In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Daily Ritual.”

Daily Ritual

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There is nothing very exotic about my daily ritual. I do it because the next move is the old folks home. Did you ever see a homey old folks home?

I’m still thankfully waking up after seven or eight hours in the bed. Not necessarily sleeping but in bed trying to rejuvenate the old body. When I wake up, I usually try to figure out what kind of animal did a number in my mouth, I use a CPAP-BIPAP machine. I slide my legs off the bed and use gravity to help get my body in a sitting position. I will sit there a few minutes letting the blood flow stabilize a little bit, next I reach my Walker and start out toward the bathroom.

There are many variables that determine how long my bathroom stop will be, it is usually from 45 minutes to an hour. Hope we never have a fire drill! I always measure my urine to try to determine how my kidneys are working that day. Having a BM in the commode is almost cause for celebration when you have lived with spinal cord injury for over 50 years. Keeping the body clean is another task, I can still do most of it, just takes a lot longer, have to use special reaching equipment. When your arms barely work you buy something or invent it to help get your daily tasks done. When I get done in the bathroom, I get a hold on my walker and head for the kitchen and the coffee pot.

Some days my loving wife has my coffee and a cookie sitting on the table by my lift chair, if not I usually’s zap my coffee in the microwave, get a cookie and settle into my lift chair for a break. I turn on the television to keep up on the weather, local news and world events. I start getting dressed after a little break, mostly wear baggy gym shorts or something with legs that will go over my clumsy shoes. In case of an emergency later in the day, long pants complicate a not so delicate situation. I have a heavy shoe and brace on my right leg and a built-up shoe on the left. The simple task of putting shoes on is about a 15 minute project.

I usually try to ride my exercise bike for about 15 minutes every morning, and use stretch bands for exercise at different times of the day, I try to maintain strength in my arms and legs. Last year if I fell on the floor I didn’t have the strength to get back up again, that was a great incentive to do more exercises.

My wife and I make many trips to visit doctors and clinics, I wouldn’t say it is a ritual but awful close to it. I can still drive so that helps a lot for me, being partly independent. When getting out of the house requires most of your strength, you just don’t get around much anymore.

In the afternoon and evening I will be at my computer in the spare bedroom. I play various solitaire games part of the time. I visit Facebook about once a day. Lately I’ve made several trips a day to visit WordPress. I am a newbie, enjoying the trip so far.

So much for my daily ritual, sounds very boring. There have been days when this ritual just couldn’t all be accomplished by myself. The day will come when I can’t do any of it. I will fight as hard as I can to move that day off into another universe.