Life Alert. The Christmas Gift I May Need to Be Getting

I have falls. Not ones where I break my hip but the type which leave you with bruises and a feeling of mild annoyance. Normally I am pretty darn good at gauging when it is about to happen. I try to avoid any life-threatening collisions and if I happen to end up face-to-face with the wall occasionally I just claim to be inspecting the paint job.

I wish he really did do Life Alert advertisements!

Last night changed my casual response to falling. O. And the way I once viewed Life Alert advertisements with amusement. 'Help. I've fallen and can't get up!' was always a tad cheesy for me. I prefer to take my falls with a stubborn bit of pride. Lay on the floor and call for help? Not going to happen. I lay there (the dog typically takes a seat on my hand or foot) and wait. Sometimes it takes an hour or two but I am not in danger of being left there until I am molding.

Early this morning, aka a bit after midnight, I got the creative urge to paint. I typically paint sitting one-leg up and oddly crouched on a kitchen stool. If I were to attempt sitting normally on a chair with no back my blood decides to rush from my head to my feet and I keel over. I have never had a problem with managing to paint from sitting like that. Only this time something was off. I do not know precisely how it happened but my rinse glass went one way, my painting went the other, and half my paints got flooded. Normally I have no trouble reaching out to catch something but I got dizzy. When I get dizzy I have trouble gauging exactly where things are positioned (hence why I am not allowed to drive). I ended up way off my attempts to stop the accident and for one moment had this sensation of pure shock. The graceful one of the family, former figure skater, and used to falls went down spectacularly on my stool. Thank goodness for my skating training, which taught me how to fall properly, or I would have taken a strong whack to the head.

Instead I landed on my arm, the one which actually feels pain, with the rest of my left side hitting hard on our lovely wood flooring. There was pain. Worry. About my poor painting. And the slow realization I would be sporting black & blue but in no danger of any broken limbs. I pulled myself up, ironically using the stool I fell off of, and staggered around trying to fix the damages without causing more pain. Not until after the adrenaline wore off did I realize why exactly people want me to have Life Alert for situations like these.

1) My house has three floors. My place of living is on the bottom floor. There is no way possible for my parent's to hear my cries for help from the third floor. 2) Falling on the carpet is all well and good but hitting the hard floor? Not a good idea. I was lucky to have only banged up the left side of me and not my head. 3) I can't reach the phone and most of the time my cell phone is nowhere near me. How the heck am I supposed to get help? Even the dog wasn't around.I would have been laying on that floor until six in the morning!

Writing this now I am reconsidering the 'help. I've fallen and can't get up!' I can't help it when the left side of me is drilling it into my head. Blast. I hate it when everyone has made an obvious point which I now have to concede is true. Not the greatest way to start a weekend. Ah well. At least I am going to get out of this house for some Friday dinner delight!