It took a while to put together the pieces of information I gathered from various sources, but I now know more or less what happened to my mom two Sundays ago.

First the background 411:

A few years ago, my mom devised a system whereby she could still work as a street artist, despite her increasingly severe chronic pain and resulting disability: She assembled three carts that she could fill with her artwork, bought a scooter and attached a trailer hook on the back of it, then installed a ramp climbing up into the back of her massive RV.

Each day she worked, my mom loaded the carts with her art, attached the carts to the scooter, drove the scooter up the ramp, then climbed down and hopped (ok, hobbled) into the driver’s seat of the RV.

Mind you, the RV is a monster truck. In fact, after being hauled away by the city, following my mother’s accident, it’s been impounded for two weeks (to the tune of $2000 and counting) — not only becuase I can’t find the freakin’ keys (not helpful that my mom still doesn’t remember shit) but also because there’s no way in hell I’m attempting to take that gargantuan machine onto the freeway.

That’s with me 6 inches taller and 34 years younger than my mom. Oh yeah, and there are friends (hers & mine combined) few and far between who are willing to do it either.

Anyhow, my mom always mentioned being afraid of falling off the ramp, and apparently last Sunday it happened — she toppled five feet backwards, landing on her head and back. She suffered a concussion with severe hemmoraging in her brain; several fractures in her pelvis; a broken hip; several broken ribs; a broken tailbone; and fluid around her lungs.

The day after the accident, doctors performed brain surgery and inserted a chest tube for drainage. They also inserted, oh, about twelve other tubes all over my mom’s body, along with a neck brace. My mom was unconscious for the greater part of a week.

Last Monday, my mom was well enough to go in for surgery on her pelvis/hip/tailbone area. She was then released from the Intensive Care Unit (having been there for eight days) and now has just a few tubes left in her.

She’s remastered the art of eating, is still working on the drinking thang, can talk sense every now and then, babbles incoherently the rest of the time, and suffers from excruciating pain all over her body — leading to bouts of screaming bloody murder that you can hear down the hallway and around the corner.

She hasn’t been able to get out of bed for almost two full weeks, though she frequently turns to me and hollers, “Loolwa! Let’s get out of here! Come on, let’s go!” while grabbing the sides of the bed and attempting either to catapult herself out of it or steer the damn thing down the hallway and on to freedom.

She hasn’t tackled any nurses recently, greatly minimizing my entertainment pleasure, and instead has taken up antaoginizing them (and me) by refusing to take her meds — reminding us all that she’s 47, no wait, 57, no wait, 74 years old and therefore doesn’t have to do shit that we tell her to.

Today I received a CC of this email from Dennis, a street artist who worked side-by-side with my mom and sent this email to all the other street artists. It is a testimony to my mom’s inspirational ability to transcend chronic pain, limited mobility, and other obstacles — enabling her to seize each day with joy and a sense of adventure.

I find it difficult to describe how much I admire EJ. When I saw her at last Sunday’s lottery, she seemed even more frail than she had been the week before. This small, shrunken woman with a great heart and will to survive, walking delicately among us.

She has the courage and resourcefulness of a Mount Everest climber or an astronaut. To see her arrive at the plaza hunched down over the steering wheel of her large truck, and then to witness her laborious, highly organized routine of unloading the heavy scooter and trucks, was awesome. And just as a mountain climber’s ice axe might fail her at a critical moment, so EJ’s scooter was tragically her undoing.

Sometimes we reflexively look away from people with severe disabilities, with the subliminal thought, “That could be me.” I hope that we do not look away from EJ.

Before I unpack my toolbox for living with old age, chronic pain, and physical disability, I would like to put out there that I developed my pain late in life, and that I brought it on myself by the lifestyle choices that I made. I think it may make a large difference in how I relate to my pain, because I do not feel the anger that can accompany pain that was caused by negligence of another person or the feeling of “why me” that can accompany those struck down in their prime. I also think I was chemically disposed at birth to be a problem solver.

I share this so that I do not come off as thinking what others are going through is easy, that all people have to do is X, Y, and Z, or that I have all the answers if people would just do things my way.

My largest tool — the one that makes all the others possible — is my creativity, which is part of the package deal of my severe ADHD: When something happens to me, I tend to cut to the chase, pondering, “What can I do about it?” I also constantly notice little things around me, seeing them not as they are customarily used, but as they might be used to solve my problem. My mental picture of this is the chimp who makes a tool out of a stick.

I became a street artist  when I was 49 yrs old, 25 years ago.  Although I had some difficulty getting around, because I weighed 267 pounds, I did not have pain. I could handle my art stand without any trouble.  I had to take a lot of weight out of my Volkswagon bus in the morning and put it back in the evening. It worked great until I got ostestoarthitis in one knee.

Mini vans had just come out, and soon as I saw them, I bought one — because it was just right for what I had to do. Instead of lifting my stand out in pieces, I bought closet organizers with wheels.  Three of the middle-sized ones boasted just the amount of space that I was allowed to have by the rules of the street artist program.  It was actually amazing how much I could get into and onto those organizers.

I painted and attached felt squares all over the organizers and put lots of heavy ceramics in the drawers.  I used two boards side-by-side, to take the stands in and out.

