An Accident Waiting to Happen, aka The Dangerous Treadmill Throws Me for a Loop

2009 was a rotten year for me, and brutish Mike Tyson as well. That was the year I had my stroke. That was also the year Mike Tyson's 4-year-old daughter, Exodus, died from a treadmill cord wrapped around her neck, strangulation style. (Her mother was busy, cleaning in the next room because they couldn't afford a housekeeper. All of Tyson's money now belongs to the IRS, but I digress). The point that Laura Cox made in '09, as a medical writer for ABC news, who informed us of Exodus' death, was that exercise equipment is dangerous.

Take treadmills, for example. Treadmills are risky pieces of equipment. Health club owners have an obligation to inspect their machines and tell members who use them if the treadmill is not in condition to work properly. Typical injuries connected to defective treadmills include back problems, spinal cord injuries, fractured bones, torn ligament and knee injuries, electric shock, facial fractures and lacerations, and traumatic brain damage. If placed too close to a wall or other equipment, a treadmill user may become trapped and the moving treadmill belt can access exposed skin which, in some cases, can require expensive skin grafts and rehabilitation. The problem with the treadmills has gotten so dire, there's attorneys out there who only represent treadmill injuries.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) documents cases, like the 86-year-old woman in Chicago who sued a health club after a treadmill malfunction threw her from the machine and then severed her right foot. How about this one? A 2-year-old boy was brought to the emergency, and he received treatment for a friction burn to his right hand after he got it stuck in a moving home treadmill. His mother, who had been running on the treadmill at the time of the accident, pulled the safety strap, but not in time to prevent the injury. The treadmill in question had safety instructions underneath the machine and were not visible to her.

West Bend Mutual Insurance Company says that adult injuries are "typically caused by deficient knowledge of the functions of the particular machine. From heart monitors to programmable routines, treadmills have become increasingly complex, and several advanced features can make operation overwhelming. When televisions, headphones, and magazines are added to the equation, it’s shocking more accidents don’t occur. Distractions, complexity, and exertion combine to set the stage for a potentially devastating trip and fall exposure." So true.
 

Here's where I come in. It was yet another day at the gym which, as a stroke survivor, was questionable anyway. But I always have someone nearby while I'm working out on the safe machines. This is my current regimen: The elliptical (safe), the inclined plates for stretching my hamstrings (safe), the treadmill (not so much), and the leg press machine (not safe at all). All my exercises are for the legs because I can't lift my hand independently. I hired a trainer at the gym, whom I liked, but he quit after two weeks of training me, and I got a new one to replace him.

Anyway, after the elliptical for 15 minutes and the inclined plates for 2, which I accomplished by myself because I safely could, I motioned to the trainer for what was supposed to be a 30-minute session including the treadmill, the leg press machine, and some body exercises he thought would be helpful. He was there in an instant because most trainers are usually bored at the gym with nothing to do unless they train somebody. I mean, my trainer was on a 6-hour shift and how long could he occupy himself by doing show-offs things like sit-ups and weight stuff.

I approached the treadmill, with the trainer right next to me, and got onto it by stepping up and transferring my hand from the cane to the side bar. The trainer took the cane off the treadmill pressed the appropriate buttons and I was off at 0.5 miles an hour. Then a few seconds later, I stopped the machine.

I said, "My safety strap isn't on. The last trainer said my safety strap has to be on in order to shut off the treadmill immediately in case I'm in trouble," quoting the last trainer exactly.

"But I've got you," he replied. "And anyway, that safety strap doesn't work sometimes. It pulls away from the treadmill. I've got you," he repeated again. Then he turned the treadmill on again.

I was going for about three minutes with my one hand holding onto the side bar, when I decided the front bar might be better. So I moved my left hand right under the treadmill's console. After thirty seconds, I realized the side bar was more comfortable, and when I moved my hand back again to the side bar, with the "I've got you" trainer right along side of me, something happened.

My feet did a turn around in which they were now facing the wall behind me. The treadmill was still running. And worst of all, I cracked my head on the cross bar. I began to cry. In that defining moment, I wasn't a jock anymore.

"Stop the treadmill," I screamed. "It's still going."

Everybody in the gym came running. Somebody, maybe the trainer, turned off the treadmill after about 15 seconds.

"You should have told me what you were going to do before you did it. It's the first time that I worked with you," remarked the trainer, as if the accident was my fault.

"Gwyneth," who brought me to the gym, showed up at the very moment. She said, "If I was there when it happened, the trainer would lose his [censored] when he made that remark." Gwyneth is a hard ass.

