An artists depiction of what arthritis should look like the way it feels.

After my accident and my survival, my sister, her friend and others purchased a Caprice. I credit my Caprice, air bags, break away steering wheel, defensive driving and luck for my survival.  I did suffer major injuries, but I did survive.  Remember to wear safety belts, have a vehicle with air bags and break away steering wheel.  While I did have lot of injuries, including hand injuries from bracing on the steering wheel, it could have been a lot worse.  When my daughter's started driving I became very conscious of the importance of  being the role model for them.  I always wore/wear safety belts whenever in the car.  #wear safety belts ​they save lives!

Figure 1 Newspaper article announcing my appointment to Wingert’s Pharmacy
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I finally realized I may never be able to be the Department Head of “my pharmacy” again. (At 52, I was hired to start a pharmacy in a grocery store and it quickly became my dream job, working for some of the best people ever, in a small town that quickly befriended me and won my heart.)
When my husband asked me to marry him, we had a long talk about children, raising them, religion and our professions. I had PharmD. Degree, before they were common – only 300 in the Nation and only a few women, and he was in college to become a physician. We both wanted to be active in our professions, but we both wanted children and I agreed to not work full time until they were out of college. Jack, my husband worked full time, and I did work part time, two days a week, to keep up to date with pharmacy. I was active in my profession, though part time, I did end up getting awards for my work with public relations and poison prevention including listed in Pharmacy Hall of Fame and becoming a Fellow, the highest award professionals can give to another professional. This was my time to give back to my profession. I was very excited to be offered this position and loved working there.
Before I interviewed for the position, I went into the store and talked to several employees asking them how they liked working there. All said that Mr. Wingert was a great boss and they loved working there.
I took the position.
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Figure 2 Why I did not make it to work that day
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My boss, Mr. Wingert, came to my home to see how I was doing, and to bring me a turkey for Christmas. He told me that he to hire a replacement pharmacist. As a result of my severe injuries and disability following my car accident on my way to work, my boss had He had been told that I would never be able to come back to work. (The doctors did not tell me that until much later, as they wanted my desire to work, to give me the best chance of being able to walk again, though they always added, you never know...)
My boss told me that he was worried that “if the store caught fire, I would not be able to get out of the store in time.”
I went from my job filling prescriptions and counseling people on medications - prescription and non and medical devices, to getting prescriptions filled for me, doing physical therapy, undergoing multiple surgeries, multiple physician office appointments, using many different medical devices and adapting to life in a wheelchair.
Not my favorite Christmas ever.
At my worst, I was still unable to walk, but I could transfer from wheelchair to commode, with difficulty, but I could, my hands and thumbs hurt whether I used them or not and I could not even make it upstairs to go to bed with my husband. If it were not for my fantastic loving and caring family, including our grown and married daughters, their husbands, and sometimes tough love, I would not have been happy to have survived.
Two years later the foot was “healed” and it only took - 3 surgeries including foot fusion using part of my hip bone, multiple orthotics and multiple physical therapy sessions. I was told that was “all that could be done for my foot”. I have constant pain, limited motion of my foot and am unable to move my ankle side to side so if I lose my balance, I fall. But I have a foot. It does not work well, but it is attached. I can put some pressure on my fused foot, so I had hope that someday I could walk. I was now strong enough to transfer from wheelchair to commode, but not to walk, for any distance, yet.
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My boss, Mr. Wingert, came to my home to see how I was doing, and to bring me a turkey for Christmas. He told me that he to hire a replacement pharmacist. As a result of my severe injuries and disability following my car accident on my way to work, my boss had He had been told that I would never be able to come back to work. (The doctors did not tell me that until much later, as they wanted my desire to work, to give me the best chance of being able to walk again, though they always added, you never know...)
My boss told me that he was worried that “if the store caught fire, I would not be able to get out of the store in time.”
I went from my job filling prescriptions and counseling people on medications - prescription and non and medical devices, to getting prescriptions filled for me, doing physical therapy, undergoing multiple surgeries, multiple physician office appointments, using many different medical devices and adapting to life in a wheelchair.
Not my favorite Christmas ever.
At my worst, I was still unable to walk, but I could transfer from wheelchair to commode, with difficulty, but I could, my hands and thumbs hurt whether I used them or not and I could not even make it upstairs to go to bed with my husband. If it were not for my fantastic loving and caring family, including our grown and married daughters, their husbands, and sometimes tough love, I would not have been happy to have survived.
Two years later the foot was “healed” and it only took - 3 surgeries including foot fusion using part of my hip bone, multiple orthotics and multiple physical therapy sessions. I was told that was “all that could be done for my foot”. I have constant pain, limited motion of my foot and am unable to move my ankle side to side so if I lose my balance, I fall. But I have a foot. It does not work well, but it is attached. I can put some pressure on my fused foot, so I had hope that someday I could walk. I was now strong enough to transfer from wheelchair to commode, but not to walk, for any distance, yet.
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Fig 3 my foot after casting both with and without anesthesia

