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who knew to watch out for falling springboards?
DRAT IT ALL!
I don’t want to post this story, I don’t want to share the dismal news of another injury (and I certainly don’t want to break my mama’s heart again), but I feel in the interest of honesty I must.
I have had a fabulous week. My right foot has been strong and stayed in place. Walking has been nearly pain free and about a gazillion times faster than it has been the past few months. All week long I had comments from people about how well I was moving. I exercised and rode my Ellitigo and smiled from ear to ear all week long. Yesterday at gymnastics I was able to be up on my feet and even played catch with one of my students who needed some love from her Miss Tracy. It was such a fun, wonderful day.
And then it wasn’t. I was walking by the equipment wall when a springboard that was leaning up against the wall fell and hit my left leg, scraping it on the way down. I must have jumped out of the way and fallen because the next thing I knew, I had landed on my back on top of the springboard.
At first, I thought I was okay, just scraped up a little, but over the next couple of hours we figured out I was in worse shape than I thought. When the amazing Grant (the young man who teaches my gymnastics classes for me since my body can’t do that anymore) moved me off the springboard and onto the floor, my left shoulder was touching the floor and my right shoulder wasn’t, which meant my pelvis was twisted. Soon my legs started trembling and my hands got tingly and I knew I needed help, so I called Sheri to come and bring me some ice packs, her nurse know-how, and most of all her great big loving heart, full of laughter. She found me on the floor with my muscles tight and trembling, my leg bruising from the springboard attack, and my hip starting to go into panic mode.
She decided we needed my wheelchair to move me, so we called Blythe to bring it over, got me loaded up in it, and started pushing me to the car. And then I passed out. My hip really can’t handle me sitting in the wheelchair. That position pinches the femoral nerve and almost always causes me to pass out, but sometimes it is necessary when I can’t walk on my own or the risk of me passing out from a standing position is too great.
Sheri and her husband got me home and settled on my couch so I could rest for a few hours before the iFamily Spring Showcase which I was determined to attend. Kat and Sheri both encouraged me to not attend, but I could not fathom that idea – all my girls were performing in various numbers and I wanted to watch them. How could I miss my Annesley performing her clogging dance she has been SO excited about for months?
So, with a lot of help from a lot of people, I made it to the Showcase and laughed and smiled and cried. I love this organization so much! Everywhere I looked I saw people I love and my heart swelled with joy at their accomplishments, contributions, and presence. The 50+ families that attend iFamily are intentional, invested, inspiring families who bless my life in innumerable ways. I couldn’t stop crying as I heard Jen’s iFamily Orchestra perform their three pieces they have worked so hard to prepare all year long. My Jen is a woman of purpose, vision, and determination. She is a one-woman powerhouse of talent and heart who has created an orchestra out of a hodge-podge of musicians with widely varying skill levels, ages, and commitment levels. I am so, so proud of her! And grateful for her dedication to not only music, but the development of the human souls she teaches.
All of the other groups were fabulous as well – the choirs, Spanish class, and dancers all did a wonderful work. Our art teacher took pictures of the art projects and brought them over to my chair so I could see. Such talented students!
I loved watching the girls perform – Annesley rocked it as she clogged her little heart out, Keziah played violin in the Orchestra, and Blythe’s ACTivate troupe performed the epilogue from their recent play. I was able to visit with dear friends, especially all the little children that call me Miss Tracy, and smile and laugh with my grown up friends as well.
When Richard and Sheri finally got me wheeled back into my house and got me into bed, the tears and pain finally hit in full force. My feet ache. My back feels like it has been hammered for hours from the top of my neck all the way down to my tailbone. The bruising on my left leg is very tender. My pubic bone is out of place and the femoral nerve feels like it is being plucked like a guitar string. The top of my pelvis on the right side is protruding and all the muscles are in spasm trying to hold those skeewampus bones in place. I am pretty sure some ribs are out of place since it hurts to breathe and I can’t use my right arm very well. Every time Richard moved in bed last night, I would moan in pain and beg him to please, please hold still – surely the man doesn’t need to breathe, right?