The trainer dragged a chair over to me and asked me to sit in it. He gave me a cup of water and I gave him the worst news.

"Every time I have a fall," I said between sobs, "I need to go to the hospital to have a CT scan, to make sure I'm not bleeding internally. My head is starting to swell up."

The trainer  looked like he was going to throw up. And the owner asked me if I required an ambulance. All I wanted to do was to leave there ASAP, worrying that my brain would burst yet another blood vessel.

I got up from the chair and sat of the bench near the elevator while Gwyneth made a call to the hospital, indicating I was coming soon.

The 10-minute ride to the hospital passed quickly, and I didn't have to wait long before I saw a triage nurse. She took my blood pressure and my temperature and said, "We are kind of crowded so you'll have to wait for the doctor in the hallway. In a gurney, of course." Gwyneth was brought a chair at my request. 

Another nurse came by to check my vitals--again--and a doctor agreed that the CT scan was the best way to tell if there was any internal bleeding. After the CT scan, I returned to the hallway and Gwyneth, and within a half hour, the doctor came over to my gurney and said that there was no bleeding and that my discharge papers would be coming momentarily.

Two hours and I was out. But some questions remain: There are three treadmills at the gym. Why did he have me on the treadmill with a defective strap? Why wasn't the owner told of the defective strap? And why wasn't the trainer's first instinct to turn off the treadmill? I'll never know the answers, and I don't care. Bottom line: the trainer failed. But I'm going back to the gym where I'll use the elliptical and the inclined plates. And the treadmill? Not yet. Not even with a safety strap that works. It's too soon.
______________________

After-the-incident note: The owner of the gym, who wasn't told the treadmill safety strap pulled away at times, told me after the fact, even if it did, the treadmill would stop running anyway. Why didn't the trainer know that? And was he not listening to the owner if she said the safety strap stops the treadmill if it pulls out of its socket? Maybe the owner didn't tell the trainer. 

I got lucky.

The Cane: It's Not Just an Aid for Walking

My cane is a lifeline. Yet, it’s humbling at times. I still often think of my cane as a third leg—cane, right leg, left leg, cane, right leg, left leg. I would rather be safe than sorry with a fall. But my thinking has changed in my four years post-stroke. I’ll tell you what I do with my cane if you promise not to guffaw!

First, a little background which you probably know already. Among the many types of canes, there is the straight cane with little support, an adjustable cane with two shaft segments, and a quad cane with four tips, or ferrules, offering the most stability. The most important thing with canes is that they be set at the right height for the users. But all canes can do something besides helping you walk. That’s where the guffawing might come into play.

I’ve gotten shorter now, as all people do when they age. At about age 40, folks are prone to lose almost a half inch every decade. I used to be 5 feet, 5 inches tall. Now, I’m 5 feet, 4 inches in measurement. The height changes, not only as part of the aging process. Gravity plays a role, too. The vertebrae of the spine might thin and dry out, making the vertebrae more compressed. And the arches of the feet are more likely to flatten out, and diseases such as osteoporosis don’t help the height situation either.

All on these physical realities may mean you’re having trouble with getting things on the top shelves of the cabinets as I do. That’s where the cane comes in. You can move boxes (glass containers break and cans dent) to the very edge of the cabinet. But wait a minute! If only one hand is working, how do you hold the cane and catch the box at the same time? You may have to let them just fall to the ground. Then if you’re able to bend at the waist or from your knees, the box is yours to pick up. If you can’t bend, bring a chair which is nearby (preparation comes first on my list) to where the item has fallen, sit down, and pick it up.

Everybody, friends and family alike, walks ahead of me because at some point, they feel like they’re walking too slowly. I’m left in tow. But I feel confident in using my cane as a weapon if need be. 

And one time, there was a need. My friend was walking ahead, as was customary for her. A thin, middle-aged man rounded the corner we were approaching, bumped into me, like the mugger that he turned out to be, and my instinct took over. When he tried to grab my pocketbook, I hit him square in the “balls” and he took off, albeit injured. Mission accomplished!

Additionally, you can use the cane to close a drawer or door that you can’t reach. I tend to leave the door wide open in the bathroom if nobody’s home and I’m doing “my business.” But my friend left the door unlocked and his workman entered. My trusty cane helped me shut the door so fast it looked like a blur. Come to think of it, I haven’t moved that fast ever!

