Detour by Greaniis

Chapter 4.

 Greg arrived at the rehab hospital before Rebecca. The transport team took him to a room with two beds. The other bed was not occupied, but there were personal items surrounding it. Great, a roommate, Greg thought. The ambulance transporters scooped him off the stretcher onto the second bed in the room using the sheet under him. Soon after he was in the new bed, a nurse dragging a blue chair with small wheels on it came in.

"Hi, I'm Donna, your nursing assistant," she said, pointing at the blue chair. "This is a scale. We get a weight on everyone when they first come in. I'm going to help you get on and off the scale."

Greg's blanket was over his lap as usual. He threw it to the side, exposing his missing legs. He also raised his left hand which was in its cast. He looked at her with a challenge.

"The nurses told me about the legs, but not the arm," Donna said, not responding to the challenging look Greg had given her. "This changes my plans a little. I'll be right back.'

While Donna left to do whatever was her plan, Rebecca came into the room.

"Did you see this place when you were coming in?"

"No."

"It's huge, and the whole thing is rehab," Rebecca said, putting her coat and purse down in the chair at the foot of his bed. She saw the blue contraption with a chair on top. "What's going on?"

"The nursing assistant left to do something but they need my weight. I guess they use that thing, " Greg said, flatly.

Rebecca nodded as she sat in the chair where she had placed her coat and purse. The nursing assistant came back to the room with a wheelchair. Across the seat was a big wooden board. There was another woman following her into the room.

"This is Karen," Donna explained. "She's here just in case we need her. This is the wheelchair for you while you're here, and this is a transfer board. Have you ever used one before?"

Donna took the board out of the wheelchair and held it for Greg to look at. It looked like one of his boogie boards for the beach, only much smaller. He was wondering how that was going to get him anywhere. He shook his head answering her question.

"Every time I needed to get out of bed, the hospital just lifted me using the lift from the ceiling."

"This is the first step toward more independence. So, no more lifts."

Donna brought the chair scale next to the bed facing the same direction as Greg was sitting. She swung the arm rest up that was between the bed and the scale. That way, it was out of the way. She then put the board down between the bed and the seat.

"This board acts as a bridge between where you are and where you want to be. We just put it under your thigh to get you started," as Donna was talking, she did this. "The next step is on you. The object is to slide across the board to the seat on the chair. Put your hands on the board so it doesn't flip up on you. This is also where Karen and I come into play. We will spot you. The last thing you want to do on your first day is land on the floor."

Donna had placed the chair scale on the side of the bed so that Greg could use his right hand to pull him over. As he began, he saw that the more weight he put on the edge of the board, the more it tipped. It scared him half to death. IT reminded him he had nothing to stop himself from falling on the floor, like the nursing assistant had said. Donna reminded him to put his hand on the board and some weight on that hand to prevent the tip. Karen came up behind him. He calmed his nerves slightly and did as Donna advised. Sure enough, the board steadied. Slowly, he began moving across the board. After four moves, he had gotten across the board and onto the scale. His stomach was tight and he was shaking slightly. He couldn't believe how vulnerable he felt.