Rehab progress 10

Today I attended church meetings all day.

The ward leadership called off Sunday School because the pump quit on the plumbing system, and there was no water. I drove my car to the church with no incident, but I felt very shaky today, so I asked Tom Fuhriman to drive down to Fairview to make the bank deposit.

My friends are all very patient with me. I feel like I am not doing things very well -- I am too slow and clumsy. But most are too kind to notice.

One teenage girl came into the clerks office today to ask for a report. She told me my slow speech was noticeable. I have tried to do better, but my words come out sounding slurry and thick, as if from a drunken man. Perhaps appropriate.


I have related my difficulty with balance, but it seems like such a fundamental and simple thing to so many. To me, keeping my balance has grown to huge priority. I am concentrating every minute to be careful not to let myself fall.

I saw a little baby that was just learning to walk a while back. The baby was wearing a thick padded diaper on its bottom, and the babe had very short legs, so he was pretty close to the ground. He would toddle along, as I watched, fall on his well-padded bottom, then bounce right back up and resume his walk. I observed his slow progress, and thought how alike and how different we are. The baby is just learning to walk. He is very unsteady, like me. He has ample padding in case of a fall, where I have not. The baby is not so ponderously heavy or tall, ,either. If I fall to the ground, it is a long ways down. I am liable to hurt my body from the great force, like a tall tree falling. The baby is built closer to the ground.

I wish I had it so easy.