Filed under: Behavior, Creative Ideas, Disability, Education, Observation, Reality, Sensitivity
My situation finds me home more than ever before. In the winter, the temperature and snow depth keep me inside and home most of the time. Summer, however, can also be trouble-some. Quadriplegics lose the ability to regulate their body temperature because of several different factors. Warm to hot days can raise our body temperatures, and we are unable to realize it until it has reached dangerously high levels. It can rapidly cause autonomic dysreflexia which is life-threating. So, the result is, a lot of time we stay in our homes. I decided if I was going to be spending so much time in my house, I was going to make it user-friendly and reflect my personality, interests and lifestyle, both inside and out.
I have always enjoyed watching wildlife, growing flowers, being aware of the weather and having my hands in the soil. We embarked on a plan to draw wildlife closer to the house. Even though I was born in Brooklyn, ever since college I have always lived in a rural area. Prior to my accident we had always fed birds in the winter but now decided to feed them year round and try to bring them closer to the house. We placed a feeding station just outside the window by my computer. Other feeders were placed strategically near or on certain windows. We bought and I built some feeders and bird houses. The gardening boxes were located in spots readily visible from particular house windows. Different weather instruments, such as a thermometer, weather vane (including wind speed cups) and a rain gauge in warm weather or a snow gauge in winter were placed in close proximity to each other to create a weather station. A turkey feeder was put on a back part of our lawn. These efforts have all born fruit. Two of our garden boxes I plant in annual flowers which I can see from the inside and work in when I’m outside. The same is true of our four vegetable boxes. In addition to deer, turkeys and other occasional unusual wildlife, we have a great variety of birds throughout the year and are able to watch the young being raised and given early flying lessons. These areas also provide an opportunity to take many photographs, which I also enjoy doing. Inside, in addition to all the plants, we have many pictures of places we have been to and things we have done.
I believe making a living space reflect ones interests is more easily done in a rural setting, but there are things which I believe could be done to create this type of habitat in a city. Many bird feeders attach to the outside of a window as do some nesting boxes. There are mobile flower or vegetable window boxes which can be used inside or out. I also believe some city areas have gardening plots in nearby lots or on roof tops which you may be able to utilize. The point I am trying to make here is to make your home a more enjoyable and reflective place to be. Once again think outside the box, and make your home environment your very special place.
Filed under: Attitude, Behavior, Creative Ideas, Disability, Observation | Tags: life lesson, lifestyle, using your mind
Probably most of you have already experienced spring, but living close to the Canadian border it comes late. The entire month of May in New York State is spring turkey season. I spend most mornings from the time I’m up until noon (one can only hunt until 12:00pm in NYS) out in a blind hunting and enjoying the natural world. This year is an exception to that pattern. We have received so much rain this month that we are more than half-way through May, and I’ve only been out three times. Even so, I am still able to watch the earth spring back to life in front of my eyes. We consider ourselves fortunate to live in the country where the bleak look of winter changes into a light green and just becomes richer and fuller. The colors are not uniform but rather separated into the myriad shades of the rainbow.
Feeding Station
While I have not been able to hunt, I am still able to enjoy the natural world right from my house. Last spring I bought a Gardman Wild Bird Feeding Station Kit online for about $35. My wife put it up outside the window facing my computer. The station has a number of places to hang different types of feeders, and well as, a small waterer. The station has regular bird seed, nijer seed, oiled sunflower seeds, a hummingbird feeder and a suet feeder. The food varies from summer to winter, but birds are always around. There is, however, a greater assortment of birds in the spring. I realize how fortunate I am to be in a location to observe nature first hand. I glance up from my computer never knowing what I will be treated too. Talk about colors and hues, this spring I have seen a variety that includes: Ruby Throated Hummingbirds, Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, Cowbirds, Blue Jays, a Female Baltimore Oriole, Rufous-sided Towhee, Sparrows and Finches of all kinds, Downey & Hairy Woodpeckers, Cardinals (the color of the female’s beak is one of the most beautiful in nature), Mourning Doves and an Indigo Bunting. These birds differ in size, color, flight patterns and behaviors. How fortunate I am to be able to stop and observe part of nature’s world from my wheelchair every day.
Looking Out
Filed under: Ability, Adapting Equipment, Attitude, Behavior, Community Inclusion, Creative Ideas, Disability, Education, Independent Living, Observation, Reality | Tags: adapting, control, lifestyle, physically challenged, quadriplegia, using your mind
Christopher & Dana Reeve
Several months ago I was contacted by the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation and asked if they could do a profile on me which they did: “Once a Teacher, Always a Teacher”. This January they contacted me again and based on the information on my website I was asked to start and moderate a group on the Christopher Reeve Foundation website. The group is called Learned Empowerment and I would like to extend an invitation to you to join. You must first join the Christopher & Dana Reeve Website which is free. I hope the group develops into a place where both individuals with a disability and those in any way affected by the disabled community can share ideas, shortcuts for various tasks and mutual support.
