"THE TRUTH IS …" PART ONE, THE FIRST PART.
by
Dennis J. Wall
The truth is that I was at a dead end. I had reached the end of my rope. I had run out of ways that I could take care of this alone. All those things.
You have to understand that I have spent a lifetime taking care of things, most of the time alone. "If I don't do it, it doesn't get done." I bought a coffee cup with that saying on it. It fit me to a "t".
This doesn't mean that I have not tried to work with other people. On the contrary, I have. My greatest success rate in accomplishing anything in life, however, has almost always been to get it done myself, and with no excuses, thank you very much.
Oh, this is not the reflection of a narcissist for gosh sake. I have failed. Many times. But I have succeeded many more times. And either way, failure or success, I have generally had myself to see as the cause whenever human actions were the likely cause.
Which brings me to the last week of December, 2022. Seventeen years ago I got cancer. At the same time, my office lease was up at a building where I had my office for sixteen years, as it turned out. I moved to a home office. It is a converted shed that was on my property already; my wife oversaw the renovation. I was too sick to contribute much time or effort, or I would have helped her. As it was, she oversaw the renovation of a building that did not even leak for the better part of the next seventeen years.
Until Hurricane Ian came on September 28, 2022, that is. Then The Shop (as I called it, and call it still) leaked. Water ran across the floor. Long story short, I cleaned up the mess. It was then I realized that I had to get rid of some things as I began plans to reorganize The Shop.
The truth is that long before Ian arrived, I had often thought about reorganizing things. The truth is that I was very comfortable turning over and going back to sleep, so to speak. No sooner did I have those thoughts about reorganizing The Shop and moving things around and getting rid of things, then I turned my thoughts to other things that I found much more pleasant to ponder.
One of the bigger obstacles, if not the biggest obstacle, was a very large photocopier. It had a large paper feeder and what I recently found out is called a "finisher" by manufacturers but which we in my office called a collator. The feeder and the finisher were on wheels, one 70 pounds and the other 50 pounds according to the manufacturer's specs. I could get them out to the curb for a special pickup by Seminole County garbage and waste collection.
The truth is, the copier itself was a different story. Although it sat on a cabinet that has wheels, the copier weighs 220 pounds. At one point, I could have picked it up by myself (or at least I think so), but not now. The stipulation by the Seminole County garbage and waste collection is that two people have to be able to pick the object up.
My neighbor must have heard the clatter as I first wheeled out the feeder, and then the finisher for pickup. She came across our respective yards and asked if I needed help. I said "no" as to lifting the copier, and asked for her ideas, because I would feel really bad if she hurt herself, and told her so. She asked if she could see the copier.
In The Shop, I showed her the four handles that I had discovered were built in to the copier. I had spent hours trying to figure out why there were four little black rubber tips, two each on opposing sides of the machine. The rubber tips were attached to levers that pulled straight out. Once I eliminated the possibility that these levers had anything to do with screwing the machine into the cabinet it sat on, I recognized them as handles. The copier was obviously designed from the beginning for two people to lift. But I had my doubts that I was any longer in a position to lift something that weighs 220 pounds, while I did not have any doubt that I did not want my neighbor to hurt herself trying. (Even though she is stronger than I am, I did not want anyone to hurt themselves trying to lift the thing.)
She suggested we try to lift it, just to see if we could, using the handles. We could. We proved my theory that these were handles we were using, and that the copier lifted straight up and off the cabinet (which I wanted to keep if I could).
We put the copier straight back down on the cabinet. That done, my neighbor said that she has a dolly on four wheels that, if we lifted the copier onto it, I could keep the cabinet and we could wheel the whole assembly down to the curb for pickup, so long as the garbage people did not take the dolly.
That gave me an idea. With her help, we could wheel the copier down to the curb sitting on the cabinet which it sat on already. The cabinet has wheels, after all. Once at the curb, we would leave it to the two garbage people to lift the copier. We would ask them to leave the cabinet. She agreed.
