Page 1 of Blinded
Chapter One
By the time Sandra reached her last appointment, she was running twenty minutes late and feeling irritated. She hoped her new client would be a nice guy and not as challenging as the rest of her day had been. Gregory T. Lewis was an orthopedic surgeon and although Sandra hadn't worked directly with him, he had a good reputation around KU Med. However, an injured surgeon could be very different than a functioning one and she didn't know what his temper was like. He was probably a control freak like most surgeons she met. She hoped he wouldn't prove doctors made awful patients.
She used the brass lion head to knock and scanned her surroundings while she waited for someone to answer the door. Unless there was help in the house, she was used to the fact it took a while for her clients to reach the entrance. The front yard was an appealing mix of formal and wild, with blooming plants and neatly trimmed grass. The house looked freshly painted, but the windows could do with a wash. Finally, the door opened, and she was met by a scowling man. She had to look down to make eye contact because he was seated in a wheelchair. Sandra narrowed her eyes. A walker would be much better with his injury.
“You’re late,” he snapped.
Well, good afternoon to you too! After her snarky thought, Sandra quickly reminded herself that he was her client and she was the professional.
“Yes, sir. Thanks for your patience,” she replied, feeling proud she managed to sound calm. She took a good look at the man before her. He had a mop of dark red hair that looked like he ran his hands through it frequently, intelligent gray eyes the color of storm clouds, and a sensual mouth pressed together in an unmistakable sign of irritation. Her eyes raked his body further. He had to be tall, although it was hard to estimate his height from his position. He had long arms, big hands, and elegant fingers with neatly trimmed nails. His nails looked manicured, but that didn’t seem to fit his personality. She always associated metrosexual men with beauty treatments, and he most definitely wasn’t one.
“Are you done staring?” he snapped, and Sandra felt her face warm from blushing. He might be a jerk, but he was her patient, and she was here to help him recover.
“Yes, of course. I’m sorry, Mr. Lewis. Let’s go inside and see how you’re doing so far.”
He scowled. “It’s Dr. Lewis, as you should know if you’re really a PT, and I know exactly how I’m doing. You’re only here because my doctor insisted.”
Oh, a stubborn one? Sandra fixed a smile on her face and gritted through her teeth. “Yes, of course, Dr. Lewis.” What a fun way to end the day! “In that case, I’m Dr. Duncan. Physical therapists are doctors now, too, you know.”
Dr. Lewis scowled again as he turned his wheelchair and rolled to the sunroom. She followed him, adjusting her steps to the pace he was keeping.
“By the way, Dr. Lewis,” Sandra said, “why are you in a wheelchair? As an orthopedic surgeon who ‘doesn’t need a physical therapist,’ you know walking as much as you can is a big part of your recovery. Where’s your walker?”
“In the sunroom with the rest of my exercise equipment.” He rounded the corner to reveal what looked like a fully equipped private gym, with a treadmill, stationary bike, elliptical trainer, universal weight machine, and – off abandoned in the corner – a lonely walker.
“Quite the set up you have here. How about you show me what you’ve been doing? How much of a workout have you had today?”
“I got plenty of exercise this morning. That’s why I’m using the chair now.” He sounded defensive.
“Great. Let’s see what you can do.” Sandra did her best to sound chipper. “Your accident was what? Two weeks ago?”
“Fifteen days, but who’s counting.”
My, we’re in a mood, aren’t we? Better to find out what I’m up against. “What happened with Martin, your first PT?”
“He was incompetent. His expectations were ridiculous, so I fired him.”
What? Sandra struggled to keep her voice even. “That’s too bad. It’s the first time I’ve ever heard anything bad about Martin. We went to school together, and we tied for top of the class. What was he asking you to do?”
He listed off his issues with Martin, ticking them off on his fingers,
“I wasn’t breathing right. I was sitting down wrong. I was using too much weight for my leg lifts.” By now his eyes were blazing in anger. “He was trying to impede my progress.”
Sandra took another deep breath to calm herself before speaking. She recognized she would have to use all her native diplomacy not to suffer Martin’s fate. Thinking quickly about the best way to handle things, Sandra opened her notebook. She wished she’d had a chance to talk to Martin before she’d come today. Now all I have to do is bluff my way through. It can’t be worse than competing in a beauty pageant.
“I have to do an assessment of where you are so we can make plans for going forward. I don’t want to hold you up, but I also don’t want you to go too fast and injure yourself. We need to strive for a happy medium.” She brought his walker to him from the corner. “Let’s start with this. I’d like to see you go across the room and back.”
Her patient grimaced but didn’t say anything. He locked his wheelchair and shifted forward to stand. He inhaled and held his breath as he started to pull himself up, holding onto the walker. The next second he dropped back in the wheelchair with the walker in his lap.
Sandra kept her face perfectly straight. “That’s why I’m sure Martin told you to push up from the seat, rather than trying to pull yourself up on the walker.” She lifted the walker away from his lap. “Try it the PT way this time?”
Dr. Lewis looked as though smoke was about to come out of his ears, but held his breath again and pushed up from the wheelchair this time. Once vertical he let out a loud breath, but quickly started moving forward. His technique was adequate as he walked across the room and back. Without waiting for instructions, he turned around and plopped down into the wheelchair.
“You walk smoothly with very little sign of which side the injury is on. That’s great at this point. There are a couple of things to improve on, though. The first is the way you held your breath when you got up. You need to try to breathe normally throughout your workout. Holding your breath is a bad habit.”
When he opened his mouth to speak, she held up her hand.
“Please let me finish, Doctor. The other issue I have is the same one Martin had with you. When you sat down just now, you plopped down, without even checking if your chair was there. It’s important to sit down slowly and evenly, so you use your muscles for that movement as well. Please stand up and try it again. This time hold onto the walker with one hand and reach back for the wheelchair with the other. Then lower yourself slowly and smoothly. That’s exercise, too, and it’s equally as important as working on walking and leg strengthening.”
