--- In Spinalcordinjury@yahoogroups.com, <candle850-keeper@...> wrote:
>
> This list has been so quiet. I hope that everyone is enjoying the
holidays.
>
> I have a question, have you dealt with people who thought they
were helping, but they really weren't? I was walking into McDonald's
the other day. It was raining and slippery and my husband was holding
my arm and helping me in. A crew worker saw me and decide to help us.
She came out and started pulling my arm. I started resisting because
I was worried about falling so she pulled harder. Thank goodness my
husband was holding me up.
>
> Another incident was at an all you can eat buffet. It was an
exercise where I had to show my husband that I could get my own plate
and make it back to our table. This was relatively soon after getting
out of the hospital. A woman came up and offered to help and I said,
no thank you and that I was fine. I almost got into a tug of war with
my plate. I had to explain to her the whole thing about the doctor
wanting me to do this as an exercise as my husband kept an eye on me
close by to prove that I could do it.
>
> I know that both of these people were trying to help out of the
goodness of their heart, but they really weren't. I can laugh about
both of those situations now, but originally they didn't seem so
funny. I should have said something to the woman who was trying to
help me over the ice, but wasn't sure how to tell her that she was
not really being helpful. I was also worried about sounding panicked,
which I was. Of course, I would have been more panicked if I had
fallen and broken something.
>
>
> --
>
> Candle
>
> May there always be a light to guide you.

Your stories are so true. I suffered a fall on July 1st resulting
in a spinal cord injury that has left me being probably confined to a
wheelchair for the rest of my life. This has been a great shock to me
at 48 years old and a very physically active Father of 3. Anyway, my
story is to do with transferring into and out of my wifes car. Being
newly disabled my goal is to achieve as much as possible on my own,
yet every time I transfer it seems that someone appears and
desperately wants to "help". At first this would appear to be
extremely kind but, after a while I realized that it was quite
annoying and sometimes downright dangerous. My problem is finding a
way to politely decline the good samaritans offer of kindness without
appearing to be ungrateful or rude? Anyway Happy Holidays to all and
may we all reach a happy conclusion to our "temporary inconvenience"
>