When Jaci was at the end of the bars she saw her mother in her chair near the end of the other set of bars.  Mitzi sat in the chair and began to cry.  Without thinking Jaci left the bars and took five unassisted steps to her and bent down to hold her.  The steps were slightly awkward but they were quite definite and almost looked sure.  Amy almost fell getting to her to make sure she didn’t fall.  Jaci was not aware of the concern for her safety.  Her attention was on her mom.  For a couple of seconds she forgot that she was not to be walking yet without her crutches.  When she finally became aware the others in the room were huddled around her she turned red.  “As mom says, ‘busted.’  I wasn’t supposed to do that, was I?”

Amy smiled, “No, but if you can and you can keep yourself from falling you are going to be fine.  For a couple of days, please use your crutches, a cane or at least hold on to something.  If you fall on that stump it will hurt, I assure you.  We’ll get you a cane before you leave if you like.  If you can walk like that I might have some good news for you.  Would you just humor me and get back in the chair before I have a coronary.  I’m too young to be in the CICU.”  She pushed the chair to a low table and asked Jaci to get on the table.

Jaci complied and said, “I’m sorry.  I shouldn’t have frightened you.  I forgot.”

“No problem, just try to not scare me so much.  Cut me in before you do something like that again.  Unless I know it will hurt you I will allow you to drive your recovery as fast as possible.  You are moving because you are moving.”  She went to the desk, made a phone call, picked up a small object and came back to the table. 

“Watch what I’m doing, you’ll need to know how to use this little wrench.”  She lifted Jaci’s leg with the pylon pointing almost straight up so she could see what she was doing at the end of the temporary socket.  “You loosen these screws to take your leg off.  You’ll have to learn to do this as time goes on, see watch this.”  A couple of turns on the screws, then she pulled the pylon and it came out of the plaster and metal socket that encased her stump. She eased Jaci’s socket and stump back to the table.  Jaci felt nearly naked, but for the removal to check her stump, this was the first time she had seen her body with no leg, the metal pylon may not have been attractive but it represented her lost leg and a connection to normalcy.  She was really one legged.  She batted back some tears.