Astronaut

When Dale got the cast on his ankle removed, his surgeon told him that now he was like an astronaut. Astronauts, whose bodies don't bear weight for months at a time, return to earth with their bones so fragile that they "lean over to sip their their soup and their spine breaks in three places," according to the surgeon. I was hoping that was an exaggeration, but apparently some returning astronauts have to be carried away from their landing craft in stretchers; it is rare that they are able to walk, and the rule of thumb is that they need one day of recovery in Earth's gravity for every day they spend in space. It turns out that when bones are unused, the body just starts taking the calcium out of them, resulting in "disuse osteoporosis." Isn't that fascinating? I forget that bones are dynamic living tissue, constantly being depleted and renewed according to the body's inner logic.

What this meant for Dale is that he had to be very gradual and intentional about putting weight on his leg. Much of the time he still used his peg leg or scooter, but his day also included sessions of careful "practice walking" with the boot and crutches. At first he placed only the lightest pressure on his foot (supposedly measured by him stepping on a bathroom scale to see what 20 lbs felt like, though in practice he found this difficult to gauge). He increased the pressure a little bit every few days. He also did exercises designed to stretch his tight muscles, increase the range of motion in his ankle, and strengthen his disused calf and foot. (For example, he would draw the alphabet with his toes.)

After about three weeks of that, he got the go-ahead to walk with just the boot. Walk! For the first time in months! He felt like an astronaut all over again ... because he was over the moon. Ba-dum bum. But really it was an incredible feeling. He took the crutches to work with him for a while just in case his foot got tired, but soon he stopped needing to do that.

That was a couple weeks ago. Now he has shed the boot and walks in sneakers. Barefoot still feels painful and unstable, and the thought of any kind of jumping, running, etc gives him the shivers. But he is well along the road to recovery!