Moving Forward: Learning to walk again for the first time - Left, Right, Repeat (chapter 2) by Vern Beachy

I didn’t feel any different.

Acting differently was another story entirely. I woke up early on January 4th of 2007—one day after my third monthly Tysabri infusion—and went to the bathroom. Normal. Nothing out of the ordinary there. I got done what had to be done and proceeded to go into my bedroom and back into bed for a few more hours of sleep, or whenever I decided to get up, and stopped.

Dead in my tracks.

The thought of what I did was not what made me stop and do a double take, it was what I DIDN’T do; I didn’t touch the walls for stability when I went to the bathroom; I didn’t fall down and I didn’t feel like I was always on the verge of falling down.

I walked.

First the left and then the right.

It was just a few feet into the next room, but I walked. I stood next to the bed and didn’t sway or even reach out for something to grab onto in order to maintain my balance

I didn’t need to.

I walked.

It was just a few feet…but I walked. One foot in front of the other. Not quite smooth, but without any assistance nonetheless. No crutches, no walls. I stood there for a few moments slowly waking up and trying to remember if I just went into the other room without leaning on any wall for support and “did I really not feel like I was going to fall down?”

Yep. Check and check.

I remembered the very last time I walked anywhere without a cane or crutches. I was living in Albuquerque and it was about a year and a half after I was diagnosed. It was a fall Sunday and I was asked by a friend to meet him at the local sports bar to watch a football game and hoist a few. As I was getting ready to head to the bar and realized I wasn’t bouncing off the walls trying to stay on my feet and trying to stay steady I decided to leave my cane at home.

I walked into the sports bar, saw my friend and sat down with him.

Did you notice anything different about me?

What?

No cane.

This is the first time in months that I went anywhere without my cane. It was Memorial Day weekend of 2000 when I resorted to using a cane whenever I would go somewhere. Prior to that it was an occasional use and only when I had a difficult time walking or felt unsteady.

Walking without a cane felt liberating to me. I didn’t have to use anything to go anywhere…at least at that time I didn’t. It was a huge deal to me and I wasn’t surprised that my friend didn’t notice. I was the one with the problem. I was the one who couldn’t go anywhere without assistance. This was MY life. This was MY problem, but I wanted to explain why I was smiling without any obvious reason for glee. I looked around at the people in the bar and saw that no one was using a cane or crutches and I was glad I left the cane at home because I didn’t want to be the only one.

That day I wasn’t.

I was standing by my bed and I looked down at my steady hand. I picked up my left foot and put it down without shaking. I did the same thing with the right. It was one of those moments that make you want to go “Hmmm…”

I wanted coffee and I wanted to try something. I was wide awake.

I went to the kitchen. I walked to the kitchen and didn’t touch the walls of the hallway to help steady myself.

Hmmm…

I filled the coffee pot. Steady. I put a new filter in and filled the hopper. Still steady. I turned it on and watched the water pour through and fill up the carafe. Still steady. When it was done brewing I took out a coffee cup and filled it. I didn’t spill a drop. I sipped it. No drips. No stains on my shirt.

I smiled lightly as it walked back to my bedroom with a full cup of coffee and didn’t spill a drop. Up until that point I would hobble and lumber to get anywhere and the coffee would always spill. It was sort of like an accident-prone waitress trying to balance a full tray while at the same time trying to avoid running into anyone and spilling its contents.

I made it back to the bedroom and sat down on the bed and got up again. I sat down again and got back up.

I did it again.

Just testing.

I will never forget the date. January 4th, 2007 joined three other dates that I will never, ever, forget: the day my wife died (June 2, 2006), the day I got married (July 27, 2003) and the day I was diagnosed with MS (September 24th, 1998).

I put on a coat to fight back the Iowa cold as I got ready to “test” my walking ability by going down to the convenience store and getting something I didn’t really need (milk I think) at that point. I walked out of my apartment and glanced at my crutches resting against my bookshelf in my living room. I didn’t need them and I was going “up the creek without a paddle,” so to speak. Going out without crutches or a cane was like removing the seatbelts from your car or skydiving without a reserve chute. The crutches were my lifeline. Sure I didn’t need them to stay alive, but I needed them so I wouldn’t fall down or look like someone who was two sheets to the wind.

Drunk out of my mind.

I didn’t feel drunk out of my mind as I left the apartment with my arms free and void of the shackling crutches. Crutches are fun—in a terrible, sick, not-at-all-fun-type of way. Crutches or a wheelchair are limiting in a way that is hard to describe. You can’t just go here and there, you must take into account every step and, if you’re in a wheelchair, all the stairs, and there are lots of them. When I lived in Memphis and had to conduct some business outside of the home I would drive by the building to view the ‘obstacles.’ If the building had a lot of steps and no wheelchair access, I would go right on by if I could wait to conduct business another day or another way. Usually I found another way. Steps are like mountains: huge, foreboding and steep.