Despite all this, I do think this will be a minor setback. Jeremy will put me all back together on Monday and I am hopeful once the bruising and feeling like I have been hit by a Mack Truck subside, I will be right back to building muscles. But I don’t know. I am sore enough that something could be quite wrong.
Today is Paige’s baptism. I don’t think I can go. And that makes me cry even more. Miss Paige is my girlie – I attended her birth eight years ago and held her mom (Jennifer, from iFamily Orchestra fame) in my arms as Paige was life flighted to Primary Children’s Medical Center for a heart defect. I can’t imagine not being there, but I also don’t want to mar her special day by my needing to be taken care of while there.
So, I will spend the day, this glorious day, in bed and hope the arnica I am smothered in kicks in soon and relieves the don’t-move-don’t-touch-me-I-am-sore-all-over-feeling.
water?
My dear friend Jessica is a lap swimmer. She loves swimming lap after lap with her long arms and legs propelling her through the water for miles at a time. I kid you not, it is a work of beauty. Jenn and I watched her lithe body glide gracefully back and forth, back and forth, and were awestruck by how well her body works in the pool. She has been searching for a pool to do her workouts in and we thought water might be really good for me, so I have been tagging along on her pool experiments to see what I think.
And the verdict? I think I love it. I can’t swim with actual swim strokes because my joints are so loose they will get sprained, subluxed, or dislocated by the lever action of strokes and kicks, but I can walk around the pool, do squats, balancing exercises, marching, and slow water jogging. It is awfully boring to walk around the pool by myself and I don’t know if I will be able to keep that level of boredom up long term. I think I need a friend to do it with me so we can talk the whole time. I LOVE the way my body feels afterwards. It feels worked. All the muscles feel soft and heavy and exercised. I haven’t felt that wonderful head to toe sensation of being strengthened for a long time – I’m sure it is better than drugs.
So, now I need to decide if I want to spend the pennies to buy a pool membership, buy the gas to drive in 3-5 times a week, and spend the time away from my family.
The pros: It feels amazing. The warm water relaxes my muscles and simultaneously gives them a workout. My body is much safer in water than on land – the buoyancy helps protect me from injury because it is harder for my joints to go to far.
Cons: Cost. Time.
I have quite a bit of exercise equipment here…Elliptigo, treadmill, balance pad, ball, bands, etc. So, now that I can exercise again, I could just use what I have and see how that goes. Hmmm. I don’t know what to do!
back in the saddle, i mean gym, again!
Banner day! Back in late November my body had progressed to the point of being able to exercise in the gym and I had a great two months of building muscles, not passing out, and feeling oodles of hope for my body. Then in January I slipped on the ice and tore some muscles and a few days later picked up a little girl at gym and separated my pubic bone. After a few weeks of being in bed with that injury, my right foot was injured when a boy landed on it while bouncing on a hippity-hop ball. It was worse than we thought and has taken much longer to heal than I ever imagined. At times I have wondered if I could go on trying to heal when it sometimes seems pointless, but God has walked with me these past four months and infused me with courage to keep trying.
And now I am back at baseline…the place I was back in November before these two latest injuries happened. My foot is not all the way healed, but I am out of the tape and it is feeling pretty good. The muscles of my lower leg still need to figure out how to take their superhero capes off and relax (they think they need to singlehandedly save my body from falling apart so they are tight as tight can be). Yesterday I was able to go to the big room at the gym and try all sorts of new exercises! I have been riding the Elliptigo for a few days and it feels great – good and hard and FANTABULOUS! Jeremy had me work a lot on lateral movements to strengthen both my pelvis and my feet and now I will do the same exercises at home.
The goal right now is NO NEW INJURIES. None. We must build some muscles right now while my body is in an okay place. So, off to ride my magic Elliptigo I love so much.
contortions
It seems my crazy collagen is awfully fragile. A few days ago I was rubbing my right foot (the currently injured/sprained/continually moving out of place one) against my left foot during scripture study. Somehow that gentle pressure moved the talus on my left foot out of place! Oh my goodness! It hurt like heck and when I went in to the amazing Mr. Jeremy, he found the talus shifted all skeewampus.
Well.
