The Art of Falling Gracefully

Some days it doesn’t pay to get out of bed. Even so, I am generally happy that I manage to do so each morning without breaking my neck.

Getting up these days is usually prefaced by a noise upstairs.

To clarify—I live with my mother. She is 83-years-old and doesn’t get around as well as she used to. She uses a walker. She has fallen before and is at risk for falling again. More recently, she has developed some difficulty in using her hands.

Regardless, I have stubbornly held on to my room downstairs. I don’t sleep well; it’s quiet down there. I like to watch television (more like listen to it, but let’s not get tedious about semantics) while I try to ignore my chatterbox of a brain so I can fall asleep and I don’t want to disturb Mom’s rest. When television doesn’t work, I listen to music—another reason not to disturb Mom.

Also—I hate the upstairs bedroom. It’s hot in there. Year round, it’s hot.

Still, I have resigned myself to the cold hard fact that eventually, I will be moving upstairs to sleep, while maintaining my room for my increasing collection of stuff.

Today, she knocked over a TV tray. She rises earlier than I, (Who doesn’t? If I’m lucky I may get to sleep by 4 a.m.) and she reads until I drag my fat and happy ass upstairs to get coffee and breakfast going.

The tray holds her newspaper and current book and whatever else she may be busy with. She is, at this time, reading Centennial. It’s a paperback, well over 1000 pages, and when it thumps to the floor upstairs, the old lady in the basement takes immediate notice and bounds up the stairs to make sure—

—it didn’t sound like a body—

—that it wasn’t Mom.

It wasn’t Mom; it was a couple of books, the remote control and the TV tray. Whew!

The “bounding up the stairs” part, though—that’s bad on so many levels.

Like many people, I am more prone to falling up the stairs than down. I have the ankles of a 100-year-old and I have the boots and crutches to prove it.

See? A move upstairs is just waiting to happen.

I’ll give you a little history. Don’t worry—I won’t be offended if you laugh. I did.

In 2009 I was working as an Optician in Boulder, CO. I don’t drive, so my commute from my town was public transportation. One bus, two bus, three bus, four. Usually only three, but absolutely four buses on Saturdays; there were a few different routes, and I sometimes switched it up for variety.

I don’t know why—it’s not like I was watching out the window. Book in hand, headphones blaring, I paid just enough attention to the route to get off and switch rides.

One night, as I stepped off the next-to-last bus of my homecoming commute, I rolled my ankle stepping on a big round rock in the gutter. Luckily for me, there was a young man just ahead of me who kept me from falling and helped me to the curb.

“Thank you so much. I’m fine! I’m fine, thank you!” He went his way and I limped mine. I was a mile from home, and often walked it, but not this time.

I wrote it off, at first, as just a sprain. ” (We’ll get to “just a sprain” later.)

But instead of the pain getting better, it just got worse. After a light bump to my heel nearly made me cry, I gave up and went to the doctor.

“Torn Achilles tendon—here ya go, have a boot! Have a shoe prop! You’ll probably be healing for the next six months.”

News flash—it doesn’t really heal. Had it torn completely, I’d have had surgery. Instead, all these years later, if I bump that spot I will limp for days—after having a good bitch and moan festival.

There’s probably a law on the books somewhere that states: “Once injured, you are undoubtedly going to try to break, bruise and batter every other part of your body for good measure—embrace your destiny.”

With this injury, the shower was my nemesis. I had to wear the boot full time except for sleep and showers.

***Side note—If you are injured in any way, for the love of Andre the Giant, get a shower chair!

I do love Andre the Giant, but I am an idiot. Also, I am cheap. Why pay for something I would only need for a few months?

Spend the money.

I could stand on this foot, although it was painful. I could get around, as long as I didn’t put my heel on the floor. I had this.

I was fine.

