No doubt about it yesterday morning was difficult and painful to say the least. As she does every morning Denise helped me pulling my legs from the bed as I have no control of them, dead weights. Once my feet are on the ground I grab hold of the side rail sit up and wait while she puts my trousers on my shoes or slippers then she disconnects my power chair and positions it close to me. I grab hold of my Super Pole with my left hand right hand on my wheelchair arm stand up and transfer, simple stuff.
Yesterday morning for some reason once I was sitting in my bed holding on to the bed rail I lunged forward banging my head against the Super Pole hitting the wall and eventually ending up on the floor. I banged myself pretty hard on that Super Pole resulting in a cut on the top of my head, according to the ambulance attendant probably required one or two stitches yet since it was right on top of my head not to mention the way everyone is panicking about the flu this year I decided to stay away from the hospital put some ointment on the cut and go from there.
I've landed on the floor before it's nothing new yet usually they are what I call controlled falls i.e. I know I'm falling so I let myself go with no resistance other than planning the best landing spot to minimize injury. Once on the ground I utilized a modified battery-operated bath chair to serve as a lift by positioning myself on the seat the lift would raise me to a height at which I could perform a lateral transfer onto one of my chairs. The seat of this modified chair is approximately 2 inches from the ground which means I would use my arms and usually two phone books one under each hand to lift myself on to the seat. This time however I could not, I did not have the strength to lift myself.
My spouse called 911 explained the situation to the operator who was very concerned about my head and the minor cut. This is no doubt what caused them to respond quickly, they were at my door 10 to 15 minutes max which granted for a heart attack or stroke victim it's game over yet for me it was a great improvement over the last time in which I had to wait three hours on the bathroom floor before they came. I was not considered a priority so I waited. At that time one of the firemen, yes they call the fire department when they are overloaded with calls recommended that I write a letter of complaint since they were not busy that day and could have easily assisted me much earlier. We wrote the letter and received a standard response that there investigation revealed their response times were within the accepted limits.
Back to yesterday's fall, of course there first concern was the cut on my head and the impact sustained, I assured them it was nothing more than a minor cut yet it took some doing, they were not easily convinced yet eventually they realized that I was not confused had no difficulty recalling facts knew where I was who I was etc. etc. finally I had them convinced at which point they picked me up from the floor and deposited me in my chair. Denise made sure I was okay before leaving for work she didn't want to go yet there was little she could do at home I was fine fine other than feeling as if I had been run over by a freight train. The entire day was spent reclined as my electric wheelchair has a tilt function until she returned from work. I watched television which was the extent of my activity that day.
Now that I have come to realize the bath lift no longer meets my requirements I need to look at purchasing a patient lift with a sling, a device that will allow Denise to lift me off of the floor in order to transfer. I will most likely get a hydraulic unit since we use it so infrequently getting a battery powered one would mean I'd have to consistently plug it in every month to ensure it was properly operating and fully charged for use. Don't care so much for the hassle a hydraulic one requires little effort to operate and can be used anywhere in our condo not like the ceiling type which is usually restricted to one or two rooms.
This morning everything went as usual a piece of cake with nothing out of the ordinary to report.
They say each of us has a mountain to climb, I just wasn't planning on a mountain range!
Have a great day
Michael
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