It’s been a rough year. I think we can all agree on that, so I thought I’d share some good news—my health has been improving lately. The other day I got out of bed and stood up three times in the span of a few hours, the most I’ve done in my walking rehabilitation in the last six years.
I’ve been measuring how much body weight I put on my legs using a bathroom scale. I step on the scale, and because it’s the first time I’ve been well enough to do so in years, I’m not entirely sure how much I weigh. But I am sure how much weight I can put on my legs. At first I could only put ten or twenty pounds on the scale. Now I can push off of my bed and put what I believe is all of my body weight on it. The fact that I’m able to put any weight on it is progress for me, but using all of my body weight is something I haven’t done since I became bedridden in 2015.
It has been quite a journey since then. For a long time I was too sick to speak or eat; I couldn’t even sit-up in bed or look at my phone. Now I’m eating and speaking, and hopefully soon I’ll try to walk.
It blows my mind that I’m so close to walking again. When I stand up and put my feet on the floor, the cold surface tingling my toes, it’s exciting (and exhausting) to know that all I have to do is take a step and I’ll be walking. But taking the first step is always the hardest, and before I do, I need to make sure my legs are strong enough and my balance is steady. I might get some kind of a rehab walking harness. And I’m sure there is a lot more aches and pains in my future. At some point, I’ll probably be asking myself, ”Is walking bad for your knees?” But hopefully the pain lessens.
The tricky part about this phase of my recovery is that I can’t afford to fall. Normally I’d be willing to take the risk, and potentially fall on my face, but in the midst of a deadly pandemic, I just can’t risk getting the coronavirus because I need someone (or multiple people) to help me get up.
So I’m being very careful, going slow and safe as I continue my walking rehabilitation, but I’m also staying consistent with my rehab. I’m not going to use COVID as an excuse to not make progress. I am still working hard to get better every day. I’m doing light stretches and exercises with my feet and legs before I stand up multiple times a day.
It feels good to make this kind of progress in my walking rehabilitation, reminding me of what it used to feel like to work out with heavy dumbbells, back when I measured my progress by how many pounds I could take off the scale. Now I’m measuring my progress by how much weight I can put on it.
BEFORE YOU GO…
1. Thanks for reading! If you haven’t already, please follow my blog.
2. For those who haven’t heard, my memoir, WHEN FORCE MEETS FATE, is going to be published next month.
You can read sample chapters, leave an early review on Goodreads (those really help!), and preorder it through Amazon and other online retailers, in both print and ebook. The audiobook is FINISHED! We’re just waiting for Audible and other retailers to approve it. I will keep you posted on that. For now, here is a sample of the audiobook:
You can also support the book by donating to help pay for the audiobook and publicist, expenses that will have to come out of my own pocket.
Here’s a list of places to order the book (by country):
US: Amazon, Apple, Target, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, BooksAMillion, Book Depository (ships worldwide for free!), Indiebound, BookShop. Canada: Amazon, Kobo, Chapters/Indigo UK: Amazon Australia: Booktopia Mexico: Amazon Germany: Amazon Norway/Sweden: Book Depository, Adlibris