Broken hip

This Christmas season was anything but normal. I spent almost the entire month of December in Mansfield MedCentral Hospital and Oak Grove Manor nursing home.

On Friday, December 7, I was walking down the slippery lane toward the mailbox, rather hurriedly and unthinking, and I fell and landed on my left side. A neighbor with a tractor and scoop was right there and helped me up but as I walked I started to pass out, so I sat down on the scoop and called 911. No way was I going to be able to walk back to the house. Something must be broken.

The ambulance came in a few minutes and backed into the lane and I was hauled off to three weeks of recuperation after having surgery on Sunday, December 9. In the ambulance, the paramedic noticed that my foot lay over to the left. Moving it slightly brought pain. They took me to MedCentral in Mansfield and put me in the ER in a small room, and there I waited, and waited. Once in awhile someone came in to ask questions. One orderly came in and asked, "Does it hurt when I move this?" and he moved my foot to my right. "YES," I screamed. He left without apology. Every time someone came near that foot I cautioned them to not touch it. The foot didn't hurt, but the leg that it was attached to. For the next few days I was in "shell-shock" from being bumped and handled.

A nurse gave me morphine and they promptly took me to Radiology. I insisted on holding my leg while they transferred me over to the xray table. It was the only way to relieve the pain slightly. Sometimes morphine is overrated.

I was admitted and transferred to the bed and that's where I stayed. Sunday I was taken to the OR where they did the surgery. The surgeon, whom I saw only once before surgery, told me that the fracture was in the upper part of the femur. He put in a plate and pins. I was now ready for further recuperation.

It wasn't long before Rehab came along and rousted me out of bed and I gingerly walked a few paces with a walker--more and more each day. I was also given an intravenous painkiller which worked a lot faster than that morphine I had at the beginning.

But Insurance usually dictates the rules and I was finally shipped to Oak Grove Manor nursing home for further rehabilitation. It was back to where I had been before when I broke my leg the last time (see HARRY). Jeff, the physical trainer, put me through the paces and told me I was doing great; I should be improving pretty quickly.

But the nursing home environment was rather depressing to me at times. Minerva, Lucy's niece, brought in a radio which helped brighten things up for me. This being Christmas season I was able to listen to Christmas music at all hours. No one to bother me, and I spent time in prayer and meditation and thinking about everything that transpired. I felt even better when I found that a piano was in the Dining Room. In the evening, I opened the double doors and wheelchaired my way to the piano and started playing Christmas songs, among other tunes. Someone opened the doors and let the sound out into the hall. A few workers came around and one young lady stood by me with a look of rapture on her face. I don't remember what I was playing at the time but I felt good about the tune I was playing and the sound of the well-tuned piano. I asked her if she knew any songs and she said, "O Come All Ye Faithful." I played it as she sang. All this was meant to cheer myself up, and anyone else within earshot who would appreciate it. And by the comments afterward, they did appreciate it. But I was not about to entertain an audience. I'm more of a closet piano player, although I play in church a few minutes before church starts, at Mennonite Christian Assembly in Fredericksburg, Ohio.

I had a few visitors during my stay at Oak Grove. One evening, Shirley, a Toastmasters speech coach, came for a visit, carrying a rather large wedge of cake. It was her last meeting with our Toastmasters Club since she was going to California to live, and she was given a good send-off with a party, which I couldn't attend. The cake was made by Nancy, one of the other attendees of the bi-weekly Toastmasters meetings. Nancy and Jerry, and their son Steve, came to my room a couple days later. Steve had had surgery on his legs so he was in a cast. We had a nice visit together and I tried to encourage Steve to keep a positive attitude. He'll eventually be up and running. It was only because I myself attempt to keep a positive attitude in a potentially discouraging situation. You think healthy, and you'll get back to better health faster.

I was scheduled to go home on Christmas Eve. I packed up some of my belongings. The walker that Jeff ordered came and I signed the papers for ownership, paid by Medicare. But Dr. Athmaram came by and felt that my leg should be checked. I was sent back to MedCentral for a ultrasound. I was in a wheelchair supplied by Oak Grove and was transported by their vehicle to MedCentral. I never returned to Oak Grove. They found a blood clot and I was immediately readmitted to MedCentral and there I stayed for the next four days--over Christmas, no less! I was not happy about that. They put me on a heperin drip for a couple of days, and Coumadin, a blood thinner.

On Christmas Day the nurses were on half-shift and one commented about her empathy for my stay in the hospital over Christmas. One nice part was that I had prime rib for lunch. The hospital food was quite tasty. Also, Joe and Esther, (Esther is Lucy's sister), along with Jonathan and Rachel, came with a couple of Christmas presents, so the season was not completely lost to me.

The next day, however, I started really getting antsy. I wanted to go home. Everyone thinks I went home on Christmas Eve. I spotted the business card of the social worker who dropped it off in my absence, and in desperation I dialed her number. Just then I saw Pastor Bill Detweiler walk through the door, and I quickly hung up the phone. He had gone to Oak Grove and found I wasn't there and came to the hospital. After I gave him an update, he gave me some encouraging words, and prayed a heart-felt prayer. I felt better.

