Rehab progress 11

Things I remember doing with ease, that are so difficult now -- or impossible.

Putting on my own shoes. I did some work with the rehab guys on this. The right foot pushes away the shoe when I try to get my toes to go into the shoe. Then the shoe will skitter away, or tip ever sideways, or the heel of the shoe will fold up so I cannot get my foot in properly without removing my foot and starting over. Richard at UVRMC rehab gave me a long shoe horn to use, and it is quite helpful (in fact, essential to this operation). I use the shoe horn to keep the shoe from tipping over while my foot is trying to worm its toes in. The shoe horn can also be useful when the heel of the shoe collapses -- I can work it into the back, pry up the back of the shoe, eliminating the need to remove the shoe and start all over again.

I look at my heavy boots with the greatest disgust and discouragement. They are simply impossible. I cannot get that right foot in. I have had several prolonged sessions that finally resulted in my abandonment of the boots, after fifteen minutes or a half-hour of cursing and struggles.

Sandals from Cabellas that use velcro closures are a blessing from heaven. I have saved much profanation and sweating, thanks to these easy-to-don sandals.

Some things are beyond my current capacity.

Typing is a good example, too. I used to type at least 50 wpm in comfort. Now I am slow and laborious, and I back-space almost as much as I enter letters. It is daunting. I persist thanks to th help of a good text editor. I have been thinking of trying out the Dragon program again. I tried it out several years ago, and it was not very useful. I spent most of the time saying "delete that" in response to the words it misunderstood. Problem is, I have a problem with speaking right now that is probably just as bad as my degradation in keyboarding speed.

Oh well, life is full of frustrations.