​fig 4 what it took to make my foot stable which included large bolts, biggest staples I ever saw and some of my hip bone.

With my foot as good as it was going to get, I worked on building up arm muscles to use wheelchair. Hubby even built a large deck with square walking or wheelchair path so I could get outside and increase my endurance. It took a while, but gradually I was able to get up the ramp and go around the path.
This meant I could take the next step, for real – to fix my knees. Knees are another story. Apparently I am not the only person with issues with them.
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Fig 5 and 6 Cartoons showing that I am not the only person with knee issues.

Figure 7  My knees were crushed by firewall and pinned so bad I could not move them.

​Just like pro athletes, I trained my muscles by doing, doing, doing and more doing. There is a quick short cut to muscle activity that by passes the brain, but it is only learned by constant repetition by triggering muscle memory. The closest example I can think of is when you put your hand on a hot burner, you instinctively remove it. This action is a reflex in the spinal cord and requires less time than if that same nerve “signal” had to go to the brain to indicate your hand is on a hot burner, think of how to react, and send the signal back to the hand muscles to remove your hand.
Pro athletes use repetition to trigger the shortest circuit, the one in the muscles themselves, for actions related to survival. This survival instinct includes the ability to walk or run and is only triggered by constant repetition. When you are trying to relearn to walk it is fun to think that you are just doing what pro athletes do. My payment though is mobility, not millions of dollars, but when you cannot walk, being able to walk is payment enough.
It took more than just reinstating muscle memory to walk. But training my muscles to walk was the first step. I needed, and still use braces, to support and hold my leg muscles in correct positions, though they gradually got smaller as I grew stronger and now only use them intermittently.
I do walk now, albeit short distances, with a cane and I wear orthotics, but I CAN WALK.
Then of course, I reinjured my knee when I fell in the basement of my home. I was continuing my PT at home to build up stamina to walk. Not only did I fall, but my brace got caught under my treadmill. Thoughts of that commercial, “Help I have fallen and can’t get up” kept ringing in my head. I could not get up and just started laughing, then praying, that my hubby came home soon. That basement floor is cold! Luckily hubby came home from work shortly afterwards and helped me to free my braced leg. We both laughed. It is more funny now than it was at the time.
I was back in the wheelchair after this re-injury – unable to walk again. I fell quite a lot in the beginning, but now I am more vigilant watching for stones, pencils or uneven ground when I walk so rarely fall anymore.
I asked to go to PT again and this time I was able to go to one in Saginaw. Mel Svorinik, my physical therapist, did a maneuver on me that allowed me to walk without knee pain for almost an hour!
I am a home sewer, pilot and farrier, so I cut up old braces, re-bent carpal tunnel stays and WALKED into my next PT session! Mel told me “I am good, but not that good. What did you do?” I showed him the retrainer I cobbled together. He told me to patent it. I did. Now if only I had kept my mouth shut…..
But that is step three…
Mobility is critical to quality of life in modern America. While I still had my knees, they were injured and did not work well. Without functioning legs, a wheelchair was my ticket to mobility and improved quality of life. In my efforts to walk again, I asked to go to PT and for an orthotic. I had no proprioception in the right foot. I could feel pin prick, but when I stood up, I had no idea where the foot was unless I looked at it.
I drove 1.5 hours each way to Lansing, MI where I used state of the art new un-weighted walking on a treadmill 2 – 3 times a week. There I learned to walk by training my brain to “see” where my foot was without looking at it and to re-train my knee muscles, restoring normal muscle memory. I remember asking the therapist if I could wear the vest and weigh myself suspended, she gave me a resounding “NO”… Too bad, it is the quickest way I know to lose weight without chopping off something. My leg and foot muscles were weak from being in wheelchair so long and the multiple procedures I endured. I wore orthotics, some from hip to foot, some built into my shoes but they all helped me to build strength and walk.
Before I got my first orthotic, the one on the left, I asked the orthotist what were my chances to walk again. He said very small. I asked him, but in your experience, how many have been able to walk – He said I would be the first.
Sometimes it is not bad to be the first.
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Figure 8 The many braces that I used to be able to walk.  As I got better, they got smaller.