A cane can also be useful for pushing things along the floor in order to get them to their destination. For example, the toilet tissue is stored in the back hallway. I get three or four rolls on the floor and push them to the bathroom like a herder navigating sheep. Then I sit on the toilet and get them lined up.  Easy, breezy!

And you thought the cane was only for walking. Balderdash!

Note: Write to me at hcwriter@gmail.com and tell me what YOU use your cane for besides walking. I might mention it in an article later on.

Wishes and Hopes: Do They Amount to a Hill of Beans?

It was a famous line in the film Casablanca that gave "hill of beans" its notoriety. Humphrey Bogart says to Ingrid Bergman, who's married to another man, “Ilsa, I’m no good at being noble, but it doesn’t take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world."

I'm having one of "those days" because I wish there was something to do about my stroke. And like Bogart says, the stroke "don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world."

Right now, I'd have an operation on my brain if there could be some improvement in my speech, my arm, my leg, any one of the above. Maybe some neurosurgeon could close the hole in my brain with stitches. But I take the blood thinner called Coumadin, and there's the likelihood of complications like significant bleeding into my brain, especially with stitches. Alas, I have a hole in my head. Please. No LOLs.

In reality, no doctors in their right minds would want to try "it," i.e. close the hole in my brain caused by dead brain cells that couldn't regenerate. Cells in the brain just don't do that once they die. The bleeding causes them to die and I had a hemorrhagic stroke when the clot caused my blood vessel to burst. My stroke anniversary just passed. I had a stroke in April 2009 and I'm tired from it. On the surface, I'm generally pleasing and happy. Below the surface, not so much. Still. Even now.

I'm angry though it never shows, at least to the general public. The bitter side says, "Why me?" The euphoric side says, "Why me?" also. Weren't you listening? I already told you. I'm having one of those days where floods of memories come back to me even though I attempt to shun them.

A memory of my mother appears right before my eyes. She had a stroke, too, but there were signs years before. Everyone--my mother, her family, her friends--ignored them. She fell every so often when she would become anxious over one thing or another. She probably had a  transient ischemic attack (TIA) which is like a mini stroke, producing like symptoms of a stroke: weaknesses on one side of the body, blurry vision, trouble talking. 

About 1 in 3 people who have a TIA ultimately have a stroke. Then she had the big one, a name that should be only reserved for California earthquakes. But that is what a stroke amounts to--an earthquake in your brain. I feel happier now, for the moment, that I just invented a new phrase for strokes. But then again, happier is relative.

I fell every so often, too, walking along the corridor or on the street. But I'm not a complainer; neither was my mother. So we didn't do anything about our falling. I attributed my mother's falling to anxiety; I attributed mine to clumsiness or tight shoes. My mother instilled a fear of doctors in me that was so strong, I screamed when the doctor would touch me in appropriate places so we didn't take any action on our falling. Or maybe it was the shoes. My mother had enormous bunions. So do I. But I believe the falling was a precursor of the stroke that damaged our lives forever. My mother was in her eighties, but I was 61, the new 41.

That's enough for memories. I don't want to spend any more time on them. I can't; I shouldn't. I am in the present now. I looked, examined, and researched many ideas--stem cell therapy to make me, even more, mostly whole once again (all the doctors that I researched were fraudulently going after people's money), the Walkaide and the Bioness to enable people walk more efficiently (I wasn't a candidate because of my hyper-extended knee), slings that reduce subluxation in my shoulder (I got one from my "friend" on Facebook, but after three months, I didn't improve any further). I just got the name of a doc who does Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. I'll try that next.

The definition of crazy is when you do the same thing over and over, expecting different results. Maybe I'm crazy. Or maybe I'm hopeful. I'm always searching, and I always reach dead ends. But I still try to find magic in the medical community. Perhaps I'll blow a hole in that definition of "crazy" yet. 

The weather is heating up, and summer is about 30 days away. But all the seasons the same for me, and just the temperatures are different. The days are consumed by the stroke, searching to find the silver bullet that will make it all, or most of it, or part of it, go away. I'll take any improvement. My friend calls me Pollyanna, a character in a 1913 novel that turned into a popular term for someone with an optimistic outlook. I say, "How can I NOT be." Hope and wishes are both traits of Pollyanna.

Today, I'm going to do research on Amazon for pomegranate and chocolate. That's to take my mind off of the stroke, but only momentarily. I am obsessed with the stroke and who it's going to hit next. "On average, one American dies from stroke every 4 minutes," say the Centers for Disease Control, (CDC), and it is a fact. How can I not be obsessed, I scream silently to myself.