I am a foot-contorting, curl my toes underneath my feet kind of gal and it seems I am stretching out those feet ligaments on a continual basis with all those contorting movements I mindlessly do when I am say, going to the bathroom (curl my toes underneath me) or reading scriptures (curl my feet around each other) or lying in bed (curl my feet around each other and stuff my cold feet between Richard’s legs to warm them up). So Jeremy wants me to wear shoes 24/7…high top ankle restricting shoes. I told him no way on buying ANOTHER pair of shoes since a high top pair is so far out of my realm of fashion sense, but I am dutifully wearing my trusty Danskos in bed and everywhere else to try to cut down on the contorting my feet can accomplish while my mind is elsewhere.
On the upside, I have permission to ride my awesome Elliptigo for three minutes a day! Hip, hip, hoorah! I am so excited to be able to be back at building muscles…at least a teensy bit. On the building muscles theme, Jessica, Jenn, and I went swimming last week. Jess is determined to find a lap swimming pool she loves and we wanted to see how my body would do in a pool. I really thought swimming would be fabulous for me. I was wrong. I couldn’t swim without major issues. Crawl stroke popped my shoulders out of place. Breast stroke popped my hip out of place and flutter kicks killed my foot and sent spasms up my legs. So, within about two minutes I ascertained that lap swimming is out and decided to jog in place instead while focusing on keeping my feet flexed. It felt great! Afterwards I was sore and worked from neck to feet, but good-sore, not bad-sore and I started trying to figure out how to incorporate water therapy into my life.
I asked Jeremy about it this week and he said “Swimming for you is DANGEROUS! Water therapy would be great.” He quickly explained all the dislocation risks I had discovered on my maiden pool trip and encouraged me to try it out, be cautious, and be wise. So today I am going to go try again and basically just walk around the pool and work on balancing on one foot at a time.
Teensy bits of progress!
math=life lessons
Our little man has what I lovingly call the “leave me alone and let me build things and find bugs and for heaven’s sake, don’t make me sit still and do workbooks syndrome.” He does love me to read to him and he will sit for hours while I do so. He also sits still whenever he is focused on something of his own choosing. Lately it has been learning to draw bugs, race cars, and space ships.
He is really good at math. His minds gets math. I love watching the wheels turn in his mind as he ponders something and figures it out. But he doesn’t really like doing math. He especially doesn’t like to be cheerful as he does it. I was about to pull out my hair with all his grumpiness and flat out refused to help him whenever he turned into a whiney mess of “I can’t do it, I hate math, why can’t I go outside?” Richard talked to him. I talked to him. But nothing really helped for more than a day at a time. I thought about it. I prayed about it. Then I put a plan into action.
About four weeks ago I made him a deal. I told him if he could cheerfully do math with me and get done with his current math book and the next math book by the end of April, I would buy him the remote control rat he had been dreaming about since last fall. He had me count up all the pages in both books and help him figure out a schedule of four pages a day, three days a week.
But then I went to California with my dad…and then my mom and sister came…and we got behind on his schedule. We had to revamp it to seven pages a day, four days a week. And he cheerfully worked hard and learned a gob of new information and increased his skills and wowed me with how smart his little mind is. Somedays he got through eight pages, sometimes nine, but usually seven tuckered him out.
This morning he woke up and came and snuggled in bed with me and asked “How many more pages do I have in my math book?” I said “I don’t know, let’s count them up.” Well, he had 28 more pages so I said “You are doing great buddy! You are going to make it to your goal, I am so proud of you!”
He thought about it for a few minutes and then asked ever so sweetly, “Mom, can we do all 28 pages today? I want to finish today.”
“Of course! I will help you out and put in the time if you are willing to put in the time.” And so we started.
Nearly five hours later we finished. He was exhausted, but quite pleased with himself. He almost gave up a few times, but he stuck it out and pushed himself to do hard things. When he finished the last page, he gave me a heartfelt look with his big blue eyes and red eyelashes and said “Mom, thank you for helping me.”
He immediately called his papa and told him the good news and asked him to go pick up the rat. We found out a few hours later that the rat was only available at Halloween time and had been gone from the store for months. The poor boy! He was so disappointed. I found one online and offered to get it for him and have it arrive sometime next week, but in the end he decided to get a little lego set he found on clearance at our local variety store with his papa tonight.
