Filed under: Disability, Attitude, Independent Living, Behavior, Ability, Reality | Tags: control, depression, suicide, life lesson, using your mind
Vice President Joseph Biden, while speaking at the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors’ (TAPS) 18th annual survivor seminar to commemorate Memorial Day 2012, deviated from his prepared remarks to share his thoughts on the issue of suicide. He told the families of fallen soldiers he was so distraught following an automobile accident in 1972 that claimed the lives of his first wife and daughter, that he himself had entertained thoughts of suicide.
Many of us in the Disability Community struggle from time to time with the issue of suicide. From my own personal experience, even though it’s been over 13 years since I was injured, it still comes to mind at times when I am struggling with depression and extreme frustration. Life with a disability can frequently seem overwhelming. This is especially true at the onset. Often suicide presents itself as a solution to all the problems one faces. Vice President Biden said: “For the first time in my life, I understood how someone could consciously decide to commit suicide. Not because they were deranged, not because they were nuts, because they had been to the top of the mountain, and they just knew in their heart they would never get there again.”
For many of us our disabilities will prevent us from ever returning to the top of the mountain, and we know it, but in time, I believe, most of us come to accept that and move on accordingly. It is being at the bottom of the mountain or starting to climb up for the first time when suicide is thought of as an option. Many of the individuals with disabilities to whom I have spoken admit they have struggled with these feelings. So, it is worthy of taking note that if you have thoughts of suicide from time to time, you certainly are not alone. For a while, I contributed blogs to a website for the disabled that refused to publish anything I submitted on suicide or severe depression. In my mind they were omitting an important subject from discussion. What message were they conveying to their readers? That life is always good? Or that one should never get depressed, and if you have thoughts of suicide there is something wrong with you? What a disservice and loss of opportunity to truly connect with individuals with disabilities.
The psychologist at Craig Rehabilitation Hospital once told me that being depressed and feeling sorry for yourself was an okay place to visit but not a place to set up permanent residence. As Vice President Biden said in the conclusion of his remarks “Folks, it can and will get better…” and most of us know that. We may have to remind ourselves of that or have somebody remind us of it, but we know it is true. We may never get to the top of the mountain again, but that does not mean we must stay at the bottom; rather it means we must continually climb.
Take note that the two “Hs” in the Handihelp logo form a ladder, to help you start your climb.
Dave Morrell
Climbing
I am happy to provide some heartwarming news about my nurse’s son Devin. He is out of danger and after about four weeks is out of the hospital. He had a strep infection which had entered his blood stream. It took a while for the doctors’ to figure out what was wrong because he was not stable enough to run many tests. His blood platelet count was so low fellow sailors were donating blood for him. Since he was unable to eat a feeding tube was inserted. Breathing was difficult so he was intubated. With this illness finally under control Devin left the hospital 20 pounds lighter. He will be on convalescent leave for two weeks while he regains strength and weight and then is expected to return to active duty.
Filed under: Community Inclusion, Education, Observation, Reality, Sensitivity | Tags: life lesson, lifestyle, using your mind
You can’t be a member of the disabled community without having asked yourself that question many times. Most likely there is no plausible answer, which is why we keep asking the question in the first place. When I speak to groups I am amazed that so many people believe life is safe and that we are almost always secure in our environment even though I believed that myself before my own accident; life altering occurrences were something that happened to others. A while ago I wrote a Blog entitled “Wishes and Daydreams” (April 2010) where I talked about my envy of my nurse’s son who was graduating from high school and entering the United States Navy to become a corpsman. Well, almost three years have passed since I wrote that and he is a corpsman stationed at a large naval hospital on an island in the Pacific Ocean.
Devin was home on leave in February and looked terrific. He’s just 20 years old, is a fine young man and a credit to his family and country. While here, he expressed concern for several of his buddies from corpsman school who had been assigned to the United States Marine Corps and sent to Afghanistan. Devin was concerned for their safety and felt he should be there, too.