The last night at the hospital was quite interesting. I had a new nurse, Mary, and she doted on me like none other. She wanted to make sure I was comfortable. She noticed the hospital socks I was wearing were rather tight so she took a scissors and snipped the top to relieve the pressure on my ankles. She put a pillow under my left arm since it still had a Heploc needle inserted, but I was finally off the IV. She spread two blankets over me so I could be warm. She finally left the room and I settled down to sleep, but she returned later and told me that my heartbeat was irregular and my pulse was over 100. She connected me to the oxygen line which I ended up breathing all night. I didn't mind the oxygen, but I felt that she had me confused with another patient. It came to a head later when she came back, exclaiming that one of the leads was disconnected. I was about to say something but she opened my gown and found that I was not even attached to a monitor. She told me my name was on one of them at the console. (I had been on a heart monitor during my first visit.) She left and didn't come back until morning. She must have gotten it all straightened out. It was the best night's sleep I had during my stay at MedCentral and Oak Grove.

I insisted that I wanted to go straight home after being released from the hospital. They obliged since I was reasonably ambulatory and didn't need further rehab. I was scheduled to have some home therapy anyway.

Minerva came before I was even dressed and I rang for the nurse and got dressed. After all the paperwork I finally was able to leave. They pushed me out in the wheelchair and, for the first time I was on my way home. Minerva stowed the wheelchair in back of the van. We would take it back to Oak Grove. But first I had to have a prescription filled for Coumadin so we stopped at Walgreens. I settled for the generic: Warfarin. It's cheaper. Then we delivered the wheelchair back to Oak Grove and we finally arrived home. I walked in with the walker and was met with Nathan (age 5) and Nolan (age 2). They were glad to see me. I sat down in a chair and gave them both a big hug. I really love those kids. They are Minerva's (Lucy's niece) two boys and Lucy babysits them every weekday. They are the next best thing to children we don't have.

Nolan brought a book for me to read and as I read the abbreviated versions of Hansel and Gretel, Beauty and the Beast, and Cinderella, Nathan stood by and listened. I was finally home again!

During the three weeks in stir, I was able to reminisce about events in my life. This leg has been under attack, broken and traumatized ever since I was eight years old. I felt a twinge of pain in my left hip when I landed after falling 30 feet down the silo chute that time; I had the fibula and tibia fractured in a spiral fracture in 2005, and now in 2007 the upper femur bone was fractured. And it was odd to remember that when I landed on the slippery lane I was facing east, the same direction I landed when I fell down the silo chute in 1952; whatever significance that might have. We experience things for a reason. It often brings to our attention the need for spiritual growth because we are eternal beings. God is Spirit and so are we. We cannot stay stagnant but constantly growing to become more aware of our place in the universe.

To get a good grip on the day, you can say this prayer every morning:

Let this day be one of blessing;
Let this day be one of joy;
Let my heart, with love possessing,
Guide the work that I employ.

Harry

I mentioned in my October 28 blog entry that I broke my leg in January 2005. What I didn’t mention was when I was put into the Oak Grove Convalescent Center to recover in February. I was on kidney dialysis and did not have a way of going to Kidney Center from home. Sending me to the Convalescent Center gave me the opportunity to go to dialysis by way of their own vehicle, since it was covered by insurance. There were other dialysis patients who also went to the Kidney Center every other day.

When I was wheelchaired to my room at Oak Grove, I began to feel rather depressed about the situation I was in. It was a small room, rather devoid of excitement or interest, and I guess I began to feel a little sorry for myself. I am not old enough to be in a Nursing Home, or so I thought. Later I found people younger than me.

I noticed my room mate which I later learned was Harry. He was a 74 year old man who didn’t seem to have a very good outlook. And for good reason. He was there for several months, and had been in another nursing home for several months. It would be enough to drive me to distraction too. Furthermore, he had had colon surgery before and the resulting situation was not conducive to positive optimism. He was not a happy man, and the nurses were not very cordial to him either. They had to come to his assistance several times a day.

Because of my own perceived plight, I began to pay attention to him. He was on the other side of the curtain and I started talking to him, introducing myself. He was pleasant enough to me, but did not have anything good to say about the plight he was in, and the attitude of the nurses and caretakers. I began to talk to him about Universal Law, like begets like, in as simple terms as I understood it. What you put out returns to you in like manner.

Late that night, nurses woke us up to give us medication, probably sleeping pills. Two nurses were arguing with Harry. I asked my nurse, “Why are they arguing with him?” She replied, “Oh, he’s quite a difficult patient.”

I saw my opportunity to make my stay worthwhile. In the morning I continued to tell him about how to relate to people you don’t like, or don’t seem to like you. I told him that thoughts have power, and that our thoughts can create the reality we find ourselves in. You put out negative thoughts, negative thoughts and situations will return. Like begets like. You put out positive thoughts, and they will return in kind.

