My Motorcycle Injuries

My life and schedule continue to change as things evolve and I move forward. My body isn't changing all that much these days. It's always the same old stuff...soreness, pain, and fatigue. Still, I'm getting plenty of things done at home and around the church property. I have no great restrictions in what I'm able to do, but in the end I pay with a body that feels as though it needs to be replaced, repaired, or rejected.  Still, after all that's been said to me by multiple health care professionals regarding the fact that I probably should have died in the accident because of the combined injuries that I sustained, I feel that each day is a gift given to me. I had no spinal damage, brain damage, or loss of limbs in the accident after being hurled onto a windshield and then thrown to the ground while riding at 40 mph. That in itself should leave me thankful each day as I awaken and actually get myself out of bed. But even greater is the fact that I have, since the acc...

 I'll turn sixty in a couple of days. The motorcycle accident occured when I was fifty years old. Ten years ago I was roughly 50 lbs. heavier than I am now and I had stopped exercising with any level of consistency. To be honest, none of that mattered to me. I was happy enough with everything in my life. However, I now keep my weight at a healthy level and I eat within fairly healthy standards because of the diabetes that was brought on by damage done to my pancreas in the accident. I also exercise regularly and it involves walking, stretching, pushups and weight lifting, along with some work on a punching bag.  I sometimes wonder what things would be like now if I hadn't been in such a horrific accident back then. I mean, would I be a heart attack waiting to happen? Would I be a plump guy who has trouble fitting into a booth at a restaurant? Would I have to resize my clothes every two years and wind up falsely claiming that jeans companies are making them smaller now?  I...

 One of my brothers-in-law is in the hospital with a very serious condition. It's the same hospital that I was taken to almost ten years ago because of the motorcycle accident. At 51 years of age he has had a stroke. After they cleared out two blood clots from his brain, he had a heart attack. The following day he experienced trouble with his breathing and they discovered that he had a combination of pneumonia and congestive heart failure, along with more blood clots in his brain and heart. Things looked bad for him, but he is now slowly recovering as the medical people continue to work hard while his loved ones continue to pray. I cannot help but to think of what it will take for him to become more fully functional within his physical and mental capacities. His rehabilitation process has already begun, but I still wonder what it is that lies ahead for him as he deals with the aftereffects of these things that have happened to his body. I have been observing the heartache that his ...

 Today is the last day of my “full time” duty with my niece. I’ve taken care of her Monday thru Friday, early morning until late afternoon, since she was six weeks old. She is now four, and will begin attending pre-k in the late summer. Her mom is a teacher and school ends for her today, so my time with my niece will now be far more limited. I’ll get her for a couple of weeks in August as her mom reports for staff days, and then she’ll begin attending school later in the month. From then on I’ll only be taking care of her on school half-days and teacher work days (along with any sick days). All in all it will only add up to a few days each school year. I’ve spent the past four years watching her grow up while joining her in playing with a multitude of different toys, playing every game that she learned or made up, walking her around my neighborhood, watching her play with my tools in the driveway, taking her to various places as a sort of field trip, playing various chase games a...

  I have a CT scan done of my chest once a year. It's ordered by my cardiologist so that he can see if the stent in my aorta is either leaking or has moved. The stent was placed there because of a force of impact rupture that occured during the motorcycle accident. I went for the scan this year after a bit of a struggle with my new insurance company, and I recieved a call from the cardiologist's office a few days later telling me that everything was peachy keen with my aorta.They usually schedule an appointment for me to see the doctor after the scan for the sake of an examination that includes an EKG but...they made no mention of an appointment, and here I am a couple of weeks later and they haven't called me.  I, uh, haven't called them yet and I'm pretty certain that it won't be happening. I hate going to doctor's appointments, and I'm thinking that I'd rather just skip this one. I've been told every year since the accident that I have a healt...

I’m not taking care of my niece this week because her mom is a teacher and the school in which she teaches is on spring break. Today I spent most of the morning working on a sermon for this coming Sunday and I spent part of the afternoon trimming a tree at the church property. My wife and my daughter are both home with me this week so I’ve been able to be with them throughout most of the day. Why do I share the minutiae of my day with you here? Because of this…earlier this afternoon I had to deal with an insurance issue concerning a CT scan that I’m supposed to have already taken. I ended up having to cancel the procedure until my insurance company gives the final OK within a few days from now. The need for the scan relates to a stent in my aorta near the heart that was placed there nine years ago because of a rupture caused by the force of impact in my accident. Am I sounding more exciting? I thought not. My point in typing this blog entry has to do with a quick thought and it’s thi...

Things have been a little demanding lately between taking care of my niece (4 years old, happy, energetic, and of the belief that I am able and willing to do anything imaginable), maintaining my house, and my regular duties within the ministry. Additionally, the folks who ordinarily do a lot of the maintenance work on the church property haven’t been well, so I’ve been covering things such as cleaning the main building and some of the landscaping work. There are days when I feel so beat up that I just want to sit and stare. The parts of my body affected by the motorcycle accident keep me feeling as though I’m wearing down like an overused gear that’s slowly running out of grease. My hand takes a few minutes to operate normally when I first wake up, while the rest of the day is spent with the need to tolerate everything else that my hand feels like, well, feeling. My leg is constantly in need of “warming up” for the sake of walking when I first stand after having been seated for more th...