I don’t believe in bribing children. I DO believe in helping them learn better skills and behaviors by occasionally creating a plan with them that involves a tangible reward. Fisher didn’t have to do x and then he got y. He had to overcome his desire to complain about his math book for weeks on end, treat me respectfully, learn a lot of really tough stuff, and stick with it day after day. In my mind, that is totally worth $14.
wired for joy
Today is the day! I ordered Wired For Joy a few months ago and today I finally have some reading time to open it up and dig in. This gem of a book is going to teach me how to calm down my nervous system response and reprogram my brain for well-being instead of the stress response.
I’ll let you know my progress and results as I progress through the book and start implementing the techniques and tools.
I am thinking about a few other things to incorporate into myu life as part of my healing journey…water therapy, working diligently on taking my supplements and proper nutrients, spending focused time with the Lord each day, and living with my whole heart once again. I feel like I have been working so hard to protect my body from getting injured that I have somehow closed off my heart from loving deeply…as if protecting myself from all hurts is the answer! Not so, my friends. I am passionate and loud and spontaneous and giving and loving and I must find some way to incorporate these parts of my personality into this life of careful body care or I may shrivel up and die. I have felt like I am dying for months…that the real parts of me are withering away and all that is left is an empty shell of a person that I don’t want to be.
I am also working on developing a new business called Raise Your Joys. I can’t put much time into it until iFamily and Keziah’s play are over, but be watching for some big announcements soon.
full to the brim
Have you ever felt full to the brim with gratitude? With joy? Right in this moment I am…and I want to savor it and soak it in like those warm August days of summer that we like to take into our souls to get us through the long months of winter cold and dreariness.
Right this moment, the sun is shining through my window, casting a warm, yellow glow through the trees of our yard. The sky is a beautiful deep blue. My children are happily talking and laughing with one another while they hold the squeaking puppies.
Yesterday I was blessed to make a dream come true for my oldest daughters. Two years ago when Hale Centre Theatre announced they were doing Les Miserables in 2014 I promised them I would take them. Of course we had no idea what these two years would be like and didn’t know how hard of a promise it would be to keep. We especially didn’t know that nine weeks ago my foot would be so badly injured and make it very difficult for me to drive or do much of anything. But yesterday the blessings poured down upon me and I was able to take my girls and two of their friends on a lovely adventure. We had so much fun laughing and singing and loving together. My girls have been taking care of me for the past two years, but especially the last two months and it has been really, really taxing on their spirits. They see me as the taskmaster bossing them around from my bedroom which has been pretty challenging for our relationships. We haven’t had any girl fun for quite a while and it was wonderful for all of us to get away from laundry and dishes and schoolwork and broken bodies for awhile.
The girls and their friends were able to explore Gardner Village, chase snakes at the pond, ride the Ferris wheel at Scheels, eat lots of cookies, eat a delicious meal at our favorite place, Old Spaghetti Factory, get some awesome ballons from Matthew the Balloon Guy, AND thoroughly enjoy Les Mis. I was the chaffeur for the day and though my foot was throbbing by the time I pulled in to our driveway at 1:00 a.m., it was totally worth it to have such a memorable day with my daughters and their friends.
While we were gone, a friend snuck into our home and left a check for a month of physical therapy for me. Oh my, there is so much goodness in this world! This foot injury has set me back so far and I have worried and wondered how to make my Moola For Muscles funds stretch far enough to make it through this year that is supposed to be focused on muscle building, not foot healing. God keeps sending angels to help me keep going to therapy and getting put back together.
This morning I took some time to write a letter to each of our children a letter about Jesus, His death and resurrection, and shared some of my thoughts about their lives. We have never done Easter baskets or egg hunts or anything like that, but yesterday I felt prompted to get each of them a little present to help them in their spiritual walk with Christ. Then I called them into my room individually and had a resurrection talk with each of them with lots of hugs and kisses and gave them their present.
