I need to be like Jamie Moyer

As I get older, my body fails me more often. I know this is not solely a Friedreich's ataxia thing. 

Your body breaks down, it just does, though I suspect FA hastens the breaks.

Baseball pitchers, for instance, might lose some velocity on their pitches. Good ones adjust, maybe becoming more like Jamie Moyer, who never had velocity but pitched until my age and won 269 games with smarts.

Like Moyer, I have plenty of smarts, and my super-awesome physical therapist has given me even more. 

I don't use it, though.

I know that to transfer safely, heels need to go behind knees. That way you can use your leg muscles then and your knees come unlocked easily.

I can do this with my right leg, but my stupid left foot slides forward when I try.

The upshot is I don't try. I rely on what I have always done:  I set my chair so a wheel blocks my left foot, then I use my arms and right leg to stand and hope I can unlock my left knee.

This transfer -- to my chair -- accounts for the lion's share of my falls.

If I were a pitcher, I'd get pummeled.

The cure for leg spasms

I have multiple insect bites below my shoe line on both feet, which is odd in that I always wear shoes except for in bed and the bites did not appear at night.

The upshot, though, is they itch badly and cause my legs to spasm uncontrollably.

The other night this was happening, and I reached for my phone about midnight to read Facebook in hopes that would relax them.

I saw my wrist was watchless and realized that in the worry about my bites, we had forgotten my phone and watch.

I did have my iPad, so I texted my sister. Nothing. Next I tried my niece. She came down her fears that I'd be in a bloody heap. My nephew was next, but he was another floor away.

After getting my phone, we chatted about this and that, which apparently was just what my legs needed;: They stopped spasming.

Scared

In one of the stories he used to tell at concerts, Bruce Springsteen talks about getting his draft notice:  "We were all so scared," he says. Me, too.

He failed his physical and went on to become a superstar. I am not sure how my terror will play out.

it is not that I am worried I'll get sick and die. I just can't stop thinking that my life is going to be permanently and badly altered by this pandemic.

Maybe that means I'll never make it back to the office, which seems more and more likely as my body gets more used towering from home.

Or I put off seeing a doctor who could help me.

Or maybe in addition toeing bitter, I will be perpetually sad.

Leveling up

When we were in high school, my little sister and I, to put it charitably, did not see eye-to-eye. We're friends now, but she does, on rare occasions, let me have it.

Unlike high school, I usually deserve it now.

For instance, she thinks I wallow and dwell too much on bitterness in this blog and wanted me to write about Dungeons and Dragons, how my nieces and nephews didn't give up on me playing and how she hears me laughing in my room and her daughter laughing in her room when we play.

She's right, but I told her I already wrote about D&D. Also, they can take away my balance, but they'll never take my bitter. Well, unless they return my balance.

But then my nieces and nephew (and brother) showed another level of awesomeness Sunday night.

I had an incident mid-game that took my sister about 15 minutes to clean up. I asked her to tell them I'd be away for a bit. They said, "No worries" and just chatted.

They're so great, my sister, too!

And then there's my stupid sleep mask

The temp and humidity has been acting up, but we finally got it straightened out, so I was thinking this past long weekend would be a good time to get some hours in.

I think I got maybe three hours total.

The first night I fell asleep with it on but woke up a few hours later with my mouth dried out. It seemed to use all the water in its reservoir in those two hours. They were the high point.

The next night, I pulled an attachment that feeds air into the mask out. It goes back easily but not for me. Zero hours.

The third night, my leg started jumping after an hour, so I took the mask off to sit up.

Stupid stupid stupid.

Daredevil isn't the answer

One of my depression busters is reading comic books, but I should know better than to read Daredevil for a pick-me-up, especially a story arc called "No Devils, Only God."

Daredevil kills a thief by accident and is hunted by police. His costumed friends tell him to give up being Daredevil, and he does. He falls apart and asks a nun whether God exists.

Substituting Mom for nun and cares for exists makes the last sentence true for me, too.

The nun tells Daredevil's alter ego, also named Matt, that his struggles aren't unique, that he isn't special.

My struggles aren't special, either, at least by themselves. What makes them sort of unique, however, is that they all expose my limits, which are all related to Friedreich's ataxia. Lots of people have sore shoulders. Not so many have to use those sore shoulders regularly in ways that hurt.

Daredevil's salvation is an affair with a gangster's wife and then  reuniting with an ex. Not sure what the answer for me is.