Hi, James!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

JB>  I just visited with the God-Mother. She seems to be MUCH
JB>  better than the last time I saw her. $600 of annuals alone
JB>  in this year, and she scaled back. Quite a girl! What a
JB>  bunch of laughs too.


          Sounds like a kindred spirit, all right....  :-)



AH>  and you are able to apply some of the insights your
AH>  sister has gained from Pilates....  :-)

JB>  Shoot... Just what I didn't need.... 


          You found the exercise ball helpful, didn't you?  Your sister may
be upset that you're not using it quite the way it was designed to be used
and/or you may have heard more than you ever really wanted to know about
Pilates, but you're able to problem-solve with the resources available... I
consider that a very important survival skill!  I'll take a good idea from
anywhere & adapt it to suit our needs as well.  Nobody has asked us why
we've hung a fuzzy key fob on the light switch in our bathroom, but there's
another example... [chuckle].



JB>  I think the nerves are exactly the same but different.
JB>  THIS is what I think of the half-full/half-empty scenario.
JB>  I too cut the end of a finger pad clear off. The same
JB>  tingling you speak of was there, and a few numb sensations
JB>  bracketing the over-activity.


          Numbness *and* tingling... yes, that's what I had!  I know it
sounds weird to have both together, but you obviously understand what I
mean....  :-)



JB>  For my hip, we are now treating it successfully by
JB>  addressing how the brain is responding to those
JB>  sensations.


          Makes sense to me.  That's more or less what we've been trying to
do too, I guess.  Initially I considered Nora's recovery a matter of
re-educating the brain... teaching it how to interpret the signals from the
nerves & how to recognize the instructions other parts of the body
needed to reproduce various motions.  Later it became increasingly evident
that Nora's physiotherapist was the sort of person who enjoys new projects,
but prefers to leave the long-term followup to others.  Recently we
consulted a neurophysiotherapist we had heard about.  She says the
connections are in place now & the next order of business is to develop
the weaker muscles.  We're much cheered by this news although we still have
a lot of work ahead!  Like you, we're trying to work smart....  :-)



JB>  I think I mentioned how astonished I was at a lack of
JB>  measuring equipment for my case. There's talk about a
JB>  conduction test, but even a CAT scan will miss a nerve.


          I suspect we're in much the same position.  The absence of
objective scientific measurements does make the task more difficult
sometimes, but I can relate to what the neurophysiotherapist has been doing
because it's similar to what I did in Learning Assistance.  When one
particular kid saw the word "hen" in a book and said
"chicken", for example, I didn't need a CAT scan to tell me he
was thinking in Chinese!  There are ways to figure out how a person's brain
is responding without extensive medical testing.  And while they may seem
like black arts, they may yield more practical information in the long
run....  :-)



AH>  And now you'll probably find little old ladies taking
AH>  an interest in you who hadn't noticed you before...
AH>  that's what I found when I was using a cane for awhile.
AH>  Older men would stop me on the street to ask for directions
AH>  & whatnot.  I found it amusing, but rather flattering...

JB>  Ardith???

JB>  They're just smart enough to know you know the shortcuts. 


          Phooey!  I was hoping they'd noticed other attributes too....  ;-)))




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+