Today at church we sang “Christ The Lord is Risen Today” two times! It is my favorite Easter hymn and I love to belt it out at the top of my lungs. I felt sorry for the young couple sitting in front of us! I don’t have a very good singing voice and when I sing lying down in my zero gravity chair it is even worse, but I couldn’t restrain my joy at singing those words I love so much. Charles Wesley, the son of Susannah Annesley, wrote those words and everytime I sing it I fall in love with Miss Susannah all over again.
Life is full of bounteous blessings – good people surround me, rich experiences teach and sustain me, and my precious family is always here for me. Most of all, God lives with His arm outstretched to me in love and because of His love I can be both resurrected and redeemed. And so can you.
it’s not all showers
Lest you think my life is full of dreariness and tears, it is not. It is full of frienships and hugs and laughter and learning and blessings and joy AND injury and pain and frustration.
Today in Annesley’s “I Have Character” class, she was transformed into a clown complete with blue eyebrows, white cheeks, red nose, and juggling balls. She LOVED it. I so wish I had my camera with me because she was the cutest clown I have ever seen. They read Tomie de Paulo’s The Clown of God and learned about love.
Meanwhile, Fisher carried around his bugs in his giant pretzel bin and guarded them with his life. Since spring-like weather has hit the past few days, he is back to constant bug finding mode. He cracks me up with how much he loves his little grasshoppers, beetles, and spiders.
I was able to teach my WUBA students about six keys of personal influence: example, service, oral persuasion, written persuasion, prayer, and the arts. We had a beautiful discussion and I realized once again how much I love teaching and touching the souls of these youth.
My life is rich beyond measure. I am surrounded by an amazing community of families, heaps and heaps of love, my four precious children, and a deeply compassionate husband who strives each day to lighten my heart.
I am grateful for all of these things and am grateful to be in this situation of learning and growth. God is with me. He loves me and is teaching me beautiful lessons.
p.s. I am hatching up some big 40th birthday celebrations!
sprain, sprain, go away, don’t come another day
Hmmm. Nine weeks ago today a young boy on a hippity-hop ball landed on my right foot which moved twelve bones way out of place and stretched the ligaments to Kalamazoo. The next morning all the bones were put back into place and we started the healing process.
It should have taken a few days or a week.
But here we are. 63 days later and I am still taped up. Still in pain. Still unable to walk very far or stay up on it for very long.
It is beyond discouraging.
I had a disappointing appointment with Jeremy this morning when he found the talus shifted all skeewampus again. AGAIN it is shifted out of place. I begged for any answers, ANYTHING I can do to help my foot heal so we can get back to work on my hip.
And the answers are depressing: an MRI to check for torn ligaments, Prolozone injections, and time. The MRI isn’t really a possibility and wouldn’t help heal my foot, only provide information. I can’t do the Prolozone because of my allergy to local anesthetics which are used in the injections, and time sounds so incredibly long. I have exercised great restraint with this foot injury and have tried my darndest to protect it, rest it, nourish it, and give it the time it needs to heal. I have kept a pretty positive attitude and sent lots of love and patience to my foot. I have tried so, so hard.
And it isn’t enough.
More time is needed. More patience. More love. More waiting on the Lord. More nutrients. I don’t want to give it more time. I want my foot to be better so I can grow some muscles in the rest of me. I want to be stop hurting. I want to stop being taped and wearing special shoes. I want to be able to stand without pain coursing up my leg. I want to heal.
I want, I want, I want. Man, I sound like a broken record.
Some little piles of tears have been shed today. And I can feel more need to come out, but it is so hard for me to let them. I think they need to pour out of me into a giant waterfall of sadness and despair so I can let it all go and get back to a mindset of hope and healing.
Will you please pray for this foot? Pray for the ligaments to hold the bones in place. Pray for the muscles to relax. Pray for me to have the will to keep walking the road of healing with hope, faith, and trust.
play, puppies, prom, and hmmm, i can’t think of another p word
Disclaimer: I’m sorry my posting has been so erratic lately. Between my family’s needs and wants and my own body’s needs, posting keeps falling by the wayside. I find when I do take the time to post I dump out an entire novel and this post is certainly novel length…at least in blog land. I finally uploaded some pics and now after months of no photos whatsoever, you get to be hammered by a gazillion.
