Driving - Yes or No?

Today we went to see the occupational therapists at St. David's to get me evaluated for being able to drive. I went there just KNOWING they were gonna find a reason - ANY reason - to keep me grounded so they could make me do a bunch more therapy so they could milk us for more insurance money. Yeah, I've grown more than a little skeptical of the system.

At first they asked a bunch of questions, tested my balance a bit, tested my upper body strength and control, and then tested my eyesight. Then they tested my reaction time on what I can only call a pedal simulator.

This involved pressing a 'gas pedal' until a red light came on then hitting the 'brake pedal' as fast as I could. My reaction time was less than stellar, but it was not that far off the expected norm.

Next up? A real driving test.

We (The therapist and I. J had to stay behind) climbed in a 2002 Impala (VERY similar to ours) that had been rigged with a passenger side brake and hand control for the driver. The evaluator took the wheel and drove us to the local mall parking lot. Then I took over.

First we drove around the lot a bit, just letting me get used to things. The next phase involved her telling me to stop and seeing how well and quickly I reacted.

The first time I was kinda in la-la-land, just enjoying driving again so when she said stop, I didn't even hardly hear her, so my time there was pretty bad. After that it got better. After doing that for a while she had me hit the streets! In downtown Austin! We drove all the way from about 32nd Street down to Riverside Dr. via the frontage road. She left it up to me where to go from there so I tested my route to work and drove into the Statesman lot and out the other side onto Congress Ave., turned left up to Cesar Chavez, then down to I35. I turned left onto the frontage road there and drove back to the hospital.

Along the way we encountered our fair share of kooks as you will inevitable do when driving in Austin and I handled them all almost as well as I ever have.

When we got back, I was bracing my self for the inevitable news that more therapy was going to be required when she declared I can drive again with NO restrictions! I was shocked! Pleasantly, but shocked nonetheless!

When we got back into the clinic I told J it was bad news. (Pause for effect) I was allowed to drive! She looked kinda surprised too. Or was that apprehension and fear? I'm not sure.
Anyway, I need to start locally and develop my timing and reaction time before venturing farther out. I'll start with short local runs and working on my reaction times in parking lots and gradually build up to driving to PT and other local areas, then to getting on the tollway to practice maneuvering at speed, then it'll be on to I35 a bit, then driving to work again!

To quote Mel Gibson in Braveheart... FREEDOM! ;)