Filed under: Ability, Attitude, Behavior, Creative Ideas, Education, Observation, Reality | Tags: adapting, life lesson, lifestyle, physically challenged, using your mind
A while ago I saw Milery Cyrus (aka Hanna Montana) being interviewed on Good Morning America about a photo shoot she had done which was appearing in some fashion magazine. To her credit she talked about the two hours of makeup preparation prior to the shoot and the airbrushing that was done to the photos afterwards before they were ready for the magazine. She concluded by saying this process would make any individual look beautiful and sexy. This was quite a mature, candid and astute observation for such a young woman. During my 34 years of teaching I was constantly trying to help students see themselves in a more positive light. When we are subjected to negative interactions in our daily lives we tend to wonder what is the matter with us. When in reality, we should be thinking what’s wrong with the other person. We are bombarded daily with messages of what the ideal image and lifestyle for us should be. Few, if any of us, can live up to these unrealistic expectations. The majority of people seem to be less than satisfied with their physical features. This is very evident when we look at the rise in cosmetic surgery over the past few years. As Oden Black pointed out in his last blog Love You. Love Me! “We look in the mirror and see deficiencies, which are compounded by everyday negative comments and messages we receive from those around us.” Our society worships youth and perfection. How many times have you turned on the television or opened a magazine to see a celebrity who has had so much plastic surgery they are hardly recognizable. There is an additional obsession for many people to look young and in shape, and many individuals take the shortest and quickest methods available to achieve this goal such as liposuction or dangerous fad diets. If I paraphrase Buddhism’s Four Noble Truths we can begin to see a way to relieve some of this way of thinking.
Life is full of suffering
Suffering is due to desire
Trying to eliminating desire
Will lead to a life with less suffering
Several years ago I was seeing a psychiatrist who asked me if I could identify any positive things that had come as a result of my condition. After several minutes of thought, I said I had met some wonderful people, but could think of no others. He then suggested to me that I no longer had to worry about vanity. What a ridiculous statement! If anything I’m more vain. In fairness to him, like most of the doctors I deal with, he had little experience with someone with my disability. The point I’m getting at here is that most people in society have hang ups about the way they look and the way others perceive them. So, as individuals with disabilities we are not as different from others as we may think we are. We would all be much more content and enjoy our lives much more if we accepted our physical selves the way we are and allow nature and the aging process to follow their normal courses.
As Matt Nathanson has written in his song “All We Are”
I kept falling over
I kept looking backward
I went broke believing
That the simple should be hard
‘Cause all we are we are
All we are we are
And every day is a start of something beautiful, something real
All we are we are
All we are we are
And every day is a start of something beautiful, beautiful
Filed under: Attitude, Behavior, Creative Ideas, Disability, Observation | Tags: control, life lesson, using your mind
Years ago, shortly after my injury, I saw an episode of NYPD Blue where the police were questioning a former drug dealer who was confined to a wheelchair as the result of a drive-by shooting. They were threatening to put him in jail and he told the officers you can lock up my body but you can’t imprison my mind. I realized the relevancy of that statement to my situation. If we choose to accept that premise, then we empower ourselves to use the freedom that exists in our minds. I was involved in the martial arts for a number of years prior to my injury. The Grandmaster of the association used to say Karate was 90% mental and only 10% physical. There was a great deal of emphasis on the mind-body connection. It seems for some reason Western Civilization separates the mental and physical aspects of an individual. Eastern Cultures seem much more aware of the total being and much more inclined to deal with a person in a holistic way.
More professionals in this country are beginning to utilize Eastern techniques such as meditation, acupuncture and yoga in a holistic approach to better heath. Many Olympic caliber athletes are including imaging, also know as visualization, as part of their training. Thomas W. Morris, a motivational coach and president of Washington, D.C. based Morris Associates (www.morrisdc.com) writes in FOCUS “Visualize success. Want to achieve a certain goal? Take time to visualize yourself reaching that goal.” Why would we believe only athletes can benefit from these techniques?
Brian Mac is a Level 4 Performance Coach and Coach Tutor/Assessor with UK Athletics, the United Kingdom’s National Governing body for Track and Field Athletics. Brian writes on his website “They (the participants) should see themselves enjoying the activity and feeling satisfied with their performance. They should attempt to enter fully into the image with all their senses. Sight, hear, feel, touch, smell and perform, as they would like to perform in real life.” www.brianmac.co.uk/
You can use your mind to help you enjoy yourself. Oden Black’s latest steamy Blog on ThisAbled.com is a perfect example of this idea. If there are activities that you once enjoyed that you are unable to participate in now, try revisiting them again with mental imaging. While this may seem a little offbeat in the beginning, remember practice makes perfect. You can use your mind to free yourself of the constraints placed on you by your disability. To change a very common phrase just a little bit, “Your mind will set you free”. One imaging activity I enjoy is to put on my poncho and sit outside in the rain with my eyes closed. The sound of the raindrops on the nylon almost immediately takes me back to my wilderness trips when the rain would confine me to my tent or to waking in the middle of the night to the sound of the rain on my tent. Nestled in a warm sleeping bag, or in this case my poncho, listening to the rain brings on a feeling of serenity and that all is right in the world. I am treated to a “memory flood” of some of the best times of my life.
Letting in rain take me away
A rainy day on Grass Pond in 1989
Filed under: Adapting Equipment, Creative Ideas, Disability, Independent Living, User Friendly | Tags: adapting, control, creative idea, lifestyle
This morning when I open my e-mail I found the most interesting letter. Dominic Valento wrote me about a website he constructed called Button Board buttonboard.com , which allows an individual to surf the web using just a mouse. He built the website for his own personal use but was wondering if it would be helpful to other people who have limited range of motion or other problems. I tried the website and it works great. It amazes me the technological skills that some people have. I encourage you to try the website and forward it on to anybody you believe would find it useful. Please if you have created something like Dominic which would be useful to others contact us.
Picture of Button Board
