Tuesday, May 17, 2022

 Tuesday, May 17, 2022

  

  Boy, was I in pain last night. Sciatica hit full force. I kept switching positions for most of the night, trying to sleep. This sciatica problem has been building. The muscles on the back of my left thigh pulled tight as I sat in my old lady chair. I finally grabbed the acupuncture pen from under my pillow. I started applying it to my lower back and moved it up the left side of my back. Ah, relief. I was glad this happened. If sciatica hits after the surgery, I now know the surgery didn’t cause the problem. I also have learned how to fix it if it hits again.

   I formulated a theory because the main release for lower back and leg pain was around my armpit. I hypothesized old injuries caused all the problems with my body. I was slammed into my mother’s hip for three hours at birth. My left brow is lower, and my nose was permanently reconfigured. Such a pounding must have had an impact on my neck. At age seven, a small event with my mother startled me. I pulled my hips sharply to the right. That became my default startle position. To this day, if I get scared, I pull to the right. I know that now because it caused no end of havoc to my left leg. At ten, I fell on an old wooden tent stake. As I fell, I feared it would hit my heart, and I would die. I didn’t. The impact was lower on the left of my ribs. When I hit, I said, “You’re dead.” And then I said, “Thank God it’s over.”  That was startling information for a ten-year-old. It was not a happy childhood. At twelve, I fractured my coccyx—no big deal. I remember walking to and from school, thrusting my hip to the right. My dad tried to stop me, warning me of the consequence. But what did he know? I was twelve! At nineteen, I pulled a left inner thigh muscle when I went into a lunge. It remained tight. I assume now that it was tight already because of my posture. Then at 35 or so, I flew down a flight of stairs head first, tearing a left rotator cuff and jamming the shoulder. Finally, at 62, I had rotator cuff surgery- another wound. At 64, Mike wrenched my inner thigh muscle. That was the bale that broke the camel’s back. I’d been lame ever since.

    I met with Terry, my PT, at 2 pm. I told her my theory and asked her to work on my shoulder arm area. I showed her the stretch I had discovered and how tight the upper arm muscles were on my left upper arm. She knew what to do. She wished she had five hours with me- five hours straight. Hey, maybe. What is money for? This woman is a miracle worker, and we work well together.

   While in the session, I had two phone calls from Shivani and Jean, my hanai sister. I called Jean on the way home. She updated me on the progress of her healing from her back surgery. She was walking on the grounds of her retirement community. She regularly sings the praises of this place. It’s expensive, but it’s worth it for these two. I hate to think of how they would have coped after her operation if they were still living in their house in Princeton.

    I called Shivani back much later. She wanted to know if I could get my hands on children’s books and toys for Sidney so she didn’t have to bring stuff when she came to visit. I got on that immediately. I called Jazzy. She has three boys; Leon, the oldest, is seven. I sent Shivani Jazzy’s number. I figured it would be better if they talked directly. I also sent her Alexandra’s number so she could talk to her directly about caring for Sidney while she worked.

     I had adolescent D at 4:30. No, he hadn’t listened to the audiofile in two days. I asked if he understood what others said better. Yes. Did he remember what they said better? Yes. This is what I have seen when people listen to the audiofile. His response was, “I don’t know.” I could appreciate his confusion. I assure you the impact of the audiofile was as much a surprise to me as it was to anyone else. His reading is also better. This may be because of the audiofile, and it may be because of the change in my approach to teaching him word recognition skills. I started using modeling only. I began with Phase I, identifying every sound and the letter(s) representing those sounds. Then I do Phase II, identifying the vowel letters, dividing the word into syllables, blending the sounds, starting with the vowel going to the end of the word or syllable and then forward. Finally, I categorize each syllable according to the syllable type. Orton Gillingham identifies six syllable types. They help identify patterns.

    I continued watching the TV series The Lincoln Lawyer.