I started the car and let it warm up for a few minutes. I questioned whether I was ready for this little trip up the creek without my paddles. But I walked to the car without falling or reaching out for anything and I really wanted this to work. I felt a little naked heading out with any crutches and I guess I had forgotten what it was like to go somewhere without ‘em.

Alice in Chains played on the car CD player as I backed out of my handicapped spot and proceeded south to the convenience store. I was no longer chained to my crutches and I wondered if this would just be a temporary thing. It didn’t really matter because I was on a test mission and wanted to see if I would succeed.

I got to the store, opened my car door and got out. I looked around to see if anyone would notice my newfound ability to walk without crutches. No one did and, really, no one should have either. It was not something out of the ordinary. I was fairly new to town and I didn’t get out too much. It was too exhausting. No one noticed because I was normal and hadn’t been in that particular class of people for a long time.

I kinda liked it and found out I really missed it. I didn’t fully realize it until that point, but I really missed it.

I walked into the store and went to the coolers and grabbed some milk. I walked to the counter, paid for it and left. Not once did I reach out for something to grab onto and steady myself when I was walking in the store. Not once did I feel naked without my crutches. Not once did I stumble.

Not once.

In the short ride home I was thinking about not stumbling and Alice in Chains was singing about rain when they die and I was thinking about the fact that I went somewhere without crutches. It had been years, eight of them actually, since I have done that. During the previous four years a little jaunt like that would’ve included a wheelchair, or I would stay in the car while my wife went in a store somewhere to get what we wanted. My wife passed away six months earlier and I could never fully explain how much I miss her and want her next to me, especially now. I want her to see me walk again. I want to dance with her.

A lot of people commented that “You must’ve jumped for joy when you started walking again.” Nah, I was angry, actually. Sure, I was glad to be walking again and I can never downplay that fact, nor do I want to. But I was angry because my wife, Melinda, was not here to walk next to me. She was not with me to celebrate the ability I had regained. I was not angry at her, I was angry that she couldn’t see this. However, I know she is with me as I take every step and she is holding my arm as I move along.

I feel her smiling down on me but I want to be really selfish and have her here in the physical sense, not just the spiritual sense. Her spiritual presence gives me strength and encouragement as I go through the day-to-day activities of life.

I pulled into the parking lot and purposely avoided the painted blue handicapped spot. When I moved into the apartment the manager asked me what spot in the parking lot I wanted him to designate as handicapped. It would be my spot, he said. Almost as if he was to paint my name on it.

It would be mine.

The closest one I said. I didn’t care if the curb wasn’t cut for easy chair access because I would just go in and out with crutches.

I got out of the car and started walking

…walking!

…to my apartment and stopped halfway up the sidewalk. I had forgotten

…me, WALKING!

something that had been a fixture in my car for quite a few years. It is an option I felt I no longer needed and vowed never to use again; my blue and white handicapped placard hanging from my rearview mirror. The placard was sun-faded from years of hanging in the windshield and the expiration date—written in black Magic Marker—was barely legible. A police officer had once written me a ticket for parking in the handicapped spot at my apartment. He wrote that he couldn’t read the expiration date. I went to see my friend Jeff, the Chief of Police in Carroll, and asked him if he could cancel the ticket because “the placard didn’t expire until I did.” He agreed and tore up the ticket and said he would talk to his officers about my situation and that I shouldn’t ever get one of those expensive tickets again.

I never did.

I walked back to the car, reached inside and pulled the placard from the mirror and stuck it in my pocket. When I got back inside my apartment I hung the sign on my key rack on the wall, just above my crutches that were leaning up against my bookshelf.

I haven’t touched either again…and I don’t plan to in the future.

I wanted to do one thing, specifically, when I got back to my apartment: take Doug the Pug for a walk. His curly little tail wagged back and forth as I asked him if he wanted to “go for a walk.” He had never heard me ask that before, but he knew what it meant. I put him on his leash and proceeded outside. I didn’t venture far from the front door, but I was walking and I did walk my dog. I was a bit shaky because my legs muscles hadn’t had that much of a workout in years. I used to hike constantly when I lived in New Mexico and my legs felt like they did after a long day of hiking; rubbery and weak.
I was walking. On two noodles, but I was walking!

I didn’t want to push myself and jump into the deep end of the pool right away, but I wanted to push myself in case my ability to walk was just a fluke, a temporary thing that I would regret not taking advantage of when it went away if I were to fall asleep or something.

Like a kid in a candy store, I was discovering new things again for the first time.