I fell again. A couple of weeks ago walking to dinner on a relatively level street in San Francisco, I took another header. I went down so fast that I didn’t have time to put my arms up to protect my face. Consequently, that’s what took the brunt of the fall.
This is the third time in a year and a half that I’ve fallen. The pattern, if that’s what it is, is beginning to worry me. Have I turned the corner into the land of “I’ve Fallen and I Can’t Get Up”? I hope not, because I’m not ready to go there.
- My doctor seems relatively unconcerned–”maybe you just have bad luck”–but then he isn’t coping with the cracked ribs and fractured shoulder and smashed up face as I have had to do.
There are several possible causes for my falling–besides clumsiness and bad luck. For one, I have a peritoneal shunt to remedy the hydrocephalus that was a consequence of my ruptured cerebral aneurysm. As the neurosurgeon who put it in told me, “It’s just plumbing and plumbing can get clogged.” The symptoms of that include balance issues, but I don’t think balance is my problem.
What I’ve noticed in all three times I’ve fallen is that it’s almost as if my toe gets stuck on the floor. Then I just pitch forward. The soles of the shoes I’ve been wearing are rubber-soled, so I wonder if I’m dragging my toe and my foot gets stuck to the ground because of the rubber? And if I am dragging my toe, is it just laziness? Or another consequence of the ruptured cerebral aneurysm?
The whole thing makes me nervous: falling….falling for no reason….falling because I’ve got neurological issues….falling because I’m getting older. None of those fit into my concept of who I am and what I can do. So I’m betting on the reason the X-ray technician gave me the other day when I went for a mammogram. She took one look at my shoes–Kenneth Cole ballet flats–and pronounced them the culprit. ”Your shoes are loose,” she explained, “and that’s making you dig in with your toes to keep them on, which is why you’re catching the sole at the toe.”
I practically heard bells ring and lights flash when she said that. It was such a simple explanation and yet so reasonable. The first time I fell, I was wearing flipflops and the other times I was wearing these very Kenneth Cole shoes. The ones I thought would be so safe to wear because they’re well-made and have arch supports. They’re also a tad loose because I’ve worn them a lot.
So now I’m examining my shoe wardrobe with a different eye. Call me shallow, but I love cute shoes, so there’s just so far I’m willing to go in to fix the problem. I’ll eighty-six the Kenneth Coles, but I’ll also pay more attention to how I’m walking.
