today is Veteran’s Day. this year it is also World Hoop Day (for more info regarding adult hoola hooping & World hoop Day, visit http://www.hooping.org). i will have more to say later about the idea of gifting for your benefit & not the recipient’s. on the convergence of these two events i feel more obligated to do something to benefit veterans such as raise awareness of an injustice to certain disabled vets. i am a disabled veteran who was medically retired in 1988 before i was able to complete 20 years of service, also known as a Chapter 61 retiree with less than twenty years of service,a subject i’ve mentioned in a previous post. every month thousands of vets like myself have hundreds of dollars withheld from our pay simply because we had to leave the military because of our disability, in other words we are essentially being penalized for being disabled.this unfair practice is perhaps a contibuting factor to the high percentage of the homeless who are veterans, if not a contributing factor to the number of veterans who are incarcerated. in 2006 i was diagnosed w/Graves disease, & in aug 2010 i had a stroke. i hoola hoop as a form of physical & emotional therapy. hoola hooping is also a form of cardio exercise which can burn up to 600 calories per hour. while i cannot claim non-concurrent receipt as a direct cause of my health problems, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out having hundreds of dollars withheld each month can’t be good for the physical, mental & financial health of veterans like myself. there are @ least 2 bills that have been written in congress that would rectify the injustice of penalizing certain disabled veterans for being disabled. think about how many young men & women who have been severely injured over the past 10 years, a large number of them have been medically retired,undoubtedly with less than 20 years of service. current rules regarding receipt of disability & retirement pay will cause them to lose thousands of dollars over the rest of their lives.talk about adding insult to injury. As an undocumented victim of Military Sexual Trauma, non-concurrent receipt of my retirement & disability pay is like a monthly reminder of the powerlessness i felt as a result of being assaulted.
the last day funky hoopster was nearly all she wanted to be. 51 years old she looked & felt like she was 31. she had been practicing hoopdance for over a year. she was working on mastering a couple of difficult moves – the elbow switch & the barrel-roll. she was able to do the barrel-roll passably well. she was also working on learning some poi hoop moves, ie “the weave” & “thread the needle”. these are very difficult advanced moves. she was growing old gracefully & loving the process.
the next day she had a TIA stroke aka a mini stroke. she was planning to buy herself an LED hoop for her next birthday (in less than 3 weeks). intead she got a walker, a cane, a medicine cabinet full of medz to take twice a day, & a new underwear wardrobe.
why am i referring to myself in the 3rd person.despite the progress i’ve made since the stroke, i look & feel the stroke aged me 30 years. to my mind i am only a shadow of my former self. after the stroke when i describe my attempts to learn those advanced moves i mentioned above, i tell other hoopers trying to learn them caused my head to explode (that’s how difficult these moves are). the most wondrous thing about this last year is my common-law husband JahHannibal, the artist who maintains the Artpolitik blog. a lesser man wouldn’t have rushed to my side & would’ve booked a long time ago. he is as much a survivor of this stroke as i am.
one of my docs finally told me something i could agree with. start hooping again. i can actually see the logic in that. judging from my current lack of skill w/ my left hand. if i regain my left hand hooping skills, i’ll make a lot of progress. a nice side effect of being able to hoop again @ my level of proficiency pre-stroke, is that it will elevate my mood somewhat.
took an important step last sunday. finally got back on my bike. nothing big. 2 laps around the reservoir. felt wierd when i first took off. left hand still isn’t stong enuf to steer the bike single-handed. under optimal circumstances, i would’ve been riding for weeks by late june, & would be in good enuf shape to do @ least 5 laps. still i feel confident enuf to attempt road riding again. went for a road ride the following saturday.
my last blog was more socio/political oriented. to keep my stress levels down i was going to stay away from that stuff this time. but i feel like i gotta say sumthin about what’s going on re the friggin gubbermint shutdown/debt ceiling. neither my spouse nor i collect SSI. he did recently retire after 35 yrs, so from what i’ve read/heard this crap could have a chaotic effect on his pension. otoh, i receive VA disability compensation, as mentioned previously, i’m already getting screwed out of my military retirement pay. so this impending crisis has me stressed. i think its time for seniors vets to go “Bonus Army” on the congress ccritters.
my docs want to me to start taking anti-depressants. no surprise there, considering my last post. it ain’t gonna happen. yeah, i’m depressed, no disrespect to anyone who relies on anti-depressants, but i’m totally against my using them. if my mood needs elevating i prefer an herbal/ allopathic remedy. better yet – getting rid of whatever is causing my depression.i already take a lot of medications, not one more pill dammit. to my mind, taking anti-depressants will just make me content with the conditions causing depression. the stroke already harmed the part of my brain where my bullshit detector is located. the last thing i want is to render it more useless. i think the reason anti-depressants are prescribed is to make us complacent. makes us eat shit w/ a smile & ask for more.
anti-depressants are not going to restore the manual dexterity in my left hand, make what i eat or drink taste good again, eliminate the need for adult protective underwear, jog my memory, get me into driver rehab, so i can regain independent mobility, or help me deal with benefits.
speaking of which, i’m totally not understanding CRDP (concurrent receipt of disability/retirement pay). i fit the criteria, but my retirement pay is being withheld, i thot they stopped doing that in ’04. just got clarification on that. apparently its my fault i didn’t stay the full 20 yrs, so i am no longer entitled to any of my retirement pay. i didn’t know veterans forced to retire before they could do 20 got screwed on the crdp. the customer service rep told me as a consulation that if the VA ever lowers my disability rating i could receive a portion of my retirement pay again. thanx for talking to me like i’m stupid.iotw, if my disability rating were lower, i wouldn’t fit the criteria for CRDP anyway.
anti-depressants would’ve made me miss that irony.
there is legislation pending to rectify this inequity. to take action visit this website HR 186
i briefly mentioned in my first post that i have considered ending myself. i don’t like what i am now. it took me almost 40 years to like myself. it took me 44 years to find my true love. he is the only reason i go on existing(this aint living). the oldest living person in my family right now is 102. when i think about putting up with anotha 50 years of spending a substantial portion of my meager income on protective underwear, taking pills every day, having everything i eat or drink taste like shit, its all i can do not to step into oncoming traffic.
i used to make videos of myself hoopdancing. i still cry almost every time i watch them now, or almost every time i think about myself hooping or riding my bike.
this past sunday there was an annual festival in my neighborhood. one of the stages was less than a block from my house. i was playing around w/ a couple of hoops in front of my house when a young lady asked if she could hoop w/ one of them. i guess i look as bad hooping as i think i do, cause she asked if i wanted her to show me how to hoop. ouch, nothing like a little negative reinforcement. at least i did find out i can still knee hoop in my dominant direction.
i think i’m ready to take up hooping again. my doctors & physical therapists have been encouraging me too. problem is nowhere to hoop. even if i had room inside the house, the AC is busted. it’s currently 88° in the basement.
there are no hoop jams/ hoopdancers nearby. when i was a fit hoopdancer, i tried to get regular hoopjams going. transportation is a problem during the day.