Spring is in the air which means sunshine, wind, and lots and lots of activities! In the past two weeks, we have had our big night at the temple, Homeschool Prom for Blythe, a week of rehearsals for two different plays, a week of performances for Blythe’s play with ACTivate and the Youth Symphony, colloquia, puppies born, music lessons, FHE with our friends who just returned from a humanitarian trip to Ecuador, board meetings for iFamily with elections coming up on Monday, all the usual stuff that normally fills our lives, and not much sleep at all. Thank goodness I have found my camera, my memory card, and my memory card reader so that I have been able to both snap photos and upload them of all our fun.
Whew! We made it. I almost passed out on Monday at board meeting so I forced myself to be very, very conservative this week with all the performances and stay put in my chair. I did not vacuum or sweep or sell concessions or do any of the things I normally do. I limited myself to one hour of being upright at a time and two hours a day total and I stayed true to those guidelines except on Friday when I went over a bit, but I was still good about taking care of myself. Big pat on the back for me – I did not want any of this exciting week for Blythe to be dampened by a passing out episode and my carefulness paid off. The best part is today I can still walk, so YIPPEE! If I can keep this up for another week, I should be back to exercising at my next appointment!
The puppies…oh, my they are so precious. The children adore them and spend time every day toting them around and loving on them. They squeak nearly 24 hours a day and none of us are getting very good sleep with all the noise, especially Keziah who has set up Sadie and her seven pups in a wading pool in her room.
They were born the night of April 2 and morning of April 3 over a period of about eight hours. Sadie will NOT give birth without Keziah sitting right by her, so it was a long night of dog doulaing for my girlie. There are four tan puppies, two chocolate, and one black. Please excuse the blurriness, trying to get a puppy to hold still is difficult, trying to get a child holding a puppy to hold still is nearly impossible!
Here is Blythe in her Prom attire. My sister, Mikelle, was here and helped Blythe turn her naturally curly hair into lovely ringlets that would stay put all night. Blythe and over 100 of her friends had a fabulous time dancing the night away.
I wasn’t able to get any pictures of Blythe during the play…no flash photography allowed and pictures in a dark theater don’t turn out. Here is a super silly one of Blythe with her stage make-up and costume and her crazy sister.
Character shot.
Both the character shots and headshots were on display in the lobby for guests to look at as they entered the theater – that way they could see what each actor really looks like and compare that to the character shot. Here is her headshot. I think it is my all-time favorite picture of her.
Crazy cast photo…man I LOVE these youth!
Last night we had the big end-of-the-year Youth Symphony performance. It was amazing! Three of the pieces were from Tchaikovsky and I fell in love the the March Slave – what a soul-stirring piece! They also played the Violin Concerto in D with an amazing violin soloist and the 1812 Overture with real cannons firing. The harp solo was light and magical – it almost made me want to become a harpist!
You can see Blythe warming-up in front of the big drum in the back. She still has her hairdo from the play she performed in a couple hours previous.
The whole Youth Symphony! Lots of musicians squished onto the stage.
In the midst of all the activities for the big girls, I try to keep life for my littles as calm as possible. They generally spend their mornings with me doing learning time. Fisher has set a goal to finish one entire math book during the month of April, so we are spending lots of time working together so he can accomplish his goal and earn a radio-control rat he has had his eyes on for months. Annesley is learning how to read and it is so much fun! Her words she has learned so far are me, meet, I, am, Sam, Mat, Ann, Nan, Mit, in, on, at, sat, sit, the, is, this, that, cat, hat, and mat. She has started noticing these words all over the place and is one happy little sounding out girl. They have been having fun with Annesley’s birthday puzzle.
Our recent 10″ snowstorm dumped gobs of snow in one night, but by the next day it was almost all melted away. They built these snowmen before all the snow disappeared.
Now it is time to get ready for Passover and then gear up for another week of Blythe’s play at the end of the month, the end of WUBA for the year, Keziah’s play in four short weeks, and my 40th birthday.
I'm Tracy, a mama with big dreams, crazy ideas, loads of laughter, an insatiable desire to learn, and enormous piles of laundry.
