For Self and Country by Rick Eilert

Author:Rick Eilert [Eilert, Rick]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781612514512
Publisher: Naval Institute Press

10

IT TOOK A week to learn how to live with two long leg casts. But the biggest moment was when Chief introduced me to a wheelchair.

He placed the chair next to my rack, picked me up, and sat me in it. I hadn’t been up for three minutes when I blacked out. Chief picked me back up and laid me in bed. When I came to, Chief explained, “It’s been so long since you’ve sat up like this that your body has to get its equilibrium back. For the rest of the day I want you to keep getting into the chair and sitting there for an hour or so until you get used to it.” Chief picked me up again, sat me back in the chair, and left me there. Again I passed out. But I stayed in the chair. By the end of the day, I’d mastered getting out of my rack and into the contraption. The next day I passed out trays for the first time and lapped the ward a few times. It was a whole new life. I went to the other side of the ward thinking it would be different from my side, but it wasn’t. Everything was the same, except the patients faced east where I faced west. But the ability to venture out of the ward by elevator was a gas. The different views of the outside world with its cars and houses were fantastic. Finally I felt that I was really getting better.

As the days passed, the nurses tried to wean me off the pain shots that I had been on so long. Like many others I was addicted, but not in the same sense as street addicts. My reason for taking the drugs was for a real physical problem, not to ease the pain of a mental problem. There were times, however, when I asked for pain med though I wasn’t hurting physically, but mentally.

It wasn’t easy. When I had real pain, the pills that I was given just couldn’t compare to a shot to both ease the pain and make me relax. Sleeping was difficult. Especially now that I could dream. Slowly, slowly I did get off the shots, but it was a real bitch. Even though my wounds were healing, especially the smaller ones, the absence of pain medication made the thrice-daily dressing changes more difficult. It became necessary for me to put myself in a trancelike state. I’d concentrate on something or someone in the area, or I’d close my eyes and try to think the pain away. Neither method was all that good. But it beat the hell out of screaming.

Now that I’d joined the mobile population, I also had to compete in the ward wheelchair races. These races could be fun, but dangerous. If the chair was to flip or tip over, injuries could be aggravated. But it was an effective way to blow off steam. I had one of the old wooden wheelchairs. It was so big and bulky that once I got in front of anyone it was almost impossible to pass me.

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