Mom’s knees pain her and are weak and wobbly with arthritis. “I feel like I might fall,” she often says.  You can’t fall, I want to say.  If you fall, your life in this house will be over.  At the nearby hospital, the orthopedic doctor prepared to inject cortisone into her knees.  I asked him questions about injection dosage and frequency, and he answered that the dosage was fixed, standard, and the injections could be administered only every three months.  I thanked him for the information.  The doctor asked Mom if she had any questions.  “Do you want me to pull my pants down now?” was her answer.  I felt a bit embarrassed as the doctor shifted on his feet and stammered a suggestion that maybe she could lift her pant legs.  She could not.  Down came her pants.  In went the needles.  “I hope the shots help, Mom,” I managed as I wheeled her out to the car.  They did not.

(Image by Ewa Urban from Pixabay)