Plains, Trains, and Automobiles

Last week was our winter break, and we didn't have classes (so no teaching), and we decided to take advantage of our time off. I have been trying to do a blog post once a week, usually on Sunday, but last week I was unable to post because I was traveling across the plains to visit friends in Lethbridge.  There have been several exciting developments in the past two weeks. First, we got our new car! We have never owned a new car before, and can hardly believe how much cars have improved in the last decade and a half. So far we absolutely love it.

Happy new Toyota owner

The very first thing we did after getting the new car was to take a road trip across the prairies to visit friends in Alberta. It was a 6 1/2 hour drive across the flattest land I have ever seen. The scenery was quite different from what we see driving on the West Coast, but I was pleasantly surprised that it has its own beauty, and is interesting in a different way. You can see so far, that it is possible to see an entire train from engine to caboose. I had never really thought of this before, but I somehow found it captivating, and kept trying to take pictures out the car window to capture it. I felt sort of like a three-year-old, pointing out every train to Jeff as we drove. I would have needed a panoramic camera lens to get a whole train, but I was able to get a couple of pictures of most of a train.

My view from the car window

We had a lovely visit with our friends, and returned on Tuesday night. Then on Thursday, I had my driving evaluation to determine whether I would be allowed to drive on my own. I was really nervous leading up to the test, more nervous than I thought I would be. Part of my nervousness was that I had been practicing driving in our old Passat, but had decided to take the driving exam in the new Prius. The Prius is easier to drive, but I was less familiar with it. I was still making some mistakes when driving, and was worried that I might not pass the test. On Thursday afternoon I went for my evaluation, and the evaluator was very nice. We drove around downtown for about 20 min., and at the end the evaluator went over the mistakes I had made. I got marked down for failing to look over my shoulder nine times, and a few of their mistakes. Looking quickly over my shoulder (as one would usually do when making turns or lane changes) is the one situation where I have problems with my double vision, and a little bit of trouble with vertigo. Despite what sounded to me like a huge number of demerits, I passed the exam! I am now legally allowed to drive all by myself wherever I want. We immediately went out for ice cream to celebrate, as we do.

Chocolate hazelnut ice cream with fudge brownie on top, and an unrestricted drivers license

Ready to take the driver's seat

 I have only driven alone once so far – to go pick up contact lenses from my eye doctor. Not too glamorous, but still exciting. It was the first time Jeff had been home by himself since we moved here. An exciting milestone in my recovery!

Reflecting and Celebrating

One year ago, I was stressed out about being in a very unsettled place, not knowing where we would live or what kind of job I would have after my postdoc finished. Two years ago, I was in my first postdoc position and was fairly unhappy with my job. Three years ago, I had just been diagnosed with my cavernous malformation, after experiencing my first bleed. Four years ago, my life was filled with the unknowns of where I would be for my clinical internship, and whether Jeff and I would be living in the same city.

While I no doubt have my share of stressors this year, they are different – still a lot of uncertainty, yes, but a different kind of uncertainty. In a lot of ways, things are starting to settle for us-- we are no longer living year-to-year, never knowing what will come next. As long as we do our jobs, we can stay here as long as we like. There is of course no way to know exactly what the future will hold, but at least now it doesn't seem like an ominous impending cliff. It has instead become a giant mountain, which I may never quite be able to climb, but at least now it's about hard work and perseverance and taking try after try, as opposed to trying to steer clear of some unseen pit, not knowing exactly where it is or when it will show up. Different kinds of challenges. I can't help but wonder what next year will bring.

Yesterday was my birthday, and we celebrated by having people over for cake in the afternoon. It was a small party, with a few people from work, and some friends who are also new faculty here, who we met when we first arrived. Two of our colleagues from work brought small children with them, and the balloons we blew up and had sitting on the floor turned out to be a big hit. At one point one of the kids decided that since it was my birthday I should be buried in balloons. It was total chaos for a couple of minutes, and Jeff tried to catch it with the camera, but just got the tail end:

A good time was had by all.

