Tuesday, July 12, 2022

 Tuesday, July 12, 2022 

   

I had PT at 7:30. It was all good news today. I told Katie I could put on my pants without using the grab stick. Katie told me I was as advanced as she expected people to be by week eight after the surgery. It would have been six weeks on Thursday. She said I wasn’t just doing well for my age; I was doing better than many people half my age.  

  I shared my concern about her comment that I wouldn’t be happy with a THR. She was finally aware that her comment had a significant impact than ever intended. She clarified. She said that she felt I wouldn’t have well with a posterior approach. She still believed that to be true. Since I had an anterior approach, her comment didn’t apply. She said she wished everyone had an anterior approach. From the beginning, it had been my gut feeling that I wanted that approach. I read the range of motion would be greater and the likelihood of joint dislocation smaller. Not to mention the posterior approach requires the doctor to cut muscles. With the anterior approach, they use crowbars to move the muscles and make the bone accessible.

    I went directly to the bank after leaving PT. There were already a dozen people online waiting for the 8:30 opening. I was in luck. The bank opened at nine, and I would have a forty-five-minute wait. I was prepared to do that. I had stopped by several times to find the parking lot full. The last time I went inside. Twenty people were online, two tellers, and the Internet was down. I left. Today there were five tellers. I was out in less than half an hour.   

   I went to the Post Office in the same strip mall to mail a book to Cylin.   Ten people were in that line, and the doors hadn’t opened yet. That line went quickly.

   I went home to nap before my 11:30 appointment with the M &W sisters. I had set my alarm, so I didn’t miss it. With going-into-second-grade M, we finished writing her story. She was reluctant to work on it, which I could appreciate. She worked very hard two sessions ago. She had difficulty communicating her thoughts. I pushed her. It is frustrating for all of us when others don’t get what is clear to us. I teach someone their point of view is important, and they should try to communicate their thoughts.

   I told M I had written a paragraph I thought summoned up the ideas we had worked on the other day. I read it to her. She was pleased. Then she gave more details about what went on in that scene. She described how people lassoed and tied up cows at the local rodeo. Hawaii has a huge cattle industry. Cowboy skills are as essential here as they are in Wyoming. In fact, a group of Hawaiian cowboys went to a mainland rodeo and won. Everyone was shocked. M storytelling flowed more easily today. We finished the telling.

 With going-into-sixth-grade W, we continued with the Gating Game. W loves games and challenges. I anticipated her mother telling me she wasn’t paying me to play games with her children. I had an easy fix for that. I would invite her to play herself. So much is learned in the process.

   I spoke to Jean, my Hanai sister. We shared problems related to age, listing all that’s breaking down. I shared some movie suggestions, Leave No Trace and Barefoot. The first was a gem that stayed with me. The second was a well-done piece of unrealistic fluff but fun.

   I worked with Adolescent D on the list of words he consistently missed his other tutor gave me. He did much better than he had done before. I told him to make accuracy his priority. He got most of the words, caught some mistakes, and corrected them. I know this doesn’t sound like much to those who don’t understand what an improvement this is for him. He argued that there was no improvement. He always did that; he denied he ever had a problem. His denial drove me crazy. If he could always do them, why did his tutor have these words on a list of words he didn’t read accurately. “I don’t know,” was his reply. Does he believe what he said, or was he just being defensive? I think he believed what he said. He only counts his best performance. If he got half of the words right, that’s all he considered. He ignored all the misses. He refused to believe his inability to read this list of words at fifteen a problem. Is it just denial or something more serious?