Last week he was not feeling well but thought he was just getting a cold. Long story short, he is now in the intensive care unit of the hospital, seriously ill with an unidentified illness serious enough for the Navy to fly his mother and father to be with him. His condition is such that he is not stable enough to be medevac’d to the mainland. How ironic, his buddies are at the end of their tours in Afghanistan and coming home, and he is the one gravely ill. Why?
What a terrible reminder to all of us of the frailty of life. Most of us have already experienced it first hand and had the lesson driven home to us in an all too real way. To stress how precarious life can be, the staff at Craig Hospital, where I went for my rehabilitation, often refers to individuals without disabilities as TABS (Temporarily Able Bodied). We can reduce our chances of having major trauma by following cautious behaviors. The greatest daily risk faced by most Americans is automobile travel. The potential risk of being hurt in a car accident, like most risks, can be reduced by following certain procedures such as wearing your seatbelt, driving within the speed limit, not driving when your ability is impaired by alcohol or drugs, and avoiding behaviors which distract your concentration from driving, like talking on a cell phone. However, all the precautions in the world guarantee nothing. We are still vulnerable and often at the mercy of circumstances beyond our control.
I believe there are a number of lessons here for everyone from this situation, not just the disabled community. We must take time to enjoy every day. We should realize that our situations could still change in an instant. Instead of feeling sorry for ourselves, we should accept what has happened to us and make the best of our situation regardless of our own circumstances. Finally, we can stop asking why and just accept what is. We will be much less frustrated, mentally healthier and better off in the long run. It seems to me the best answer to the question WHY comes from Travis Roy who has said, “There are times in our lives when we choose our challenges and other times when challenges simply choose us. It is what we do in the face of those challenges that defines who we are, and more importantly, who we can and will become.”
Filed under: Ability, Adapting Equipment, Attitude, Behavior, Disability, Reality, User Friendly | Tags: control, dietary considerations, inexpensive solution, lifestyle, nutrition category, quadriplegia
Lose It is an app that is available free on iTunes and can be used with iPhone, iPod Touch or an iPad. It is located in the Health and Nutrition category and is designed to help people lose weight. While it is set up for the general population, it lends itself to easy adaptation for any individual with a disability. Prior to my accident I was 6’4″ tall and weighed 215 pounds. Now, 13 years later, even with major dietary adjustments, I weigh close to 260 pounds. Being a quadriplegic, weighing oneself is difficult, and using a scale designed to weigh individuals in a sling, can be costly. I have found an inexpensive solution to this problem. I use a Big Buck scale that can be purchased at Cabela’s for $45. It is intended for weighing deer but still is surprisingly accurate.
The following description of Lose It is taken from iTunes:
“Succeed at weight loss with Lose It! Set goals and establish a daily calorie budget that enables you to meet them. Stay on track each day by recording your food and exercise and staying within your budget. The average active Lose It user has lost more than 12 pounds and more than 85% of our active users have lost weight. Lose It is completely free — get started losing weight with Lose It today.”
Lose It is simple and easy to use. It has a large database of food and exercise which can be easily added to. After entering a food or exercise once, it becomes part of your personal database and can be selected the next time with a simple click. What lends itself so nicely to adaptation is the fact that you can add both foods and exercises to the program. In the exercise category I was able to add Hand cycling and several other modified activities with the amount of time I do them and the number of calories I burn. Existing categories within the exercise section can be manipulated to reflect your level of participation.
For those of us who have specialized dietary considerations in addition to keeping track of calories, Lose It can be set up to monitor Fat, Cholesterol, Sodium, Carbohydrates, Sugar, Fiber and Protein in our daily diets. It also has a bar code scanner for packaged products to make entering specific nutritional information easier. Lose It has an extensive menu of foods from both the supermarket and many well-known food chains. Simple, user-friendly, adaptable and free: what more could you ask for? Give it a try; you have nothing to lose but weight!! Available now for your computer at LoseIt.com
Summer Before the Accident
Thirteen Years Later
Filed under: Adapting Equipment, Attitude, Behavior, Disability, Education, Reality, Sensitivity | Tags: adapting, creative idea, life lesson, physically challenged, using your mind
D. H. Lawrence, the early 20th century English novelist, storywriter, critic, poet and painter wrote, “I have never seen a wild thing feel sorry for itself. A little bird will fall dead, frozen from a bough, without ever having felt sorry for itself.” How the hell did he know?
