If you read my last post, you know that I had a bad fall and knocked out most of my upper teeth. Why did I fall? It was clearly a balance problem that I had been actively denying. Once in awhile I had used a cane at night to go to the bathroom, but that was all the precaution that I took. I have this ingrained attitude that I can do anything. For example:
All my life, I have been very self-aware. My two boy cousins, with whom I was raised until the age of eleven, and I were pretty much ignored as children unless there were tasks that we were told to do. In this two-family household on a Wisconsin dairy farm more than eighty years ago, our parents were so busy scratching out a living that we were allowed to roam as we wished. If we encountered a problem, we were expected to solve it ourselves without bothering them. There was no distinction made between us regarding gender. We were treated exactly the same, and the expectations of us, whether boy or girl were equal.
When I was about eleven, my father bought the run-down farm next door and began to restore it. Since I was his only child, I was expected to help. I drove the tractor, brought the cows from the pasture into the barn, and worked in the tobacco fields. For most of these tasks I was left on my own to figure out how to accomplish them — even driving the tractor (long story. I’ll tell you later if interested).
Even as a little girl in the two-family household, I began plotting how I could get away from this life. Finally, in high school, the opportunity showed itself. I could go to college! Others were planning it, why not me? My father had left school after the sixth grade, and he was all for it. He believed in education! Yes, I could DO this! He would help. (In 1953, the tuition at the small private college was $200 a semester, and room and board was inexpensive.)
After a year in college, I applied to and was accepted at a diploma school of nursing. It was tough. Not the studies and the clinical work which I loved, but the disease Fibromyalgia was slowly taking hold of my body. Everything that I did was in spite of how I felt. Nevertheless, I persisted, graduated, and began working. At this point, the brain fog was the most prominent symptom. (The pain and the weird cycles would come later. More on Fibromyalgia in a later post.) I still thought that anything was possible; I could overcome anything.
My comeuppance came many years later when I took a friend’s advice and applied for graduate school to get an MBA. I was the oldest woman accepted into the class and the second-oldest student. When I nailed Statistics by getting a high pass as my grade, I thought that Accounting would be similar. It wasn’t. I just didn’t get-it. There was cost-accounting, financial accounting, managerial accounting, tax accounting, and on and on. And then we were introduced to creative accounting as well. If it wouldn’t have been for my small study group getting together weekly, and the help of another student, I would never have made it.
I found that I couldn’t successfully slog my way through everything and come out on top after all. Hard work, perseverance, and drive wasn’t enough. Determination to master the subject wasn’t enough. I just didn’t have the capability to fully understand accounting. In the end, I got through with the help of my friends. I was humbled by the experience.
Which brings me back to the subject of balance. I just finished six weeks of twice-weekly sessions of physical therapy (PT). It was great. The therapist said that she was working me harder than any of her other patients giving me more and more challenging exercises each week. One night I woke up thinking, “If I, supposedly, am doing so well while I’m in the physical therapy session, why then, do I go home and knock into walls and frequently begin tipping over so that I have to grab onto the nearest chair. Something isn’t right….
I realized that when I’m in PT, I was deliberate and focused. Back in my apartment, I was constantly distracted, thinking about other things, and that’s when I’d lose my balance. I decided to change my way of thinking. When at home, or out with others, I would straighten up, pull myself out of a slump, focus on where I was headed, and think about walking properly.
It’s working. I don’t know why, specifically, that I’m balanced challenged. It’s common among us elderly folks, but some are worse than others, and some never suffer from it at all. I tried reading a book about balance once, but it wasn’t helpful because there are many and differing causes. Here at the retirement home where I live, we have an excellent fitness center that gives classes in balance, yoga, water aerobics, and many other things.
I can do this. I can continue exercising regularly, walk with confidence using a rollator (walker with wheels) for now, until my balance improves enough that I don’t need it anymore.