st like pro athletes, I trained my muscles by doing, doing, doing and more doing. There is a quick short cut to muscle activity that by passes the brain, but it is only learned by constant repetition by triggering muscle memory. The closest example I can think of is when you put your hand on a hot burner, you instinctively remove it. This action is a reflex in the spinal cord and requires less time than if that same nerve “signal” had to go to the brain to indicate your hand is on a hot burner, think of how to react, and send the signal back to the hand muscles to remove your hand.
Pro athletes use repetition to trigger the shortest circuit, the one in the muscles themselves, for actions related to survival. This survival instinct includes the ability to walk or run and is only triggered by constant repetition. When you are trying to relearn to walk it is fun to think that you are just doing what pro athletes do. My payment though is mobility, not millions of dollars, but when you cannot walk, being able to walk is payment enough.
​
It took more than just reinstating muscle memory to walk. But training my muscles to walk was the first step. I needed, and still use braces, to support and hold my leg muscles in correct positions, though they gradually got smaller as I grew stronger and now only use them intermittently.
I do walk now, albeit short distances, with a cane and I wear orthotics, but I CAN WALK.
Then of course, I reinjured my knee when I fell in the basement of my home. I was continuing my PT at home to build up stamina to walk. Not only did I fall, but my brace got caught under my treadmill. Thoughts of that commercial, “Help I have fallen and can’t get up” kept ringing in my head. I could not get up and just started laughing, then praying, that my hubby came home soon. That basement floor is cold! Luckily hubby came home from work shortly afterwards and helped me to free my braced leg. We both laughed. It is more funny now than it was at the time.

I was back in the wheelchair after this re-injury – unable to walk again. I fell quite a lot in the beginning, but now I am more vigilant watching for stones, pencils or uneven ground when I walk so rarely fall anymore.
I asked to go to PT again and this time I was able to go to one in Saginaw. Mel Svorinik, my physical therapist, did a maneuver on me that allowed me to walk without knee pain for almost an hour!

​I am a home sewer, pilot and farrier, so I cut up old braces, re-bent carpal tunnel stays and WALKED into my next PT session! Mel told me “I am good, but not that good. What did you do?” I showed him the retrainer I cobbled together. He told me to patent it.  

