Attitude

When my kids were about five or seven I decided to take them ice-skating.  Some weekend afternoon we walked the half a mile down to the ice-skating rink in Prospect Park.  Walking there I remembered that the last time I skated was in that same rink.  It was a sweet 16 party, and I was probably 17 or 18.  It was an abomination.  I don't think I ever let go of the wall.  I didn't feel any need to ice skate after that.

When I got to the old rink things entered my mind at once.  First that the playing the same music that they did 25 years ago.  That made me giggle.  But I suddenly realized that I had to skate again.  I could just put skates so my kids and shove them out on the ice.  I had to go with them.  That made me gag.

I swallowed and changed my attitude.  I wasn't the same goofy teenager who couldn't I skate 25 years ago.  I had grown up a little and accomplished a lot.  I graduated college with honors, I got a Masters degree.  I got married and I was helping raised two wonderful kids.  I had run a few marathons and broke four hours and one of them.  I had changed many diapers.  So, there was no reason I couldn't successfully ice skate.

I put those crappy skates on my feet.  I endured the horrible pain of plantar fasciitis combined with worn-out broken ice skates.  I saw stars but I did not hold the wall nor did I fall.  I made it around the rink holding both my kids hands..  My kids didn't know it then, but that was the moment I became Super Dad  (in my mind anyway.)

And then I saw this image on the Facebook page for GBS this morning.  It help me prepare for the EMG test I have tomorrow.

It's gonna be my fourth EMG test.  The first one came without warning.  I didn't know what was going to be like.  The doctor was just sticking needles in me turning on electricity.  It was beyond the nightmare, not just because it was painful because it was endless.

The second time I was supposed to see a psychiatrist to help me prepare for it.  But they came before I had time to prepare, so I prep myself.  I turned on my running brain.  As a long-distance runner I have learned to deal discomfort and pain.  And that's done by dividing things up into units.  So I asked the doctor how many times was he going to zap me.

He said 10.  Five with a poker and five with the needle.  Shit, I can get five of anything.  Five miles, five hill repeats or even five laps around the ice-skating rink with my ankles and feet throbbing.  The third EMG test was nothing.  I hardly noticed it.  The doctors was so busy prepping me for chemo scaring the shit out of me before they started chemo

So it's nothing.  Five zaps two different kinds of ways.  And when it's over it won't hurt anymore.  Bring it on.  I need to know if my paralysis is due to sheath damage or actual nerve damage.  This test will tell me that it will tell me what will get better with exercise and /or electrical stimulation machines.  It will also tell me what parts of my body I should start getting used to working around.

Knowledge is power


This will not be me..................  But tune back in tomorrow or the next day I might post my own video



This is me