I am not a spontaneous person.  I like to know who, what, where and when and make a plan for that time frame..  I love schedules.  I suppose, growing up on a dairy farm, where schedules were kept—no matter what, has caused me to be like this.  Cows had to be milked 12 hours apart.  I don’t care if it was the birth of your first child or the deathbed vigil for your father.  When it was milking time—you were in the barn, milking cows.

The first year of the pandemic didn’t throw me off too much, I was still mobile.  I still had my schedule of chores around the house to do.  Certain jobs on certain days and I could do 2 or 3 chores in a day—dusting, vacuuming, washing down counter tops, working in the garden.

Then I got this dang drop-foot, along with balance issues, and there are some chores I just can’t do anymore.  I am an independent person, I could take care of myself—until the drop-foot. This has rattled me and made me feel very unsettled

So, over the weekend, I decided which chore I could adapt to fit my condition and make a schedule.  I knew that I could only do one major chore a day, so I made an Excel spreadsheet (that’s part of the OCD I have) and made a schedule for each day with one chore.  I call it my BIG CHORE Day.

Today, I dusted.  I can do quite a lot of it sitting on the seat of the Rollator.  The higher shelves and stuff, I rest one hand on the Rollator for balance and use my right hand to work with.  Then I wiped down the kitchen counters, using my legs braced against the lower cupboards.

I can still bend over to feed the cats and clean up their litter box and put dirty dishes in the dishwasher for a future wash and I have no problem emptying the dishwasher—I haul the dishes from the dishwasher, resting on the Rollator seat, to the varying cupboards where they belong.

The same way with laundry…I load a load of dirty clothes into the bag under the seat of the Rollator and wheel them out to the washer.  When they are done drying, I sit on the seat of the Rollator, easily reach in to the very back of the dryer, and fold them or put them on hangers and then wheel them back into the bedroom.

I feel a lot better emotionally, working from the schedule and knowing there are still things I CAN do.  I have to stay as independent for as long as I can.