Freedom

Initially you lie in bed that is more you can do with your broken body and your useless legs. All  you or you do is lying in bed. The first relief, that is offered is is a wheelchair. Initially it takes a nurse and and aide to move you from your bed to the wheelchair. Eventually you learn the skills to make the transfer on your own. The ability to get into a wheelchair gives you the freedom of the hospital floor. You go many places and do many things that you cannot do lying in bed but in the end you are still held in a larger cage.

Weeks later, as your abilities improve, and much more valuable transfer becomes possible. The day that you transfer from a wheelchair to a car is the day that you can leave the hospital and enter the world of at large. Until the day that I successfully demonstrated the ability to transfer into her passenger seat she was convinced that her Honda Civic was too small or too what ever to allow me the ability to make this transfer.

The moment I could successfully move from a wheelchair to a car, I had the freedom of the city as long as I could enlist the aid of the willing driver.

The next freedom will come when we buy a car equipped with hand controls and acquire enough skill and confidence to be able to move alone from my chair to the car and to be able to disassemble and store the chair before I drive off. At that point I will have achieved full freedom.