MSI Press Blog

  In 1980, I fell down a flight of stairs. The day started out normally enough. Breakfast over, Donnie departed for work, and school lunches prepared, the kids and I were ready to take on the day, as usual. Lizzie had skipped off to her fourth grade class a few blocks from home. Three-year-old Noelle, dressed in a pretty pink dress and her blond hair tied up into two ponytails   with matching pink ribbons was tucked away in the back of our orange Pacer, where she could sit comfortably with her legs stretched out. (Those were days before the invention of seat belts.) Two-year-old Shane was seated on the outside stairs, waiting for me to bring out Doah, in his carrier, along with his suction machine for his trach tube. Doah was on the sofa, next to his suction machine. Everything and everyone in place – except that Shane needed a pair of socks. I quickly scooted down the basement stairs in search of clean socks that should have been on top of the dryer. And the, oops, I slippe...

When Noelle was ready for entry into elementary school, she was already very active with her braces and quite socially advanced. She made friends easily. Mainstreaming was just coming into popular use, and we all decided that we wanted Noelle in a regular classroom. The school agreed, then little "differences" cropped up.  "You do not have to stand for the pledge of allegiance," her teacher told her.  Yes, she did, I retorted. If everybody else stands, she stands. It meant that she had to become adept, very adept and quick, at standing up, locking her braces while standing, then unlocking them and sitting down. She managed it and was very adept the rest of the years that she wore braces at changing positions. She had to in order to fit in, and that was not a bad thing. That was commonsense. Then, the principle scarfed up an old wheelchair and placed it at the corner of the school so that she could watch everyone else playing during recess. All the handicapped childr...

  In her lifetime, Noelle has had two amputations—each one a study in her extraordinary, almost disarming practicality. The first happened because of what can only be described as a silly accident. Somehow, she managed to catch her toe in the spokes of her wheelchair. Why she was barefoot, I still cannot tell you. She shouldn’t have been; she’s supposed to protect her feet precisely because she can’t feel them. In fact, she has no sensation below the waist. So when her toe got caught, she simply kept rolling. The toe tore mostly off, and the only thing that alerted her was the trail of blood she noticed on the floor as she moved. Off to surgery she went. Off with the toe. No drama. Noelle is a pragmatist to her core. A toe she couldn’t feel meant nothing to her. The well‑meaning doctor, unfamiliar with the matter‑of‑factness that often accompanies life as a paraplegic, tried to offer empathy during the post‑op conversation. Gently, she asked Noelle whether she was “missing” her...