​​Now if only I had kept my mouth shut…..
But that is step three…

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Fig 1 My car after being hit head on a country road. Luckily it was a big car. Because of my Caprice, I survived.
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One of the paramedics came to where my window was and asked if he could go to the guy lying in the road as he had serious injuries and they were worried he would be run over. It was a two lane country road, a major thoroughfare. I told him to go to him as I was alright. I just couldn’t move either my arms or legs.
Another medic came to me and said they called for the Jaws of Life. They were needed to extricate me. While I appreciate what the Jaws of Life did, the noise was horrible. My window was open so the lower Jaw went there and the upper Jaw on the roof. The two jaws clamp down until they crush whatever is between and open the door so I could be pulled out of my seat. You can see the indent on the roof in the picture above. It is really scary to hear the metal and what is left of the glass slowly be crushed and cut to release the door. A paramedic sat close to me and covered both of us with tarp so that any glass or metal fragments would not hit us directly. I told him that there was no reason to risk his life and that I was ok, but he said “it’s my job and I am not leaving until you do.” He stayed.
I then asked him to call my work to tell them I was going to be late and to call my husband. He said he would, but I do not think you will make it to work today…..
Little did I know that I was never able to go back to my dream job, or to go to that party.
As you would guess, I was rushed to an emergency room where my injuries were assessed. My favorite blouse, coat and pants were cut off. I was as upset as I was dressed up to a party after work. Then the doctor said he would have to cut off my new shoes. I was furious. I already lost all my clothes, now my shoes too! He said that since I had shoe laces, tennis shoes as I am a pharmacist and we stand on our feet all day, he could just cut the shoe laces and not the shoe itself. It was little compensation. But then, shoes are more expensive than blouses.
In the emergency room, on a gurney, I knew I was in trouble when the top half of my foot fell down. The shoe was holding my foot together. My foot looked like an upside down letter L! This is not what you want to see when it is YOUR foot. The doctor told me he did not think he could get my foot back into my shoe. I told him “then you should not have taken it off”. He started to explain how sorry he was and that he had to see the extent of my injuries. I told him I was just teasing him. He said I reminded him of Dr. Patch Adams. It was good I could laugh about it. I missed his/this ominous prediction.
Perhaps I just did not want to hear it.
Lucky for me he was an orthopedic specialist. He explained that when a person stands on the breaks with all their might, which I did as I saw the headlights coming into my lane. I steered toward the side of the road, stood on the brake and braced the steering wheel as hard as I could. He said “the severity of your injuries depends upon whether you’re a woman or a man. While both suffer severe injuries, men break their leg which tends to heal quicker and women their foot.” It has something due to angle of the foot on the brakes. (It seems to me it that it is the person’s leg length, rather than their sex, that is the deciding factor.)
Anyway, this was a small town emergency room and he told me that my injuries were such that I needed to go to a bigger hospital….
He said my injuries were impressive, not what you want to hear if you are the patient.
I asked when I could return to work. He said “ask the next doctor”.
I did go to a bigger city, but after casting, then recasting under anesthesia, my orthopedic doctor consulted with other local orthopedic physicians there, and told me that my injuries were impressive. That since these procedures did not result in the fractures healing correctly; I needed to see an orthopedic physician that specializes in feet. An orthopedic physician that only treats feet.
I asked when I could go back to work. He said ask the foot specialist. Ugh Oh…
The foot specialist confirmed that my injuries were impressive and that I needed a foot fusion. I asked when I could go back to work. He asked what I did. He said let’s see if you can walk first.
I mean I know that I was in a wheelchair, but what do you mean see if I can walk first? He is a foot specialist and they can do anything with surgery, right? He said take it one step at a time. “Let’s see how you do after the foot fusion”. I told him I could not even take a step right now. I am in a wheelchair and it is all I could do to just transfer from wheelchair to a commode. What do you mean see how I do?
It began to set in. Now instead of when can I go back to work, when can I walk? At that point - all I wanted to do was to walk to take that first step. Going to work would have to wait.
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Fig 2 my right foot after fusion. Those bolts are 4 inches long – I could not believe they fit in my heel. It had to be fused to many smaller bones in the foot that were also fractured, so that my foot would look like a foot and hopefully work like a foot.
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After many surgeries to right foot, and hands, I was still told I still may never walk again. I forgot to mention that my left hand went through the driver’s side glass, cutting my left forearm, and imbedding glass. Glass fragments were spitting out on their own for months. I was told that since glass is not metal and clear, if they opened up my hand, it would cause more damage and that as long as the shards were working their way out, it was the better option. Also my thumbs were jammed against the steering wheel causing severe pain and worse pain worse pain when moving them. Luckily my hand surgeon knew what caused this and did surgery on both thumbs releasing the tendon. It meant that I lost some range of motion, but could use my hands, thumbs actually, with much less pain. When you cannot walk or use your legs, the best option for mobility is to use your hands. I had double whammy when I could not use them without excruciating pain. It is amazing how just a little thing can cause such severe consequences and life changes.
For 10 days after the accident I could barely transfer from wheel chair to commode, not go to my bed upstairs or use my hands. I wondered what I did so bad to survive. Wrong thinking. Life happens, it is what you do afterwa​rds that determines who you are and what you can accomplish, or is it the other way around. Thankfully, my daughter with MS set me straight whenever I wanted to give up I would call her. At 19 she had 3 severe attacks the summer after one year at University of Michigan. These attacks were so severe her physician said she may not survive this summer. She not only did, she finished college and graduated from U of M. She told me whatever you do, do your best and “forget the rest, never quit”.
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Fig 3 Later, I met Dana Bowman, a Golden Night with US Army, who was double amputee from skydiving accident. He reiterated that statement. His autographed picture is by my computer. “It is not the disability, it is the ability. Alice, Never Quit”
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One step at a time…
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