Years ago, when I did " social work" type
employment, all the programs and conferences I went to were based on an idea expressed by First Lady
Hillary Clinton," It takes a village to raise a child."
Life experiences have made me realize that a rewrite of Ms.
Clinton's catchphrase applies to me these days. I would change her quotation to
"It takes a community to provide quality of life to a differently abled
person."
I used to think my life partner and caregiver Janet could
meet all my needs, (beyond the services provided by the home health aide).
After all, Janet is the MS Society’s Caregiver of the Year! But then something
happened that made me realize how wrong I was.
It was Friday morning a week or so ago and my home health
aide was not coming until about 1:30 PM. This was her last day for a while
because she was 8 1/2 months pregnant and honestly, I was afraid to have her do
anything. Anyway, Janet called me at about 10 AM and woke me from a sound
sleep, causing me to have an extremely strong spasm. When I got off the phone
with her, I realized the spasms were continuing and I was slowly but surely
sliding out of the hospital bed. When I understood that I was in trouble, I
managed to call back Janet and let her know that this was a 911 situation that
I had no control over. The pillow we used to protect me from knocking into the
hard metal rails of the hospital bed when I spasmed, was actually acting on one
side as a ramp, causing my back to go right over the rail.
As I started to dangle over the edge, I dropped the phone
but I could hear Janet's frantic messages on the answering machine to let me
know she was coming and that she had reached a neighborhood friend who was on
the way. By the time our friend Susan had gotten here, I was half out of the
bed, trying to hold myself up with my right arm, which is not as strong as it
used to be. In other words, I was almost on the floor. Anyway, Susan arrived in
time to save the day and get me back in the bed. Janet arrived shortly thereafter.
