to be doing.  I suppose that's a good thing, and it cuts down my stress level, but I feel like my life is on pause.  I'm just waiting for something to change.

People that know me well know that I have a poor memory, and I'm already starting to forget what life was like before the injury.  I haven't had any dreams about walking lately.  I guess that's a good thing.

Work is going about as well as I could.  I'm still working 3 hours a day, and I think it's getting easier.  I'm still glad I'm doing it.  It makes me feel like I'm accomplishing something.  It's about the only time I feel useful.

Gus continues to make himself indispensable.  Last weekend, we took my van over to his house to do a little work on it.  I really appreciate that, but it's frustrating to watch him do work that I used to be perfectly capable of doing myself.  Makes me feel useless.

This morning, Gus had a garage sale for some of my stuff that I don't need anymore.  I didn't go this morning, but I was over there last night putting prices on stuff.  I'm curious to hear how it went.

The HO continues to be a huge problem, but I'm getting accustomed to it.  I've kindof accepted that there are things I can do and things I can't do.  I hope the surgery fixes me eventually, but I've got a system to cope with the things I can't do.  Most of the time I have to depend on Gus for that, but at least I've got Gus.

Speaking of that, I meet with the orthopedic surgeon on the 18th so maybe I'll have some news around then.  I suspect that they're just going to tell me to wait a few more months and we'll talk again then.  The longer I'm out of the hospital, the less I'm looking forward to a big surgery.  I don't really enjoy pain all that much.

I've been trying to get out of the house a little more, and I've had a few opportunities since the last time I wrote.  Mike and Sue took me to trivia night at a wing place, and I got to go to a couple restaurants outside my neighborhood.  I've also been to Gus's house a couple times although I can still only get into the garage and the basement.  It's a nice change of pace though.

I guess that's about all I want to write right now.  This post was all over the place, but hopefully it will hold you for a little while.  Now I'm going back to watching Virginia Tech try to lose a football game to Duke.