Wheelchair (again?) and dancing

I knew that my chair and ChairTopper would need adjustments. I worried that mistakes would be made in the order. I expected to have difficulties with transfers till I could get used to the new chair. I hoped that good things would come from it too, like being easy on my wrists. But, there’s always the unexpected! So far these are my unexpected experiences:

I’m not bottoming out on my cushion as much, which means pressure is more equal on my bottom in this chair than the old one, which is great! Eventually I want to get a pressure mapping done to be sure though.

Unfortunately I’ve had one negative side effect of this chair. My fingertips are all red, shiny and tender, almost blistery. Sunday evening I noticed that my left index finger hurt, and I thought maybe I had burned it on something. Last night, and especially when I got up this morning I realized that all my fingers were hurting. It’s as if they are going to start blisters. The left index finger is still the worst, but they all hurt. Picking up hot pizza to eat at dinner was very painful. Hot water too. I am guessing that I’m holding the rims of my chair differently with the Natural Fit rims, and using my fingertips more – so I’m getting blisters, much like someone with new shoes might get a blister on the heal. I never expected this! At the moment I’m not worried about it. I’m going to keep pushing myself about to develop some calluses on my fingers, as long as I don’t get outright full blisters. If it didn’t hurt I’d find it amusing.

I’ve decided that I really don’t like the yellow spokes. Oh well. I’ll put in the extra $100 needed for my second set of wheels to have orange spokes, which is what I really wanted in the first place, but was being cheap about paying extra for. The second set will be just like these, only with orange spokes, and solid tires. Later I’ll swap the pneumatics on this set with the solids on the other. The orange cost more, not because of the color, but because it’s a wheel with only 12 spokes instead of this one with 18. It’s a higher end model, and comes in different colors. So there are other benefits besides color, though they are minimal for me.

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On another topic – I went back to the wheelchair dancing class today, because a new friend of mine, and I’m going to give her name – Ginni, volunteered to be my regular dance partner. I admire her pluck and courage! And I am grateful for her friendship. I know it won’t be long before I call her an old and dear friend. It was a hard class for her today. The waltz is a beautiful dance, and very fun for the wheelchair user, but harder on the ones walking. She had never danced before, and she stepped into a session in progress – in its 6th class out of an 8 class session. Many of the people in this group have been to multiple sessions, and most of the standing partners have been dancers for years. So, compared with them she looked clumsy, and I think she felt a bit goofy. But she did great. She mastered the most important first basic step, and has a feel for how you have to count steps and move. If she’s enjoying herself, I bet she will be one of the best wheelchair dance partners around because she has no other dance experience to mess her up. Often female able-bodied partners have a hard time learning to lead instead of follow, for example. And men want to do a lot of extra steps that don’t work with a wheelchair partner.

People have asked me if it was hard to learn how to drive with hand controls, and I tell them I never knew how to drive with my feet. Ginni will be like that in dancing. Though I kind of hope she’ll enjoy this enough to try dancing with her boyfriend too. I’m reminded of a story. My cousin’s husband knew he would be asked to dance at his daughter’s wedding, so he and my cousin decided to take some dance classes. He’s overweight and at first he couldn’t get through even one song without getting winded. But he enjoyed the dancing so much, and the people too, that they have continued to dance socially, and he has gone on to compete. I’ve seen videos of him dancing (never one of my cousin who sticks to the sidelines) and it’s become a kind of passion for him – if not an obsession. So, Ginni, you never know!

For my part – it wasn’t as much exercise for me today as some dance classes were, because the waltz is easy in the wheelchair, and because Ginni needed more instruction on the simpler moves. But, I didn’t hurt myself! More important to me though was knowing that I was partnered with someone I could talk to when I was hurting, and we could adapt accordingly. And I had fun. We’re going to have a private lesson on Friday to help Ginni get more confidence and to feel like she can follow along with the class a little better. I’m sure she’ll do fine.

We’ve agreed that we’ll see how the private lesson goes, and the last 2 weeks of this class session and decide whether to continue then. I’m happy to be back, more than I expected, but still not so committed as to take any partner.