Fall…

Physical therapy has become a lot more challenging and today I fell. I fell well, not on my face, and I got up by myself (small victories). Still it upset me a lot more than I wanted to let on, and it upset my therapist. I think it really upset the poor one-legged guy who, today, was walking between the parallel bars.

My left leg isn’t just shorter than the right one, it’s weaker and — if this makes any sense at all — it’s afraid. As we were doing the first exercise I “saw” that leg for what it is. We used the thing in the featured photo, just like this, but the exercise was putting one foot on it and doing a sort of lunge. For whatever reason, or reasons, my leg is just plain scared as if it has an emotional center and little brain of its own.

When I go back on Thursday I’m going to ask for the opportunity to do the same things, but more slowly. I think I need to feel what’s going on to fully understand it and move forward from this place in my psyche and life. I felt bad for my therapist. I am sure she was more upset than I was.

I have a friend who was on the Italian Olympic Gymnastics Team in the 80s. He’s also a world class mountaineer. Balance is huge for him. I wrote him a month or so ago about the falls and how freaked out I was/am. He said something very wise, and I passed it on to my therapist. He said, “People fall.”

I truly don’t expect never to fall again for that very reason. People fall. I said to her, “This is ok. It was a good fall. I didn’t fall on my face, and I didn’t fall alone at home. I got up by myself, and I fell here while I was challenging myself.” Logically, it made total sense and had an element of progress. Babies learning to walk fall all the time. We talked about my bad knee which is out of alignment and how my muscles compensate for that. We both agreed that knee replacement surgery is something to avoid if I can; it comes with its own limitations and problems that are, in my opinion, worse than I’m dealing with now. My therapist agreed with that, but there’s also the possibility that I’m lying to myself.

I felt so many emotions I can’t even identify, including disappointment. I really wanted to cry and quit. It’s just so fucking complex and inchoate. I asked her, “Am I going to get it?” She nodded yes.

We did a couple more exercises and I left. The minute I got home, I got Bear, and we headed out to the Refuge. In other days I’d have contended with emotions like this by grabbing a dog and running up and down some hills. I guess we kind of did that since a sharp cold wind is a lot like a hill and we walked into such a wind. Beautiful, wind-scoured afternoon with some cranes and lots of snow drama over both mountain ranges. It was close enough to running up hills and I realized that this is where I am now.

Thanks for listening. ❤