Until—slip…slide…lift foot to protect it…fall in a semi-fetal pose. Bump head on edge of tub and slide forward until butt collides with faucet. Slide back for another head bump, forward for a faucet nudge, and then glide back and forth less forcefully, like a marble in a bowl—all while giggling madly until I come to a stop on the floor of the tub.

(Weirdly, this is all present-tense in my head—I relive that fall every time my foot slips, no matter where I am.)

Water pounded down on me. I lay there, mostly on my back, still clutching my knee to keep my foot up. (Hey, it worked—my foot touched nothing!) At some point I had grabbed for the shower curtain, because that was surely going to save me from going down. That worked well—ha ha.

I was still giggling—to keep from crying, of course—when the bathroom door crashed open and my son barged in.

The shower curtain, more than half pulled down, had wrapped around me, so my modesty was somewhat spared. But—“Get out! I’m naked!”

“I don’t care if you’re naked!” my son yelled. “I care if you’re hurt!”

Well, I was—but most of the pain was in my dignity.

And my head; and my butt; and my back; and…

Look: It’s humiliating to fall down; more so to fall down naked; worse still to accept the help of your son while naked. Ugh!

He got me up and out. His wife bought little duckies to glue to the bottom of the tub so it wouldn’t be slippery, because—guess what? I STILL wouldn’t get a shower chair.

I have my pride.

Six months is a long time, measured in boot-wear.

Little did I know…

Fast forward a few years.

It was 2014. My son had invested in a dancercise video collection and we were going to get in shape. There were a lot of great songs, and we all danced around having a good old time.

One morning Sam made a playlist and we got our dance on.

These videos took popular songs and developed a dance routine that you could score points on—they were all a game, for exercise and fun.

And now, I present to you, the best song to injure yourself to: “Timber”!

It's going down, I'm yelling timber (I’m going down!)

You better move, you better dance (Well, I tried!)

Let's make a night you won't remember (Oh, I remember it well!)

I'll be the one you won't forget (And so you were!)

The bigger they are, the harder they fall…

(Words in italics are mine. LOL)

I lifted my foot. I put my foot down. It wasn’t even a full stomp of the foot, but—SNAP!

“Ow!”

After a few minutes of the old, “I’m fine, I’m fine”, I finally admitted I couldn’t put weight on it and had Sam get me a kitchen chair to use as a walker. I stumped my way down the hall to my room, he put a bag of ice on my ankle and I watched TV for a while.

I was sure that a little rest would put it all right.

It did not.

A few hours later I found myself in the emergency room. “Well, you’ve got quite a sprain, young lady,” said the pre-pubescent downy-cheeked cherub masquerading as a doctor to the 50-plus-year-old “young lady” on the examination table. I tried, unsuccessfully, to disguise my derisive laugh as a cough. He gave me a reproachful look and added, “We’ll have to get you in a boot.”

I groaned. “It’s just a sprain,” I complained. “Can’t you just wrap it up tight?”

He shook his head. “There’s really no such thing as ‘just a sprain’, you know.”

That didn’t sound good.

“What do you mean?” I demanded. “At least it’s not broken.”

“Too bad it’s not,” he told me. “It would heal much faster.”

“Huh?”

True story: broken ankle equals six-to-eight weeks and you’re on your way. Sprain equals six-months-to-a-year! Mine, according to the MRI, was sprained in several locations all the way around my ankle and foot. I couldn’t put my foot on the ground for six months, continued to crutch-walk for another two and finally got to graduate to boot-only at nine months in. I wore the boot for a year. I still limp when I spend too much time on my feet.

Last year I was diagnosed with Osteogenesis, which is a precursor to Osteoporosis. Blah. Just what I wanted to hear.

But you know what? Exercise is still key; I do those stairs multiple times a day, and I believe and hope that they are making me stronger.

In light of that, I will stay downstairs as long as possible. It makes me mindful of taking care of my bones.

And since I have no grace, I will diligently avoid falling down.

But not dancing. I can’t avoid dancing. I danced on crutches. I dance in my chair. I will simply dance with caution…

Can one stomp with care?