This is why I’m glad I was finally able to seek physical therapy for my back and pelvic floor. Since it help me give me a baseline on how I am and where I can improve. It’s one thing to try to learn all this on my own, and I’m very knowledgeable about a lot of it. But it’s different from someone who went to school to get a degree in understanding the human body. This also goes for personal trainers, because they also had to study to be good at their job.

I’m also grateful for having enough of an able body to put in the physical labor of working out when I did. Especially since all my hardw work and physical therapy is helping me greatly during my surgery recovery.

From the upper body strength I need to get myself in and out of bed and chairs. Having to perfect doing squats and working my legs to be able to move able in very awkward positions. Such as the restroom, shifting my body on my bed, getting up from the couch without arm support. A lot of extra moment to avoid using my core.

Since for my hysterectomy I had to do everything I can to allow all those muscles time to relax and heal. Meaning the rest of my body goes into overdrive to compensate.

This is similar to how I am with my arms. I’m naturally a right handed guy. But I always fear of breaking my arm, especially when I had family members who had to deal with not being able to use their dominant hand because of something happened. So I trained myself to use my left hand.

I’m now able to lift, write, and do almost anything with my left hand. Sometimes my left side is stronger than my right. And I did this all because I didn’t want to feel crippled by the loss of my naturally dominant hand. Which it worked out for me.

When I was still working in corporate I would overwork my right hand to the point of carpal tunnel. So I would switch hands to give my right hand a break. Heck, I still have this habit.

I always suffered from server hand cramps that my fingers would lock up and be useless. So I adapted how I would be able to do chores around my limitations. But even so, I have to admit it still gets bad enough that I can’t work as long and as hard as I used to.

Me learning to use my left hand isn’t the only adaptive behavior I learned over the years. I had cousins and friends who were mute, so I learned to communicate with them. It’s even more fun with how one of my mute friends growing up was in the Dominican Republic, so it was fun trying to learn basic Spanish sign language to speak with her.

Some of the people who inspired me was colorblind, like my art teacher in 3rd grade. Just being around people who have different disabilities was very encouraging because they didn’t let those disabilities stopped them from living life.

It’s why I work so hard on reading and writing, because that’s something my disability makes it difficult to do. I’m also hard of hearing and have other issues. But being surrounded by people who I learned to communicate with them in their way helped me learn how to communicate with the world around me.

As while I been on my personal healing journey, things that were missing from my knowledge is finally coming together. Concepts that I know about I’m finally starting to understand. It’s one thing to read a book, it’s a whole other thing to understand what you’re reading.

I know I started this little rant about how grateful I am to have done physically therapy when I did, because it’s helping me with my surgery recovery. But I ran off into a tangent because I feel grateful for all the things and people I came across growing up.

Even though I didn’t understand much of the world around or understood what was happening to me, I still had positive influences that still empowers me today. From the love and kindness from my grandparents, who we had a huge language barrier. To the teachers who showed me that being different is a good thing, since it opens up a different world view than everyone else. To the friends and family who still pushed forward, even though they had disabilities (temporary or permanent). And even the small moments I enjoyed living in nyc to witness off the different people and cultures.

Even when I moved to a place that has none of the multi cultural and ability communities I enjoyed has something to offer. Because now I’m given a chance to connect with people and myself. I needed a moment of absolute quietness to be able to create my own voice.

I can’t learn lessons if I’m constantly being given so much information at once. So, as I work on building a home and eventually getting my first vehicle, I’ll take the time to embody everything I value and built for all these years. I said it before, I want to live a life that I’ll get to tell my grandparents all about one day.