Love and Laughter Coping With Polio

After raising three daughters, volunteering in public school special education classes for eighteen years, and sitting on several Boards serving people with various disabilities, Jean Phillips finds herself confined to a hospital bed in her small living room with no hope of ever moving independently again. She feels like she is in jail. As a polio survivor, she knows she had been pushing her body to its limits with all her activities, but saying no is not easy for her. Now she has been felled by an accident and the debilitating effects of Post Polio Syndrome. She reads through the journal her mother kept during the years Jean was in and out of hospitals as doctors tried to restore mobility to her legs and feet. She cannot remember when she was only four and awoke one morning with a high fever, unable to walk. Soon, though, her mother%u2019s words match her memories of her childhood. She is so happy to finally come home from the hospital that first time, and she works hard with the physical therapist who visits every day. Her mother is thrilled when she can stand holding on with only one hand. Progress is slow, but her mother%u2019s faith and Jean%u2019s determination keep them from being discouraged. Although she gradually regains some strength, and is able to walk with crutches and braces, doctors feel more can be done. She is accepted as a patient by Shriner's Hospital when she is seven years old. Immediately she is put in a cast from her neck to below her hips in an attempt to straighten the spine. No visitors are allowed inside the hospital, but twice a week they visit through the window from outside. Jean's father gets a ladder so they can be closer to her, and they use a Walkie-Talkie device to communicate. Her first surgery is to fuse her spine, and her parents wait anxiously until they are allowed to call at 6:00. They cannot visit her until two weeks after the surgery, and the wait is very hard for the whole family. Two months later she is home in a body cast. So begins a childhood spent between home and hospital. There are many more surgeries and casts. A treatment called "wedging," is perhaps the most painful she endures. The diary ends when Jean is 16, and no longer eligible for the services of Shriner's. Two years later her mother dies, and leaves the family reeling. Without the guidance she needs, Jean gets pregnant and enters into the first of two lonely, loveless marriages. She tries to say and do what her in-laws want, but she knows they only see her disability. After her second divorce, she and two of her daughters follow a man to Michigan, looking for the "true love" that has evaded her. When he deserts her, she returns to California and decides to volunteer in her youngest daughter's special education class. She finds she loves the work. It is close to a dream she has always harbored of running a pre-school. She joins the Board of Directors of Far Northern Regional Center, serving people with developmental disabilities. With others, she works to end abuse of disabled people in care facilities. She is deeply involved in community projects when she breaks her leg. Given the added complications of Post Polio Syndrome, her doctor says she will never leave her bed without assistance. This is her newest challenge: can an independent, dynamic woman find happiness when her body no longer has the strength to carry her.