I suggested that when a nurse or caretaker comes to his assistance, think about something he likes about that person, no matter how he feels about that person. Turn the tables on the continuing situation. It will work.

I hoped it would work. I never coached a person like that before, especially a man older than I was and probably set in his ways. But throughout the weekend he gradually seemed to be more acquiescent. There was not as much commotion, although his needs were the same. You could justify his attitude by what he had to deal with. He could not run to the restroom and he often had to be cleaned up, is the plain description of his plight. He didn’t like it and the nurses had to constantly come to his aid, and his attitude had put them on the offensive sometimes.

But by Sunday he was a saint. The nurses exclaimed about his about-face attitude. It was something entirely different from the way they had to handle him before. He was actually pleasant. One nurse exclaimed, “Wes, what did you do to him?” I replied, “Nothing, he had it within him all the time.”

I had ordered an accordion and it happened to arrive at my home while I was in the nursing home. I asked that it be brought to me. Jim and Bonnie visited with me and brought it along. I started playing it, and patients from other rooms came around to see who was originating the music. And they had smiles on their faces. At one moment, when we were alone, a song came to me, with the words, and I played it for Harry. It had to do with our mutual confinement in this place. It was a bit bawdy, but fit the situation we were in, with words you should not repeat in Sunday School. It was the first time I saw him laugh.

Occasionally there was someone playing the piano. I took the opportunity to wheelchair myself over to the piano room, close the double doors, and play to my heart’s content. A nurse came and opened the doors wide. She explained that the patients want to hear. I’m not an accomplished piano player, but I tried to play songs that were uplifting for all the sorry people who needed to hear it. If it cheered me up, it most likely cheered others also.

Meanwhile, Lucy called the local radio station, WMAN and, by telephone, broadcast to the whole listening area the need for a driver for a patient who needs to go to dialysis three times a week. Four people responded and I picked one of them and signed myself out of the nursing home to finally go home. After a couple of weeks or so, I realized I could drive myself in spite of my full cast. It was on the left leg, and with an automatic drive there was no need to have to use it. It all worked out OK.

Quite a number of months passed. I had Harry’s home phone number and I called up his wife and asked about Harry. I was taken aback when she told me he had passed away.

My reasoning is that he needed to find a way to love in an unlovely situation, to come to terms with his own feelings, to make it easier to pass on without fear. God is in control of our lives when we allow it—and we can allow it in order to fulfill the reason for our existence. We have free will but God will answer us when we ask. God bless you, Harry, wherever you are.

Almost . . .

It was around 1965 I believe. A few years after the picture at the right was taken. I had my newfound freedom off the farm. I was old enough to drive, although I didn’t have a car, and independent enough to go a distance to visit my relatives. I used Dad’s car.

It was early afternoon when I drove about 40 miles to Philadelphia to visit my second-cousins somewhere near Second Street and Girard Avenue, if I remember right. On that day I was nicely dressed in a suit and tie. Anyway, I drove toward the waterfront not far from the Delaware River. I was on a street in a quiet part of town, and I got thirsty. I saw a small grocery store and parked a couple car lengths beyond it. I carefully locked the passenger side door. You never know what could happen in a strange neighborhood. I had in mind to get something to drink, like orange juice. I entered the small store and bought a small container of orange juice and engaged in conversation with the proprietors as I drank it. They were a Russian husband and wife who had this store for years. They did not especially like the city but it was a living for them to have the small neighborhood convenience store.

I finally stepped out of the store and onto the sidewalk. Suddenly the door of a bar opened across the street and a woman stumbled out and toward me. I watched as she came close and then she fell down just a couple yards from me. A man rushed out and came up to her exclaiming, “Mama!”, and carefully helped her up. He brought her over to me and asked if I would please take her home, just a few blocks down the street. She was ill, he said.

I was not exactly naïve but I was in a quandary—doing a good deed, or possibly getting into a trap. I was not the kind of person to be used to the strange activities of strangers in a big city. As I hesitated, the woman walked over to the car and tried the door on the passenger's side. She stood waiting as the man explained her illness and the need for someone to take her home. In my hesitancy I was almost ready to help them out as I slowly wandered toward the car.

Suddenly, from the store came a call, “Mister…Mister…you forgot something!” The Russian lady was outside the store and waving a handkerchief in my direction. “You forgot something!” I answered to the ruse and walked back to the safety of the store. Both proprietors gave me an orientation lesson on the devious misadventures that occasionally occurred in the neighborhood. “It’s a bum city,” they said. “They have already stolen from people... and killed people. They would do just what they tried to do to you. It’s a bum city!” As I waited inside the store, both the would-be thieves went back into the bar.

I thanked the Russian couple profusely, and when the street was empty once again, I left, chastened by the experience.

Psalm 91:11 Because thou hast made the LORD, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation; There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.

That’s not to say I’m treated with any particular favor more than anyone else could. It apparently was to be a lesson learned—learning to be careful in a city of strangers, even if it is called The City of Brotherly Love. I thank God that it was not a worse experience. After all, I don't exactly lack for bad experiences, but that's another story or two.