In December 2005, a 3 month old female dolphin was found wrapped in the rope line of a crab trap near Cape Canaveral Florida. She was taken to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium in Clearwater, which is a marine rescue center. The dolphin, named Winter, struggled to survive. The rope had cut off blood circulation to her tail which resulted in, not only the loss of her tail, but several spinal vertebrae too. Few experts believed the dolphin could survive major trauma like this. Winter not only survived, she developed a new method of propulsion. The new movement she used to move herself through the water while amazing, however, was detrimental to her spinal cord.
Winter
A well-known prosthetic specialist heard about Winter and offered his services. The challenges looked to be overwhelming: artificially reproduce one of the most powerful propulsion systems in the world, finding a way to attach it to a dolphin, and then train a wild animal to use it. Mike Walsh, Winter’s lead veterinarian, said:
“We put together a team who doesn’t know what ‘no’ means.
As long as you’re willing to try, you can make a big difference.”
After a lot of trial and error, a successful apparatus was finally developed. This story is responsible for the movie, “Dolphin’s Tale”, which is a touching movie for the entire family. In the movie, Winter plays herself. If you see it, be sure to watch after the end of the movie for some very special scenes.
There are lessons here for all of us in the disabled community, not only from the behavior of the humans but also in Winter’s behavior: their collective refusal to give up or accept failure as an answer, their ability to find alternative ways of attacking a challenge, their love and enjoyment of life itself, and Winter’ attitude of accepting what happened and to move on. The team’s persistence led not only to the dolphin’s prosthesis, but help for human amputees as well. Winter’s early rejection of the prosthesis was not due to the device itself, as originally thought, but rather to the material that was being used to attach it to her body. After realizing this, the team developed a new gel sleeve which adhered to her body with suction. This gel material is now being used with veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Additional new materials are also being developed to stand up better to salt water.
Once again, we see that positive attitude, thinking out of the box and relentless perseverance reap rewards and success.
Winter's Prosthesis and Gel Sleeve
Filed under: Ability, Disability, Education, Observation, Reality, Simple Solution | Tags: control, lifestyle, physically challenged, using your mind
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 2,800 times in 2011. If it were a cable car, it would take about 47 trips to carry that many people.
Click here to see the complete report.
Filed under: Ability, Attitude, Behavior, Disability, Education, Reality | Tags: adapting, control, life lesson, quadriplegia, using your mind
I am always stressing about attitude in dealing with the challenges of having a disability. I have even gone so far as to say that attitude is more important in dealing with a disability than ability, and I really believe it is. But what happens when your attitude deteriorates? It doesn’t happen to me often, but it does happen and it most likely happens to you also! I like to compare my situation to that of a juggler who can keep just so many objects in the air at any one time. It doesn’t matter whether the objects are the same or different, just add one more and everything comes tumbling down.
Well, I have too many objects in the air right now, and as a result my attitude has crashed. The last week of November into early December I started getting severe headaches followed by mental confusion. Saturday and Sunday December 3rd and 4th I went to the local hospital but on Monday I was transported to Upstate University Medical Center in Syracuse, New York. I had suffered a “chronic” subdural hematoma (bleeding on the brain). I was scared, confused and very aware how helpless I was. I thought about all the limitations that my situation places on me. When I’m in this frame of mind, it’s hard to simply consider them as challenges. I begin to wonder if I really have quality-of-life, and when I’m like this seriously question if my life is worth it. I’m going to die someday anyway, so why postpone the inevitable. Giving up would be easy. It’s going on day after day that’s tough. If I stop and think about this for a while, I remember how hard I fought the first six months after my accident doing whatever I had to in order to survive; however, that was at age 55, and now I’m 68. When I get in this mindset it’s hard to put the limitations aside.