Update: The video should now work :)

Thank Goodness for Good Neighbors

It has been extremely cold here, especially last week. On Wednesday, it got down to almost -40°C (which coincidentally is also -40°F). While most people here plug in their cars, our parking situation is such that we don't have access to electrified parking while we are at work. There is a wait list to get into the lots that have electrified parking, and an even longer wait list to get into the heated underground parkade. Because of my disability parking permit, we are able to park right in front of our building. This is convenient, except for the fact that it is unprotected and often icy, which can be hazardous for me getting in and out of the car. It is also problematic on very very cold days, because weather like that can kill a battery if the car is not kept warm either by staying indoors or plugging it in.

I have been badgering the parking office to allow us to get parking in the underground lot in anticipation of the possibility of me driving to work on my own, as I am not particularly comfortable with the idea of getting in and out of the car and trying to get my walker by myself when there's ice on the ground (which is all of the time). Not to mention that if it snows during the day it would be almost impossible for me to clear the snow or ice off of the windshield and windows. So far I have not gotten a response from the parking office regarding my request. If they deny me, I will take it to the next level, as I think this is clearly a disability accommodation issue and this request should be granted.

It is very unfortunate that we had to park outside last Wednesday when it was so cold, as after being parked there for about eight hours, the car wouldn't start. We contacted campus security, and they try to jumpstart our car, but it didn't work. By a stroke of good luck, the campus security officer who responded happened to be someone I had met at a training, who also happens to live one block from us. Jeff and I played board games with him and his wife a couple of weeks ago. He kindly offered to drive us home, which was well beyond what he had to do as a part of his job.

We tried calling CAA (the Canadian equivalent of AAA), and apparently we were not the only ones having car trouble in the cold weather, because we could barely get through. They were finally able to come by on Thursday to try to get the car to start (it didn't), and then sent someone else out on Friday to replace the battery. It still didn't start. We eventually had the car towed to a shop where it will be looked at on Monday.

We are also fortunate to be friends with another faculty member in our department who happens to live three blocks away. He was able to take us to work on Thursday and Friday, and helped us out in a number of other ways. We had relied on this neighbor/colleague/friend for a lot of rides for a couple of days, and knowing that we wouldn't have the car at least until Monday, we finally decided to rent a car.

At that point we realized that our car is now 14 years old. We were frustrated and fed up with car trouble, and decided that now that we have real jobs maybe it's time to get a real car – a newer car that won't break down so often. We have been talking about this possibility for a long time, and have always wanted to get a hybrid. We decided that there was no reason not to do it, so yesterday we went to a dealership and picked out a car. We decided that we wanted the new Prius v, took it for a test drive, thought it was great, and successfully negotiated a deal on a 2012 model. We applied for financing, and to our surprise as well as the dealer's, Toyota Canada is able to talk to Toyota USA. Based on our American credit history, we were able to get approved for the best deal on financing. We should have our new car in 7 to 10 business days (it has to be transported from elsewhere). We were so pleased that we went out for ice cream to celebrate, as we do:

Jeff thinks it's reasonable to wear a T-shirt out to ice cream when it's -12°C. To be fair, compared with the weather from a couple of days earlier it did feel balmy out.

A picture of us driving our new car, that Jeff drew while we were having ice cream.

What our new car will actually look like.

This morning, I baked oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and we delivered them to our two helpful neighbors. It's nice to know that even though we are new here and haven't yet established a huge social network, we do have people we can count on to help us out when we need it!

Ups and Downs

This has been a week full of ups and downs. It turns out that driving comes back pretty easily. After last weekend's trial run at the cemetery, Jeff had enough confidence in my driving that he thought I should try taking a quick spin around the neighborhood. I did, and that went well, so now he is making me drive everywhere. I have gotten a fair bit of practice in the last week, and am now quite confident that I will pass my driving test. I scheduled the test for February 21, so I have lots of time to practice before then. I am also getting better and better at getting my walker up and down the stairs and in and out of the car. So that's one big up.

Another up is that I am now able to walk short distances with two canes. This is a step harder than walking with the forearm crutches, and is one step closer to walking on my own. I first tried this out at my physical therapy session last Tuesday. During the session it felt like it was going very well. I thought that maybe this would be my new way of getting around. The forearm crutches are being and heavy, and fall over whenever I try to lean them on something. The canes are small and light, and have a little tripod thing at the bottom, so that they stand where they are set down. However, when I tried to use them for more than a few minutes or for something like going up and down a small set of stairs without a railing, or up and down a curb, it turned out to be extremely difficult. So this was one of my downs.

