KosAbility is a community diary series posted at 5 PM ET every Sunday and Wednesday by volunteer diarists. This is a gathering place for people who are living with disabilities, who love someone with a disability, or who want to know more about the issues surrounding this topic. There are two parts to each diary. First, a volunteer diarist will offer their specific knowledge and insight about a topic they know intimately. Then, readers are invited to comment on what they've read and/or ask general questions about disabilities share something they've learned, tell bad jokes, post photos, or rage about the unfairness of their situation. Our only rule is to be kind; trolls will be spayed or neutered.
I really don't tend to sleep well.
I wake up a few hours before my alarm, look at my phone, check my email, reach down and scritch Pùka's ears, try to get comfy again, and attempt to doze. Sometimes it works. Sometimes I just have nightmares.
My body needs time to get used to the idea of moving, anyway, so it's probably a self-defense mechanism, even though I build that into my 'buffer' time to get up.
My alarm goes off, and Pùka (a 7-pound red min-pin) gives a little bark and stands up against the bed. He started doing this after I got into a car accident back in October 2010 and incurred a low-grade traumatic brain injury (TBI). He figured out before I did that my hearing was affected.
Now, I can usually hear my alarm and the door, but why extinguish a good alert? Besides, there are worse things to start off a day with his adorable little face.
He curls back into his bed while I start my stretches. Fifteen minutes minimum, better if I go a full thirty. I concentrate on the legs, back, torso, neck. Arms get stretched while I pull my knees to my chest, so no worries there. This also helps seat my hips into their sockets--the joints are shallow. My landlady thinks I'm crazy for sleeping under a featherbed in spring, but there's no way I'd be able to move in the morning otherwise. Yes, the stretches happen under the featherbed. :)
Now I can stand without falling over. Yay fibromyalgia! I take my morning meds (I have to be sure to take them at least 30 minutes before breakfast to give the Synthroid time to absorb), and call Pùka over to 'get dressed'. He's a bit disappointed that this only means his leash, and not his full kit, but I carry him out past our landlady's food-guarding fox terrier and we shiver our way out to the way back of the back yard.
Pùka does his business, I clean up after him, bring him back to his room and take my (very hot) shower.
Hot showers are part of my prescription. Two hot showers of at least 15 minutes a day, to help keep the muscles relaxed. I only get one daily while I live here, though. This will become a problem. The more tense I become, the more a feed-back loop occurs. Soon costocondritis may set in again--where the connective tissue in the ribcage causes spasms and that makes breathing painful.)
I feed Pùka his breakfast, and eat if I am able to. And now I'm able to tell him to 'get dressed' in the way that makes him happy! We get out his harness, and he pushes his head through, and stands patiently while I thread the straps and buckle them. He then gets to dance while I get his service dog vest, which he also helps put on. You have never seen a prouder little dog than Pùka in full gear! We head off to the store.
I have severe PTSD, and pretty bad social anxiety as a result. Also, I cannot distinguish what and where things are around me by sound anymore as a result of the TBI. Pùka keeps track of where things are, keeps me calm, and can even lead me out of a big box store, if needed. He has ridden with me in ambulances, stayed with me during all sorts of medical procedures (except CT scans, a nurse held him outside the room for that), and according to one of my doctors brought the length of one part of my yearly exam down from 45 minutes to 20 minutes. Pùka is priceless.
Back to the store. I tend to carry Pùka, since he is small, and he can alert me better from up close. Also, people are less offended by a small dog in arms than one trotting on the ground, and he is less likely to get hurt. People have noted that he looks like he's a bobble-head, the way he's constantly looking around, but he's doing his job. :) If I start to get nervous, he licks my arm. If I start to panic, he licks my face. These are cues to me to stop, breathe, focus. If I can't, he will squirm down and I will follow him out. It has only gotten that bad twice.
Sometimes people will complain about Pùka being in a store. If they complain directly to me I will tell them only that Pùka is a service dog and has every right to be there, and I will walk away from them. Sometimes they complain to a manager, who then comes to me. I keep Pùka's paperwork on my iPhone in my Dropbox so that I don't have to worry about forgetting it, losing it, or it getting taken away, ripped, tattered, or damaged. I can simply pull up my doctor's letter, or the ADA's Business FAQ, or the state's specific law regarding service animals, or whatever else I need. No, I should not have to do this, but it is quite handy when you're made to anyway. Having social anxiety means taking the path of least resistance when you don't have the energy to fight.
I have fought on occasion, like in a Navy commissary when they said that PTSD dogs did not count as service animals (when the Army post 10 miles up the road was, at that moment, training PTSD dogs for active duty service members!), or when a SSG tried to bar Pùka and I from visiting Cailín Ard when she was in a military psych unit (the SSG's supervisor heard him, stopped him, and had him apologize), but sometimes... needs can as needs must.
My Dropbox also has a list of all my medications and dosages. My iPhone lock screen has a list of my conditions, allergies, medications, and emergency contact info--also known as an ICE screen (In Case of Emergency).
Pùka is adept at public transport, having gone all over Oahu with me on TheBus (in fact, my bus pass has a 'service animal' marker on it), and takes planes and airports in stride, much better than I do. I sit on a plane jittering, worried...he drapes himself over my lap, wondering what the difference is between the plane and TheBus, and why I'm so damned nervous! Cars are fun, and he knows that he must either sit at my feet or in the back, well away from nasty airbags. When I get a car of my own, I'll have to get him a car seat. That will be a new experience!
I'm worried about finding work. It was hard before, when I was 'just' disabled with fibromyalgia and PTSD (they can't see the hypothyroid disorder anymore). Now I have a service animal, and I can't function without him with my new hearing issues. I'm very good at the things I do, and in fact I have a history with the big company in the area that's hiring right now--I left on good terms when they were laying off several years ago. But will they let me back? Pùka is well-behaved and just needs his bed and will curl up for hours--he's a couch potato, happy to just be my ears if that's all I need--in fact, I'll need more movement than he will! But I know this company has strict rules that will keep my need for getting up for 10 minutes every hour met. Other companies, however, are less forgiving.
I left my last job under a bit of a cloud, because my caregiving of Cailín Ard was starting to get in the way of work. I sure miss my dear girl Cailin, she's trying to do it on her own now and I too am trying to make it on my own with the help of my wonderful little Puka. Wish me luck!