Looking forward to celebrating Halloween on Saturday, October 31, 2020, I smiled as I picked out my outfit of black leggings and an orange pumpkin sweatshirt to wear to work the next day at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newspaper as a Library Assistant. Only three days after my birthday, Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays. I’ve written several blog posts about all the autumn activities I love, such as this post from 2014, Happy October.
Just a few hours later, around 2:30 am, an ambulance transported me to a local hospital in the middle of the night after I fell and broke my right leg while sleepwalking. On November 1, I had a total hip replacement. What a way to spend my Halloween weekend!
All I could think of was that annoying phrase racing through my head as I was lying on the floor, in the middle of the kitchen. If you were not around in the 1980’s to see the commercial for a medical alarm system first hand, here’s a link to it. My husband and our friends would laugh at the commercial. One year, one of my husband’s friends dressed up like the old lady in the commercial for Halloween and “pretended” to fall in the middle of an elevator! An elder gentleman didn’t know she was dressed in a costume and attempted to help her up. At the time, while we were all in our mid-twenties, it seemed funny. Here’s another link to the Urban Dictionary website that explains more about this phrase.
Almost thirty years late, now in my late 50’s and having been a widow since my husband passed away suddenly from an undiagnosed pulmonary embolism (blood clot) in May 2012, falls are more of a hazard now. About four years ago, I also fell after sleepwalking while taking the sleep medication, Ambien, and broke my left shoulder and tore my rotator cuff. I had to complete several months of Physical Therapy along with two surgeries on my shoulder. So it doesn’t seem as funny anymore.
In fact, with the recent death of actor and comedian Bob Saget, which was ruled as Accidental, falls can be very serious. My mother recently fell in our kitchen and fractured a vertebrae. As people get older, we need to take all the precautions we need to in order to keep from falling.
Me leaving the hospital November 2020
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