Act Two, Part One

The intermission is over. My blogging streak is officially over, too, and I don’t feel a smidge bad about it. The show is lasting longer than anticipated, and I couldn’t maintain a once-a-day pace forever. In Act Two of this saga, I’ll lower my self-expectations, just as I had to lower my expectations of the people in whose hands my mobility lies.

I realize that I’ve left the current state of my chair—and thus my general well-being, which is intrinsically linked to it—somewhat vague up to now. I wish this were due to an attempt to build suspense or something, but that would imply that my approach is more sophisticated and cunning than “delude myself into believing that more than a handful of people read what I word-vomit onto the screen.” Nope: the paucity of info I shared in my previous few posts was a reflection of a) the paucity of info I had, and b) the paucity of my will to think about it more than I was forced to. Trust me when I say that emotionally and practically dealing with the (near-) demise of my wheelchair has occupied the majority of my headspace and required an infuriating amount of time and energy.

As I wrote here, the death knell was sounded last Thursday. On Friday, a technician came to evaluate the chair and, performing a sort of mobility-device autopsy, provided a preliminary diagnosis: motor failure. Of both motors, no less. As a worst-case-scenario thinker, I’d steeled myself for devastating news, but this was somehow worse than the horrible scenario my brain had come up with. When I asked him what the next steps were—and I’ll add that I had to ask; he’d started packing up to go without telling me a thing—he said that I’d hear from the client-care team with next steps and a quote this week. I took a beat to calm down and gather myself before sputtering a response. I’d assumed that I’d have a working chair for the weekend, I’d only had one day of (partial) freedom post-snowstorm, and power chair = independence. Understandably, then, I was stunned.

“What do I do in the meantime?” I inquired. His reply was, essentially, “not my problem” (if I’m paraphrasing, it’s only slightly). This was true, I suppose, in that he’s a technician, had completed the job he’d been dispatched to do, and could leave what was definitely my problem at the office before signing off for the weekend. It nonetheless left a horrible taste in my mouth. I can’t help but think that if someone contacted the doctor complaining of a foot injury that wasn’t life-threatening but made it impossible for them to walk, they wouldn’t be told to “just deal with it” with no set of crutches and the expectation that they’d be totally cool with being stranded at home for days on end. An imperfect analogy, but there you go.

I did what I could to settle into the reality I’d been handed and coax myself into an attitude adjustment. I truly did. I knew I’d be out with my husband the whole next day. I had plans on Sunday, too, so I’d be distracted. Maybe this is a good thing, I reasoned in an attempt to avert the panic attack hurtling toward me. Now I won’t feel obliged to make up for lost time by being out in my wheelchair racking up kilometres in the arctic cold! Both were accurate statements that helped for thirty seconds at most. When it comes down to it, it’s not about whether it would be wise to or whether I want to leave my building; it’s about whether or not I have the option. Adding to my anxiety was the financial piece of it: my cursory research indicated that the motors’ warranty had likely expired, and my back-of-the-Salvation-Army-receipt calculations suggested that between parts and labour, this might cost upward of $4,000. I’m fortunate to have extended health coverage through my husband’s employer, but there were no guarantees that the expense would be approved. Deep breaths.

While my self-talk and diaphragm expansions did little, the thought that it wouldn’t be long before I’d be given some clarity was more effective in soothing my nerves. Monday morning would arrive before I knew it.

Monday indeed arrived in short-ish order. I woke up feeling cautiously optimistic and called the mobility company a minute after their lines opened. That’s self-control for you. The first person I spoke to was super friendly and helpful and expressed genuine concern that I didn’t have a functioning chair. In other words, he understood and acknowledged that this was no small deal for me. Some other person with key information wouldn’t be in for another few hours, he said, but he’d flag this for him so that he could handle it right away. And had I reached out to the sales rep I’d worked with when purchasing the chair? Having not received a single reply to the many emails I’d sent her about my recent battery issues, I hadn’t bothered. He gave me the number for her assistant, and I left her a message expecting nothing to come of it. (I was right.)

In the ultimate act of restraint, I didn’t try again until mid-afternoon. I spoke to someone else this time and was once more assured that I would hear back soon. This pattern repeated itself: I waited what seemed an appropriate interval; I was told that the person I needed to speak to was on lunch (for three hours?) but that I would be contacted ASAP, and certainly by the end of the business day; and I stewed in anxiety until deciding that it was OK to follow up. My last call offered hope. The customer-care representative told me that he was actively working on my file, at that very minute, and he would get back to me with a concrete plan the next day, after the mystery man on eternal lunch break started his shift. Was this progress?

Yesterday morning, my phone rang around 10:30. It was my mobility angel, and he brought a welcome development: my chair would be picked up that same afternoon and brought to the shop, and an appointment was made for it to be worked on today. From 10:00 until 12:00, to be precise.

What a cliffhanger! Maybe I am becoming a strategic blogger. Or maybe it’s time for dinner; either way, you’ll have to wait.