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Louis "Bud" Dabney,
8354 Edgedale Road,
Baltimore, 4, Maryland

Before my visit to Toomey on June 4, 1957, I did not do very much of anything, but sit in my chair for a couple of hours and lay in bed with a chest piece on. Now, some days the time goes by so fast, you wonder where all the time has gone. In that way, you forget about your polio, and that is the biggest fight with someone who has polio. (I think so any way).

The four months I spent in the hospital, I picked up some good ideas from other patients, got some new equipment and learned about typing with a mouthstick which I enjoy very much. I can now type 15 to 20 words a minute at times. I also had my right kidney removed which has improved my health. Now, I am doing more, sitting in my chair most of the day, also taking longer trips in our car and my portable respirator enables me to stay away from home over night.

In September '58, I passed my State Insurance Examination which made me an insurance agent to sell any place in Maryland. After I passed my test, I needed a desk that my wheelchair could roll under and big enough for some one else who might come in to buy insurance. I needed a telephone that I could use while I was getting information over the phone to type, and when I was alone.

So I supervised the building of my desk which is 6 x 2 ft x 31 1/2 in. It has two shelves and a little switch board with three switches. One is for my positive pressure typing stick, one is for the electric typewriter and the third switch is for a wall light over my desk which I use when I do telephone work at night. (I do most of my insurance work at night, that seems the best time to get the man of the house at home.) By the way, I do not have any use of my arms or hands, but my legs are in pretty good shape, as you will see later in my letter.

My telephone is one with an operator's head piece. I have the phone mounted on a board 10" x 13" with a large handle so that I can lift it with my foot and move it around to where I want it. Once someone puts the headpiece on my head, I can sit in my chair and talk for hours. I turn the phone on and off with my foot talking to as many people as I want. I have a manual phone, I just push a button to get the operator and he gets my number. During the conversation if I get tired I just roll my chair over to my positive pressure and get a few puffs of air, then back to the conversation.

Some of the few other things that I can do myself seem to make things a little more enjoyable. Once I have my corset on, I can get in and out of bed by myself, as I have a switch on the foot board of my rocking bed, so that when I stop the bed with the foot end down and roll on my side to get my foot under the frame of the bed in order to pull myself up, then I just step off the bed.

When I want to get back in bed, I step on a stool to sit on the edge of the bed and just fall on my right side and start the rocking bed going. I learned the trick of getting out of bed from Jerry Hill of Cleveland.

I have switches on just about every thing that I might want to turn off and on. One of the big helpers for me in new equipment is my hand resuscitator. It is a handy thing for me around the house. It enables me to walk up and down stairs with someone pumping, then I am not too tired when I get to where I am going, like the bath room several times a day or just to take a bath or a shower. It has been used when I take short rides and many different ways.