Paralysis is Annoying

Quick anatomy lesson: the brain talks to the spine which talks to the nerves which talk to the muscles. If there is a disruption in any of these (AKA a bullet) then the muscles don’t work. So here is where I’m at. I am a C-4 quadriplegic meaning that all four of my limbs have been impacted by my spinal cord injury. Luckily I still have some upper body function in my shoulders and biceps so with practice, I can get by. 

One of the first things that I noticed in the hospital was that my reflexes were WAY off. This was my first annoyance. I would have my family throw empty water bottles and foam balls at me so I could practice catching things as a form of therapy. I noticed that when the ball came my way my brain would tell my body to catch it and the ball would just hit me and fall to the ground... and then my arms would move. It’s like there was a two second delay between my limbs and my body. “Hand eye baby, hand eye”. It was always strange when I would have something on my lap and it would slowly start falling and I would reach out to catch it and it would already be on the ground. Basically I just had to watch my phone fall. Overtime I’ve noticed that my reaction time has improved. Hopefully that means that my nerve impulses are getting faster and better with my limbs! I can start putting this annoyance behind me. 

My next annoyance is a “facepalm”. Literally. Because of where my spine was injured, I have pretty decent bicep control but I have no triceps. I never realized how important triceps were until mine were snatched from me. When I lay flat in bed I am pretty much useless. I can do a shimmy to change positions but as soon as I raise my arms up, I smack myself in the face. Because my triceps are so weak, when my arm is extended there is no muscle to support the weight of gravity and my hand comes crashing down like a guillotine. The amount of times that Kass has heard a crisp ‘smack’ followed by an F-bomb in the middle of the night is probably well into the thousands. You would think that I would learn my lesson, but I don’t think that’s ever going to happen. Sticking with the lack-of-tricep theme, I usually wake up with what I call ‘dinosaur arms’. 

If I bring my hands to my face while I am flat in bed it is extremely difficult to get them back down to my side. I never thought about how my tricep straightened my arm. They just kind of did it. It was just something that happened naturally. Now if my hands get to my face, I just kind of leave them there resting on my chest like T-Rex arms. 

By the way, if you guys didn’t know, I actually invented the dab before Fortnite made it a thing.

I want you to pay attention to your body the next time that you yawn. Just take notice that all of the muscles in your arms tense up. Well mine do too. That is, my good muscles tense up. My shoulders and my biceps flex, however my triceps do not. The end result is an ugly looking dab. So if you ever see a quadriplegic doing a dab in public, just know that they’re probably just yawning! Also, I hope that me talking about yawning is making you yawn now. This stuff is contagious (the yawning, not the paralysis). 

Have any of you played the car game ‘wet noodle’? Essentially, someone in the backseat goes limp and crashes into their friends when the driver goes through a turn. No? Just me? Okay then. Well now, every car ride is that game. I am stuck being a wet noodle. Except now I have to worry about face planting the dashboard or going through the windshield during a sudden stop. Basically every car ride has become me holding on for dear life. I’ve gotten better with it for sure though! It was really scary at the beginning, I never thought I would be able to be in a car again. Now I have a bad ass minivan/spaceship and I am working on getting a truck for myself! Big things are happening vehicle wise, but I will always be a wet noodle.

My next physical annoyance involves trunk support and my posture muscles. The reason that I am a wet noodle in the car is because I have no trunk support. That means that my abdominal muscles and back muscles have grown relaxed and weak from lack of use. This is referred to as quad belly. I’ve stopped trying to explain it to people and now I just refer to it as my ‘chonk’. Quick poll: raise your hand if you look good when you’re sitting? That’s right... (btw chances are that you actually do, you’re just too hard on yourself you beautiful/handsome train wreck). Sitting is a hard look to rock and it is easy to pick yourself apart, believe me. You get stomach folds and weird lines and you just don’t look very natural when you’re sitting. There isn’t anything wrong with that! I am just sitting for a much longer period than most of you. When I lean on my relaxed stomach all day, I look chubby. It’s whatever at this point. I am a quad so quad belly is pretty unavoidable. But when I lay flat in bed, skinny little Josh comes back. I’m not explaining this in a vain way, I just wanted to bring a little awareness to a hidden side effect of paralysis. Another thing that I try to avoid is the dreaded hunchback. I mostly catch myself leaning forward towards the end of the day when my muscles are more tired, but my lack of posture muscles causes me to lean. It is really annoying and uncomfortable so I try to pay attention to it but a lot of times I look like the Hunchback of Notre Dame. Again, it’s just an unseen side effect and there’s nothing wrong with it. I know that none of you judge, I just want to bring awareness to it as well. 

I’ve hit on handshakes a few times in my blogs. They are a tricky situation because the person on the other end doesn’t know that my hands don’t work. However, if you do know that my hands don’t work, fist-bumps work great! Hugs are also cool.

My next few annoyances aren’t exactly related to any anatomy. The first one I will hit on are touchscreen cell phones. I love my iPad and I love my phone. They help me navigate so much in my new life but zooming in is hard. I know that there are a lot of accessibility features, but not being able to spread my fingers apart and zoom in on something or expand the letters on an Instagram story is very annoying. Just a small little thing that really gets to me. 

My second big annoyance involves clothing and department stores. I have dragged so many shirts and sweatshirts through clothing store isles! A lot of places have their isles too small and my wheelchair barely fits through it. I’m at the point in this wheelchair gig where I just don’t care and I’ll drag stuff around or murder a manikin just to prove a point. So bring it on TJ Maxx. 

P.S. I think that my biggest fear is knocking over a candle display at Bath and Body Works.

Well, this is just the short version of my list of physical annoyances that come with wheeling around. I actually highly recommend that everyone make a small list of what bugs them. I know that it was very therapeutic for me and I want to thank you for reading and following along! If you see me out and about, come say hi and give me a fist bump. 

God Bless!