Moving with a Disability

Moving is hard work for anyone, I know.  It can be extra hard when you have a disability, though.

For instance, packing requires a lot of bending and lifting.  Even though I've tried as much as possible not to lift really heavy things, my back is still quite unhappy with me these days.  Cleaning my new apartment, which was necessary before moving in, was hard on my back, too.  Doing all these things day after day for the last week has caused a lot of back pain, pain that at times shoots all the way down my legs, which it never used to do.  For the most part, I try to avoid doing things that cause my pain to worsen, but it really can't be helped now.

Also, it's exhausting.  Not just physically, but also mentally.  Keeping track of all the things that need to be done, making a million phone calls, making sure I don't forget anything important, it wears me out.

If you're not familiar with spoon theory, take a minute to read about it here.  When you're disabled, you don't have that many spoons to begin with.  And then, tasks that might seem simple or small to most people can use up a lot of spoons for someone with a disability. 

For instance, grocery shopping takes a lot of spoons for me.  It's hard on my back, bending over, reaching for groceries, getting items out of the cart when it's time to check out, then loading the car, then carrying groceries from the car into the house.  If the store is crowded, or even if it's not, if I have a lot of things to get, it makes me anxious and tired.  I had a very long grocery list of things I needed to get for my new apartment.  I ended up dividing it into two parts and today I bought all the non-perishable things on my list.  Friday, the day before the actual move, I will buy all the perishable things.  I'm guessing most people are able to accomplish all their grocery shopping in one trip, but I just couldn't.  Even dividing it into two parts, today's trip wore me out.  I ended up coming home and sleeping for about an hour.

I will be so glad when it's all over.  Just a few more days.