neurorehabilitationFromTheTrenches

This past weekend, I smashed my mileage record on the trike, which now stands at 24K with only 3 breaks in total. It was glorious weather here on Sunday when we had planned our cycle. We planned to, so did, cycle along the Vierlanden-Bahn-Radweg . The Radweg (think greenway, in the Irish context) allowed us to travel, pretty much, undisturbed to our destination, 12K, during which we had one break at a park bench en route, which was located just before a much more suitable stopping place, which we would avail of on the way back. After an initial 2k of zig-zagging, attempting to get on the Radweg, we were on a very smooth, picturesque cycling route with ample tree cover from the sun. We met, and were overtaken by, a countable number of fellow cyclists, especially e-cyclists; they are the most annoying cyclists to be passed out by. OK, I might not be going very fast, but at least I'm trying. Good luck to them in all honesty. Technology has enabled them to push on toward the end,...

I am very fortunate to have Annas Physio so near to my doorstep. We have incorporated tricyling into our 3 weekly sessions and it has been great so far. We haven't quite agreed on the ratio of walking:tricycling but so far we have had the weather for both and we've been attempting both, as follows: We went touring on the trike, she was on a bike, on one Friday evening when we had the weather for it. She cycled along, side by side, offering advice and training drills as well as assistance if and when I needed it. We currently have 3 sessions per week; Monday, Wednesday and Friday, when we, more often than not, get outside and walk a 400 meter cane walk, which often takes more than the allotted time. Sometimes that coincides with a Crossfit class that Claire takes in Athlevo , so Claire can and does offer encouragement as she runs past us. The exposure I get to outside cane walking has been very fruitful as I've recently made noticeable gains and, as  Dr Walther remarked ...

This past weekend was a bank holiday weekend, as it would be called in Ireland. Bank holidays work a little differently here. In Ireland, whichever day of the week the occasion that deserves a bank holiday falls on, the bank holiday will fall on the next Monday (with the exception of Good Friday), giving a long weekend to everyone. In Germany, it's the luck of the draw, with the exception of last weekend. Monday was Whit Monday. That coincided with a triathlon in Luebeck which Claire was taking part in. So, off we went on the train with the trike and Claire's racing bike. Luebeck was great for my training. As well as gaining more experience with trains, the great weather we got in Luebeck meant that I got to trike around. As well as improving on the previous weekend's mileage, I also got the opportunity to cane walk in, among other places, Hamburg Hauptbahnhof, which is the main railway station in Hamburg. Claire noted that I'm gaining in confidence; I felt it too. On...

This weekend it arrived. Claire needed to pick it up at the Dreirad Zentrum but it was a nice day for it. My maiden voyage on my Dreirad was a mixed bag. I felt free and Independent, sure, but there were some technical difficulties. I had thought that it was sufficient to switch my left peddle for a more secure alternative. Alas, my right foot was struggling with its own peddle. We cut our planned cycle short, mainly because it had been ill-thought-through to wear my Vibram 5-fingers with my left peddle replacement; my toes had, unbeknownst to me, wormed their way out though the straps, in a truly uncomfortable way. Meanwhile, my exposed left, inside ankle was continually getting prodded by an irritating, superfluous part of the replacement peddle. We regrouped, It was giving a hotter day on Sunday anyway. Sunday didn't disappoint, with thirty degrees, as promised. So we planned to follow through with our planned cycle from the previous day. Claire took advantage of the Ve...

This has been a very frustrating weekend. There is no trike; not with me anyway. Claire called the Dreirad Zentrum on Thursday and they, sadly, confirmed that it wouldn't be ready for collection before Monday, and since Claire will be unavailable to collect it during the week, and since the Dreirad zentrum didn't offer to deliver it, on account of the inconvenience that they had caused, I will have to wait another whole week until I can start mastering it. In other news, this weekend saw me take part in another workshop. This time, instead of physiotherapy and Bobath. it was Ergotherapy (occupational therapy) and Perfetti . Perfetti is a method of rehabilitation, typically Ergotherapy, that focuses on cognition as it relates to movement. I wanted the focus to be, where possible, on walking. I believe that as soon as I can walk independently with the cane; it will have a snowball effect that will exponentially improve my physicality. Thankfully, Ergo therapists there, concentr...

...Happy Birthday to the blog. So, in this special birthday (11/May) edition, I will share my Blogger statistics. I have been keeping my eye on these for a while, it's interesting to me, and hopefully you too, the blog articles that don't get much traffic and those that do. This weekend I'm off to Berlin to meet some friends. I'll name the group members in case I manage to rope some of them in to submitting a guest post. Here goes: Sean Tack, Adam O'Shea, Declan Barry, Cillian Cahill, Dan Wolfe, Darran Diskin, John O'Grady, Mick McEvilly, and then some fellows I don't know, yet, from the Whatsapp group; Simon, Emmet, Robbie, Barry, Craig Atkinson, Ray Reilly and Joe Hasset, then the following ambiguous characters: Am?, 0851246*** and 0863710***. Overview This is simply a snapshot of the most important statistics, according to the Blogger engineers. That graph in the top left reflects the fact that there was a spike in May of last year for obvious rea...

I want to ride it where I like. This morning I made the first steps toward getting a tricycle (or Dreirad as it's known in Germany). Claire and I went to the Dreirad Zentrum in neighbouring (to Bergedorf) Wentdorf to try one of them out. I was shown out to the car park with my tricycle and permitted to go for it. The brake was unfortunately on my left handlebar but I was assured that this could be easily amended; also, I wasn't as confident on it as I dreamt I would be. My left foot kept slipping off the pedal if I wasn't paying complete attention to keeping it there. Again, the sales person had a solution for that too, he would ensure my left pedal could be replaced with a more secure alternative. There was one snag; I would have to wait two long weeks. That sucked, but they needed to order it, so what could I do? I had hoped to have it for this weekend. The wheelchair's days are numbered. The tricycle will come with much more independence. Eventually, Claire wil...