Preparing for the Move

One good thing about the anesthesia was that it made Ben rather groggy for a few days. This meant that he slept through most of the worst part of his recovery. So once again the anticipation was much worse than the reality. We did have a few disputes about “eye-rubbing”, but were always able to come up with a quick distraction.

The next few weeks were spent preparing for the move to Charleston. I had to go almost immediately to get started with my new job. Dennis stayed behind to prepare the house for sale. This was a particularly difficult task because we had bought the house five years earlier as a “fixer-upper”. While we had put a great deal of work in the outside we had done nothing inside; not even paint. Dennis was tasked with painting the entire house. I was unable to take Ben with me because I was staying in a hotel until the company could make arrangements for temporary housing for our family. So Dennis was very busy working his last two weeks, painting, and caring for Ben. As you might imagine life was quite stressful for us during this period.

I was able to come home for a couple of days during this time to be present for our last round of doctors’ appointments. This was to collect our already massive file of records as well as get the ABR results and additional recommendations from the “professionals”. The ABR confirmed Ben’s hearing impairment and it was recommended that we get a hearing aid consult as soon as we were settled in Charleston….great. In addition, the physical therapist we had been working with also gave us a troubling recommendation

. She felt that since Ben would be moving into a more educational setting that we should go ahead and buy a wheelchair for him. I still have the quote for a $3,500 Zippie Wheelchair with a candy red frame. The truth is, until that moment, it never occurred to me that Ben might never walk. She was very honest in her assessment of Ben. She just could not see how he would ever build the trunk strength to support the process of walking. Dennis and I both could not bring ourselves to agree with her. Besides, in 1991, $3,500 to us might as well had been one million dollars, and our insurance would not cover most of the cost. Instead, we decided to go with our “gut” feeling; that Ben would one day walk, and we purchased a Maclaren Major Special Needs Stroller which was one of the smartest purchases we’ve ever made and it was one tenth the cost of the wheelchair. The Maclaren Major Special Needs Stroller is an oversized stroller that provides side support, an abduction block, and an adjustable footrest. The best part is; it accommodates children up to 140 pounds. Because of Ben’s slight build, we are still able to use the stroller if we are someplace we know we will be doing a lot of walking. Obviously, this stroller is pretty substantial to have held up under twenty years of use.

My first few weeks in Charleston were very lonely. Looking back, it would have been a great opportunity to be a tourist (something we never really did while living there). However, I did not take advantage of that time because I was missing my guys way too much.