The last ten years of my teaching career was spent with a class of high school students who had emotional or behavioral problems. I often found my- self doing more counseling than teaching. Most of them thought life had given them a lousy deal, and they were right. At times, I feel the same way, so I remind myself of what I told them. The Gambler, sung by Kenny Rodgers was current at that time, so we would talk about its meaning; life deals you a hand of cards and you must play them. You can wish all you want but the cards aren’t going to change much. The gambler knows this so he advises:
“If you’re gonna play the game, boy, ya gotta learn to play it right.
You’ve got to know when to hold ‘em know when to fold ‘em,
Know when to walk away and know when to run….
Now, every gambler knows the secret to survivin’
is knowin’ what to throw away and knowing what to keep.”
So according to this old sage, it’s not the hand you’ve been dealt that’s important but rather how you play it that determines the outcome
“Cause every hand’s a winner and every hand’s a loser,
and the best you can hope for is to die in your sleep.”
What is the gambler trying to tell the listener? I believe it’s that life is like playing a card game and how we handle life is all up to us. Our success is more influenced by our attitude then the cards we’ve been dealt.
“Happy” New Year? The choice is ours!
Filed under: Ability, Attitude, Behavior, Disability, Education, Reality, Sensitivity | Tags: control, life lesson, using your mind
Monday night is “fight night” in our house. I want to watch Monday Night Football and my wife wants to watch Dancing with the Stars. I sometimes end up giving in, even on nights when the Giants are playing. Last Monday night October 3, I was deeply touched by several of the dancers but no more so than JR Martinez. If you watch the show you know that the contestants are selected to gain the interest of many different segments of our population. Week three’s theme was to illustrate “The Most Memorable Year of My Life,” with each couple performing a dance to their song of choice. Most of the dances were well performed and highlighted a high point or low point in the participant’s life. But nothing, in my opinion, came close to the performance of JR Martinez.
Karina Smirnoff & J.R. Martinez photo by Adam Taylo ABC News
JR is not the first person from the disabled community to compete on Dancing with the Stars. In 2008 Marlee Maitland, actress and activist, appeared and danced for three weeks until she was voted off. Ms. Maitland has been deaf since the age of 18 months. Imagine getting out on the dance floor and trying to perform in front of a large audience when you are unable to hear the music. In 2007 Heather Mills appeared even though her left leg below her knee had been amputated in 1993 as a result of a motorcycle accident. She danced with a prosthesis and did quite well. There may have been others but these are the only ones I recall. Perhaps I was watching football. I was amazed and dumbfounded by these contestants on a variety of levels.
For some reason JR Martinez’s performance seems to stand above the others. Disabilities present themselves in thousands of different ways. In a society that worships physical appearance, women, men, and even children are in increasing numbers going to plastic surgeons for operations to improve their physical appearance Mr. Martinez should be an inspiration to all of us. His acceptance of his situation is a lesson we all can learn. His resilience, fortitude and perseverance have enabled him to rise above a situation which could just as easily lead to despair and hopelessness. Those of us in the disabled community would do well to emulate these characteristics. After all there aren’t any attributes in JR Martinez that aren’t in all of us. JR Martinez’s performance made me proud to be a member of the disabled community and I never thought I’d ever say that. So, my friend, if you feel like you need some inspiration look to those members of the disabled community who, like Christopher Reeve, are refusing to allow a disability to determine how they will led their lives.
Filed under: Ability, Attitude, Behavior, Disability, Education, Observation, Reality, Sensitivity | Tags: adapting, life lesson, physically challenged, quadriplegia, using your mind
How does one begin to deal with the devastating changes in lifestyle brought on by a catastrophic event? One of the techniques which can help is to look back over your life and find skills you already have that can be helpful. This is why, I believe, adapting is so very difficult for young people who have fewer life experiences to draw from. At 68 years old my life certainly seems to have gone quickly. I wonder how much longer I’ll live. Not only have I looked forward, but lately I’ve spent more time looking back. The pivotal point looking back was my accident in 1999 which left me a quadriplegic at the age of 55. In the past 12 and half years I have forgotten what it was like to walk, run, and bike or make love. Hard for me to believe, but true. What I do see when looking back are experiences which at the time seemed isolated and unrelated but today look like part of a much larger plan that was preparing me to deal with my quadriplegia and its impact on my life.