The first down of the week was finding out that my physical therapist is leaving for a different job. This week will be my last week working with her. I am sad about this both because I like her, and because she's a very good therapist, and I'm not sure that another therapist will be able to help me progress as quickly. My second down of the week came when I asked my physical therapist whether she thinks I will still be using the walker four months from now. She said that unfortunately her crystal ball was broken, and she couldn't predict, but she  implied that she thought I probably would be. That same day, my occupational therapist explained that there is not much that can be done therapy-wise to help with recovery of sensation. She said that there is really no way of knowing whether I will get sensation back on my right side.

So my big down is related to wondering how much I will recover. I have been told that brain recovery mostly happens in the first year after injury or surgery. I am now a little over seven months post surgery, and it is hard to imagine that my balance, coordination, and sensation will return to normal in the next five months. I really don't know-- no one knows-- whether this is possible. Part of the issue is that it is unclear whether I am waiting for tissue that has been damaged to heal (as was the case with my double vision, which was caused by a sort of stretching of the sixth cranial nerve), or whether I am dealing with tissue damage that is beyond healing and am working at creating new pathways to compensate for this loss. If it is the former, then sudden and dramatic change is possible (as was the case with my vision). However, if it is the latter, then progress is likely to be very slow, decreasing over time, and eventually stopping. I am still making steady progress, so I know that when my recovery stops moving forward I will be further along than I am now. But it is impossible to say how much further along. For now, I keep trudging forward, one step at a time.

On the Road Again

It's kind of hard to believe, but I may be driving again soon. Ever since moving here I have been in back-and-forth correspondence with the provincial licensing and insurance agency. Here in Saskatchewan, there is an agency equivalent to the DMV called SGI, that does everything the DMV does and also administers auto insurance. When I went to get my drivers license, I was required to report that I had a medical condition which might affect my driving. There was a series of letters that I had to respond to, and finally in December I was required to have my doctor fill out a form.

Somewhat to my surprise, he said that I had nothing wrong that would impair my ability to drive at that point, and recommended that I take a road test. I thought, fine, I'll take it in the spring after the snow melts, because I was in no hurry to get back on the road and was a bit nervous about driving in the ice and snow. Then, a couple of weeks ago I received a letter from SGI stating that I had to take my road test before March 3, or  my license would be suspended for noncompliance. I called and asked if I could delay the test, and they said no. My only options were to either take the test by March 3, voluntarily surrender my license, or have my license suspended.

I explained the situation to my physical therapist and occupational therapist, and they said maybe I should just get back to driving. My occupational therapist did some tests with me, including speed of moving my foot back and forth to simulate quickly stepping on the gas and brake, and a reaction time test that involved using both hands to press buttons that would light up in various places across my entire visual field including peripheral vision. These tests are normed on elderly populations, and I am average or above-average for a person over 72 years old. This means that I passed the tests, suggesting that I have the physical capacity to drive. At my last physical therapy session we worked on having me get my walker in and out of the car by myself. We also worked on getting the walker up and down a short flight of stairs, which I would have to do to get in and out of the house on my own. At my next occupational therapy session I will be trying out a driving simulator.

It was recommended that I go out in an empty parking lot and just see what driving feels like. There was a bridal show going on where we expected to have a big empty parking lot, so went out this afternoon to the cemetery instead. There was not another living soul there, so I was pretty sure I wouldn't hurt anyone. Also, everything was covered in several feet of snow, so if I hit anything it would be a snow bank. I drove around at a top speed of about 15 mph, on the winding roads of the cemetery, which were plowed but still quite snowy. Jeff was in the passenger seat, nervous at first, but once I got going he said it felt like I was driving just like normal. He even asked if I want to  drive over to the University where we were headed (I did not). I need to call SGI tomorrow to clarify what I am legally allowed to do right now-- I certainly need to practice more before taking the road test, but I'm not sure what my status is in terms of being allowed to drive.

But it looks like I really might be driving again soon. It's kind of hard to imagine having that much independence again. It's exciting and also a little bit scary – I haven't been anywhere by myself since June. I think I will go ahead and make the appointment for the road test, so sometime before March 3 I will probably be on the road again!