And that is what we did. The truth is, we did it together.
Now that may seem like a natural place to end this story, but the truth is that I have another end in mind. Long before the copier reached the curb, I was at a loss as to how to get it there, and even whether it would be worthwhile to get it there if, once it was there, two people could not lift it after all such as if it was still attached to the cabinet somehow.
To return to the beginning of this story here at the end, I was at the end of my rope. I had hit a wall (no pun intended) as far as my own abilities would take me solo. It was then that, through no fault of my own and with me not even suspecting that it was about to happen, my neighbor appeared. She was the previously unknown answer to my prayer that somehow, I could get this copier down to the street where it could be hauled away.
The truth is, the end of this story is not complicated. To many people, including some people who share our social circles, the end will even seem trite. But the truth is that we are simply not in control of everything. We will, all of us, reach the end of our rope, run into a wall, run out of ways to do things strictly by ourselves alone. All those things.
So we perhaps we had better realize that. For people like me, that involves shedding years of thinking otherwise. My experience in the last week of December, 2022 that I have described in this true story is not the only opportunity I have had for this kind of enlightenment. But it is the most recent and it is one of the more unexpected opportunities I have ever had to realize that Sinn Fein, "Ourselves Alone," is best left as the name of a political party in Ireland. A good, secular way to express the thought as a behavioral idea or way of life, was given to us by The Beatles back in the day: "I get by with a little help from my friends."
Another way of expressing the lesson I took away from my experience with a copier and a neighbor in the last week of the year, is the same sort of story that Linus told Charlie Brown. "And that's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown."
Please read the disclaimer. ©2023 Dennis J. Wall. All rights reserved.
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POWERCHAIRS, MEDICARE, AND YOU.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has published a proposed decision to expand Medicare. They want to cover power seat elevation equipment in Powerchairs (Power Wheelchairs) for the wheelchair users that need it the most. Medicare calls this group, Group 3, and they are looking for your Comments on their proposed decision -- and also on whether to expand Medicare to provide the same benefit to wheelchair users who are a little better off, which CMS calls Group 2. (I know, the acronym should be CMMS rather than CMS, but you and I didn't invent it, so there you are.)
CMS's deadline for your Comments on these things is St. Patrick's Day, 2023, which as you know is tomorrow!
This being the federal government and Congress being what it was (and is), the Medicare people have to meet standards before they can expand Medicare coverage. The overarching standards are that the extended coverage is reasonable and necessary. First and foremost, that is what CMS is asking your Comments to address.
For this particular extension of Medicare to cover power seat elevation equipment, CMS is proposing to extend coverage when both of two things exist: (1) wheelchair transfers do damage to the wheelchair user's body (arms, shoulders) when she transfers from the wheelchair to anyplace else at home, and (2) the reasonable necessity if you will to elevate the chair is established in a specialty evaluation by a medical specialist trained in wheelchair uses especially in the home such as a Physical Therapist or an Occupational Therapist.
Finally, they are looking for Comments from anyone affected by the ability of wheelchair users to raise their powerchair seats, including family members, physicians, therapists, the users themselves, and more. It's simple and easy to leave your Comment: Just write about "reasonable and necessary" and be sure to address (1) and (2) that I have summarized above.
The CMS Press Release explaining its proposed decision is here, https://www.cms.gov/newsroom/press-releases/cms-proposes-benefit-expansion-mobility-devices-advancing-health-equity-people-disabilities.
The portal to enter and leave your Comment is here, https://www.cms.gov/medicare-coverage-database/view/nca.aspx?NCAId=309, just click the blue button that says Submit Public Comment.
Please read the disclaimer. ©2023 Dennis J. Wall. All rights reserved.
Posted by Dennis J. Wall on March 16, 2023 at 11:08 AM in Comments on proposed changes to regs and rules, Disabled and Disabilities | Permalink | Comments (0)