I grew up in a family where hard work and inner strength were admirable qualities. Before my accident, I believe the major influence on my life was my marriage to my wife Marge. Up until that point, my life lacked stability and purpose. As a teenager I was unruly, probably drank too much and had little or no sense of direction in my life. My love for my wife and growing family gave me a sense of pride and was the cornerstone of my new life. After a college basketball injury I had become sedentary, and with the addition of my wife’s good cooking and baking, I became overweight in a few short years. As a result of a scolding from my family doctor, I began working out again. By the mid-70’s I was running up to 30 miles a week, and shortly before my 40th birthday I ran a marathon. In addition to jogging I also, kayaked, biked, skied, camped and mountain climbed. As a result I became quite disciplined and health conscious.
During this same period I was teaching Social Studies and Health in a high school in central New York. I became interested in the teachings of Buddha and especially the Four Noble Truths. Basically Buddhism taught me you can live a much happier life by being satisfied with what you have, and that being materialistic can easily lead to much unhappiness. Also a friend’s wife, who happened to be an instructor in Transcendental Meditation, taught me how to meditate. It has been a tool which I have used ever since to help me deal with stress and anxiety.
A Project Adventure group challenge
teamwork. Participants are given the time necessary to collectively figure out a solution to a particularly challenging obstacle. PA taught me that failure should not be looked at as an end in itself but rather as an experience to be learned from and to grow. Also it made me aware that there are many different ways to solve a particular problem and it’s almost always possible to come up with solution if you are willing to commit time, energy and persistence.
2nd from the left
For ten years I worked on the summer staff of a local college teaching outdoor skills and then taking small groups of students on six day wilderness trips. One year one of the members of my trip group was a young coed who was legally blind. It was a wonderful and unique experience and gave me insight into a wealth of information which has proved very useful in my own situation.
As I look back over these life experiences from the vantage point of today, it is difficult for me not to believe that these happenings were part of a process that was helping prepare me for the new life I have experienced since my accident. It took me a while to put the lessons learned prior to my accident into my “toolbox”, but once I did, they became useful skills that have made dealing with the challenges presented by my quadriplegia a lot easier. So what life skills are hiding in your background that may be helpful for you to use in dealing with your own adversities?
Filed under: Attitude, Behavior, Disability, Education, Love, Reality, Sensitivity | Tags: life lesson, using your mind
Since my accident in 1999, like many other things, the word friend has taken on a totally new meaning. Prior to that time I prided myself on being self-reliant and able to take care of myself and family in any situation. We grew or raised most of our own food and heated our house with wood we cut from our 40 acre wood lot. We took trips into wilderness areas of Canada and New York’s Adirondacks Mountains. Being a C6 complete quadriplegic and a big man (6’5” and 265 pounds), now it is difficult for me to do most activities by myself or just with the help of my wife. Friends have stepped up and offered their time and efforts to help me participate in the activities I love.
Although it’s still difficult for me to ask for help, I am definitely getting better at it. I’ve come to realize that friends enjoy helping me as much as I enjoy what they are enabling me to do. However, helping is not as cut and dry as one might initially think. People approach me with different attitudes and expectations. Some will wait to be asked for their assistance. Some will wait until you struggle and then step in. Others feel they need to do everything for you. It’s very easy for an individual with a disability to get frustrated with someone helping too much. Their actions could easily be misinterpreted as, “I don’t think you have the ability to do anything on your own”. I must remind myself of people’s good intentions and, when necessary, tactfully intercede on my own behalf.
Friends helping me kayak
Quadriplegia has taken many things away from me. Primary among them is the majority of physical contact I had with my wife. Marge remains beside me, takes care of me, but most importantly she is still my best friend.
Andy
Although I am no longer able to be self-reliant and provide for most of my family’s needs, my life has been enriched by the kindness of both old and new friends and their willingness to step up and help empower me. How very fortunate I am!
