I never knew walking was so dangerous
Thursday, October 6th 2011 @ 1:11 PM
Two nights ago, around one o’clock in the morning, I was sitting at my computer, working my usual nightshift. I heard my two-year-old wake up and call for me, so I stood up and started walking across the room… and then I heard… POP! and felt something like a hard ball or a broomstick hitting into the back of my right calf (although no ball or broom was anywhere to be found). I stumbled the rest of the way to my bed and collapsed onto it to nurse my toddler and my injured leg.
In the morning, I was not better. I couldn’t even touch my right foot to the floor without excruciating pain. So I parked myself at the computer and let my kids know that they would need to do everything they could for themselves.
My six-year-old disappeared to the living room for a while, and when she came back, she told me she had set up a place for me to rest. It was a while before I had the energy to hop to the other side of the house to take a look, but when I did, I saw the couch, cleared off and neat, with pillows to prop up my leg. On the coffee table was a plate with cookies, an apple, cashews, chocolate pudding, and a glass of water. And next to the plate was the kind of sweet get-well note that only a six-year-old child can write.
She also presented me with a get-well banner to hang by my desk. It says: “Heart - Love - FEEL BETTER.”
Those acts of kindness from my daughter were the first inkling I had that something good could come from this.
In the late afternoon, I went to the doctor. She told me it was a muscle tear but she wasn’t sure how serious it was, and she sent me to the emergency room for further evaluation and treatment. A few hours later, after being definitvely diagnosed with a torn gastrocnemius muscle, I walked out of the hospital with a brand-new splint (more like a cast) on my right leg and foot, and a pair of crutches.
So now it’s hard to do everything from getting something out of the refrigerator to going up a flight of stairs. My older kids spent the night at my parents’ house last night, but when they get home this afternoon, I’m hoping they’ll rise to the occasion and help plenty. They’ll have to—and that can only be good. It’s a lesson for me, and for them, that I need to do less, and they can do more!
And my two-year-old has already caught on to the fact that if she wants to tag along with me, it won’t be in my arms, but rather, next to me (“helping” me with my crutches by holding on) or behind me (when I was hopping, she called it “jumprope” and hopped along too). And she’s not a bad gofer, either! This morning she brought me the phone… and the Advil.
I figure that having this happen when it did—just before “kapparos” and Yom Kippur—can surely be considered a “kapparah” (an atonement) for me, and I hope for my family, too. The pain and inconvenience we will deal with with Mommy sidelined during the cooking and preparing for the Yomim Tovim, and through the celebration of each holiday, should be in place of harsher judgments that might otherwise happen. In the scheme of things, this is just a small problem. And it’s temporary.
And I know this will all come to something good in the end. I will get used to accepting more help. My kids will get used to helping themselves more, and they will have lots of chances to do the kinds of chessed that my daughter did for me yesterday morning. We will all appreciate how fortunate we are that we usually have good health and bodies that work as they should. And we will have more understanding of and compassion for the challenges faced by those who cope with disability on more than a temporary basis.
May we all be inscribed for a good, sweet, happy, and healthy new year!