Finally my pain progressed to the point where I could no longer deal with that system, and I cast around for some other solution. I wasn’t happy with any of the possible solutions, but I had to do something; so I settled on a larger van with a ramp that was not quite right.  I was on my way to the bank to get money for that van, when I turned at the wrong block and saw a school bus for sale.

I immediatly bought that bus, because it was perfect.  I used it happily for ten years, but then, because my pain and mobility were getting worse, I began to need help getting the stands in and out, even on that ramp.

Note from Loolwa:

A few months before her accident, my mom asked me to look over this article, which she wrote for publication on my blog. That week, I happened to be mad at her about something, so I didn’t want to deal with reading her email. Then I totally forgot about the article.

An email I received today reminded me about it. My mom didn’t finish the article before sending it to me to review. So you’re going to have to pray hard for her recovery if you want to hear what happens next!

Just yesterday, my mom proclaimed, during one of her touch-and-go lucid moments, “I’m now entering the third phase of my life.” We then discussed how, even though she might not be able to work as a street artist anymore, we would problem-solve her situation together; and whatever she’d end up doing, she’d be totally funky and fabulous. 

After reading this article, I’m wondering if my mom might pursue a dream she’s mentioned here and there: to be a consultant, teaching people with physical and mental disabilities how to problem-solve and cope. If you think you can benefit from my mom’s coaching, let me know in the comment box (click on the title, then scroll down to the bottom of that page to get there), and I’ll pass it on when she’s well.

I’m tickled pink to announce my natural pain relief article in AARP magazine. For the story, I interviewed fabulous health care practitioners and chronic pain patients, including James Dillard, Paula Kamen, Martin Rossman, David Simon, Steven Stanos, and Cynthia Toussaint. Check it out and let me know what you think!

In my journey living with and healing from chronic pain, I have learned to transcend pain and suffering through attitude of gratitude.  Even in my lowest moments, I have been able to find something for which I have been grateful.

There have been days when my pain and suffering have been so bad that I’ve been positive I couldn’t think of even five things for which to be grateful.  On those days specifically, I have made myself write a list of 50 things that I appreciate about my life. The practice has consistently pulled me out of my misery and made me feel like an incredibly lucky person.

In this spirit, and in honor of Thanksgiving, here are my thanks for the little and big blessings during this life-and-death crisis for my mom:

I am grateful that…

1. my mom’s accident happened in front of someone instead of when she was alone
2. the person who saw the accident called an ambulance
3. my mom was taken to the best trauma hospital in the area
4. the doctors and nurses were intelligent, competent, and compassionate
5. my mom thought ahead of time to enter my number as an emergency contact on her cell phone
6. my mom had her cell phone on her at the time of the accident
7. someone thought to check my mom’s cell phone to find someone to call
8. I checked the voicemail on my cell phone, which I rarely do, on the night of the accident — leading me to find out about what happened just four hours after the incident
9. my mom was conscious enough on the night of the accident that I could speak with her for one coherent conversation — which, for all I knew at the time, may have been the last coherent conversation I’d have with her.
10. the night nurse and doctor taking care of my mom were kind and compassionate, patiently answering all my questions
11. I live just an hour plane ride away from my mom
12. there was an available seat on the first flight out after I received word about the accident
13. my pain levels were low enough that I could travel to the hospital
14. I made it safely to the airport, even though I did not sleep all night
15. long-term parking at the airport was only $10/night
16. I make enough money to pay for all of the transportation, accommodation, food, and other crisis management expenses that have come up during the past two weeks
17. I had the presence of mind to take a cab to the hospital from the airport, instead of renting a car
18. I made it to my mom’s side somewhere between 1/2 hour to 45 minutes before her brain surgery
19. over the past decade plus, I have learned a tremendous amount about healing, so I was positioned to know how to help my mom above and beyond the conventional medical care she was receiving
20. I had the strength and rootedness to stand by my mother’s side, despite all of the blood and screams, and offer her healing energy that calmed and soothed her
21. the doctors and nurses let me follow my mom down all the way to the hallway in front of the surgery room — singing, chanting, saying positive affirmations, and doing guided imagery
22. over the past two weeks, I have witnessed the profound impact that my healing energy work has had on my mom — thus validating and encouraging my own healing path
23. through participating in my mother’s fight for her life, I have had the honor and privilege to witness many layers of the body, spirit, and mind — learning more about how each contribute to what we call life
24. I was by my mother’s side when she woke up
25. through this experience, I honed my assertiveness and negotiation skills in working with doctors
26. my mother and I were recipients of an outpouring of love, support, and prayer — leading me to understand that even when I feel isolated, people are there for me if and when I reach out
27. random strangers prayed for and sent healing energy to my mother — among them the taxi driver who took me to the airport, the waitress at the restaurant across the street from the hospital, the concierge at the hotel where I stayed for the first two nights, and people around the world who responded to my posting on listservs. Through these prayers, the universe received calls about my mother in English, Hebrew, Spanish, and Arabic, through the filter of Jews, Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, spiritualists, and secular people.
28. I learned about different dimensions of friends and family in my life, by seeing how people did and did not come through in this crisis
29. I became better acquainted with the depth of my own strength and resilience in crisis
30. I have more compassion than ever for those who are sick, injured, and in pain