Julian’s Progress

Well, it has been three years now since my spinal cord injury. I celebrated by visiting the Baha’i Shrine in Montreal yesterday, with my wife Suzanne, and our good friends Joan and Franklin from New Hampshire. We drove around the city in their car, did some shopping, and visited the Shrine. Here we all are standing outside the Shrine on Pine Avenue.

Joan, Franklin, Suzanne, and Julian

Franklin then took my camera and filmed me walking back to the car, using my canes.

I now use my canes outside when I know that I will not have to sit down in the middle of the street, or when I know that there are going to be places for me to sit when I get wherever I am going. If I know that I am going to have a long walk, I usually take my walker, so that I can sit down if I need to. I also use the walker to carry my backpack when it gets too heavy. At home I can manage to get around most of the time without using my canes at all! What I find most encouraging, is that I am still improving. I think that all the exercising I am doing at the YMCA is really helping. I am up to 15 minutes on the treadmill, 9 minutes on the bicycle, and I do various other exercises using the machines at the YMCA’s technogym (I guess it took a geeky approach to exercise to keep me interested).