A Pulmonary Rehab Story

Stop the presses! I think it is going to rain within minutes!! It NEVER rains here during the summer and we are in a serious drought! What a treat it will be to hear the tiny drops on the roof. But, it throws all my plans out the window, so to speak.

Saturday mid-afternoon, we are going to a graduation party for a friend's daughter who is heading to college soon. Other friends we have not seen in many years will also be there and we are looking forward to spending some time with everyone. As you may know, my Saturdays are always devoted to yard work. Hours worth of yard work. So, today I thought I would cut the grass then trim the entire little garden outside our bedroom window and turn all the dirt. It is near the same area where I "fluffed" all the dirt around the drainage system last weekend. My goal is to break up the tough top soil so the plants can drink in the little bits of water I am using to keep them alive as we are on water rationing.

But, the rain. I may have to wait for it to stop and not cut the grass, but I think I can still trim all the plants by hand and turn the dirt. This is going to probably take two to three hours. A good workout thus I will not be going to yoga this morning.

My stats at the rehab class yesterday were excellent - 96% on the treadmill at 3.4 MPH on 2 liters of oxygen. I often struggle to keep it above 92%. I am feeling great.

There is an 8-week class for the new people to pulmonary rehab just before our class. We often see people going through that process who end up in our class. There has been a gentleman attending this class who we have chatted with as he leaves these past few weeks. A nice man. A true gentleman. He and I were in the back of the gym yesterday, he was cooling down while I was warming up. He tried to put on his oxygen backpack but the strap was tangled so he asked for my help. We started to talk. Thursday is going to be his final class and he will be not joining our class. This may have been the last time I would see him.

I swear, sometimes I think a divine hand puts me in these situations so I can deliver a message someone needs to hear. It is a weird feeling. I almost feel like I have no control over what comes out of my mouth. The words just flow.

He asked about my situation and he told me that I was totally inspirational. That was when I looked him in the eye and said, "I promise you that if you keep exercising like you have been taught here, increase your speed and intensity slowly over time and build up to every day, you will have a much better quality of life and you may even have a longer life."

Tears welled up in his eyes. He told me he needed to hear that and asked if he could hug me. So there we were, in the middle of people warming up or cooling down in the back of the gym, human to human, both of us with tears in our eyes, hugging.