Summer Physical Rehab Update

A lot’s been going on this summer, especially with my physical rehabilitation, so I thought I would include an update this week!

I decided to go back to Shepherd this summer for a little more PT before I head back to Gainesville. When I was doing PT last year, I wasn’t able to make a ton of progress, especially with my transfers (which are pretty important for my mobility and independence). I was soooo fatigued and weak and overweight and in pain most of the time that it was just hard to move my body.

Now that I’ve lost so much weight and gotten so much stronger, I’m able to do most transfers on my own, except for the really hard stuff, like floor transfer. I wanted to go back to Shepherd to work on that, along with some wheelchair skills like wheelies and getting on and off curbs on my own.

I’ve made a ton of progress with my transfers. I used to not be able to get in and out of bed or the shower by myself, now I can do that without having to think twice. Car transfers have also taken a long time to get the hang of, especially in big cars, but with enough practice and perfecting the mechanics, I’m able to do that on my own too!

Now I’m working on floor transfers, and I’m SO close, but I'm not quite there yet. I’ve included some videos of my progress; the first one is from September 2018, the second from when I started PT at the beginning of the month, and the last one is from yesterday. I’ve gotten a lot better over the last 3 weeks (I finished PT today), and really the last year, and all I need is a little more practice to perfect it.

Floor transfers aren’t the most crucial, but I like getting on the floor to workout, and I want to be able to get back up if I ever fall out of my chair, so it’s something that I want to be able to do on my own.

My improvement in transfers have really helped me gain more independence. I can’t drive due to my vision loss, so I’ve been reliant on others to get me places, but a couple of weeks ago I Uber’d by myself for the first time!

It was very nerve-racking, I just felt like a lot could go wrong, but I didn’t feel like I ran into any issues! It felt really good to be able to go somewhere by myself and do something on my own again. It was pricey, and kind of a lot of work, so it’s probably not something I’ll do a lot, but I felt like it was something I needed to be able to do before I got back to school.

I also tried Aerial Yoga!

My gym offers it twice a week, and I wanted to check it out. I thought that since it was in the air, I wouldn’t need my legs, right? That wasn’t really the case. It was a cool experience, and I’m glad I did it, but it wasn’t what I expected it to be, and it was disappointing. It was hard to watch everyone else try out these cool new things while I just kind of hung there… I did get to go upside down and that was cool, but it made me realize that I’m not able to make things very adaptable on my own. However, I still want to try to make cool experiences like that adaptable so that I can still participate, that’s something that’s become really important to me.

A lot happened this summer, and that was just an update on some of the physical rehab I’ve done, but I hope it keeps you in the loop and gives you a glance at some of the things I do that don’t always get posted on social media!