Numbness
 

My feet are numb and I have poor balance. But I am perplexed that
I can feel the accelerator and can drive. Any input will be appreciated

Hi - I don't have a great deal of trouble driving - sometimes late in the day. I know I am really cautious driving the car into the garage late in the day. Sometimes when neuropathy is at its worst I actually look down to check where my foot is placed on the break. I don't have a great deal of trouble with pressure on either the gas or breaks just position of the foot. I also have the numbness and the balance problem.

Driving? Wow!
 

It can be such an ADVENTURE at times!
I drive mostly in suburban type traffic, lots of stop/go stuff and when I get tired or am having an 'off' or worse day, I DO wish I could actually see where my feet are!
It's just a process of super caution, I guess. I schedule doc appointments after or before rush hours. I drive the less restrictive routes to offices, such as back roads - so I can pull over and walk around the car a few times to get some 'feeling' back in my feet. It can get scary at times? But, I appreciate the fact that I can drive [altho like a super-chicken] as I realize others aren't a mobile.
Just plan things out, allow extra time for delays [traffic and body wise] and be super careful. - j

I may drive like a little old lady, but I definitely am NOT!

Driving is not so much a problem for me as walking. I tend to not step where I think I am stepping. Took my first spill last week and went crashing to the floor. That was strange. I tried to turn in place and over I went. The front of my feet seem to forget late in the day. Of course that is when the pain, numbness and tingling is worse so it makes sense.

Only if you
 

both are sure you wouldn't hurt others,i just can't do it,and i don't like
it just know i can't...I also have trouble walking,and falling hurts,so
try your best to slow down.. I'm sure you both already know this..
J is very carefull about everything she does,i know it's so hard to
think everything through,but we must.. Nothing but the best, Sue

Hi cwc000, if i remember right you have prediabetes which is said to cause
prominently small nerve damage, which of course is showing up as numbness in your feet.
When you say you can feel the cars pedals, then one would think that not all of your small fibres in your feet are completely numb as they must be still sending signals to your brain to interpret that feeling.
Prediabetes can also affect the larger nerves as well, which is not mentioned in some studies i have read, its usually picked up by an EMG which was the case in my PN, your balance problem makes me think that there is some large nerve involvement going on as well, which could explain the balance trouble, have you had an EMG yet ?

HI. up until five or so years ago, Alan would drive with no problems. He even drove when he wore the fentanyl pain patch. It just ended his pain (he didn't go to the bathroom unless he took laxatives), but the patch helped a great deal with the pain. So he was able to drive and do his work.

BUT.. one day, we were at a red light and all of a sudden, he goes "what did my foot do?? I can't feel what pedal I'm hitting". It seems that at the red light, when he should have had his foot on the left brake pedal, he hit the accelerator. He caught himself right away.

I don't drive, so I didn't think much about that.

But later on in the day, we went in the car and he said to me "Melody, I can't feel the pedals". I said "you are not driving after today, it's not fair to anybody else and it's certainly not fair to me". It's like having a weapon in your hands and you have no control over where the weapon goes. Alan's feet had become so numb after all those years with his PN getting progressively worse, that the time had come for him to get our of the car, give the car back to the leasing company, and take public transportation or walk where we had to walk.

Believe me, when you have gone everywhere by car, visited family in nearby adjoining states, gone to Costco, gone to appointments, visited friends, and all that stops, well, we lost a great deal.

I hope that one day, if he ever gets feeling back in his feet, that we can get a second hand car and go places again. We have friends and family in New Jersey, we want to go to Costco.

I offered to learn to drive. Alan just looked at me and said "with your sense of direction, you'd wind up in Alaska". I just laughed. lol

Melody

It's intersting about driving. (I haven't driven since I had the muscle seizures with tetanus and my legs would movve without me intending them too. But I so want to drive again one day. I want to go to Old Oraibi.. I forget how it's spelled, a Hopi village, and get my earrings mended that I bought there.)

When I'd first been living in the hydrogen sulfide I was always bumping my head, and spilling things because I didn't judge the distance right and I'd hit the edge of a cabinet with a pitcher, or a door jam with a plate...

I asked each of my therapists at the time, the one was helping me with adjusting to learning of my mental disability: loss of processing speed and working memory, and the other was helping me learn compensation techniques.

Each of them had brain damage, traumatic brain injury, which is what I got when I fell and hit my head on the brick floor. And they too had problems with bumping into things. But each of them said that driving was okay. I can't remember how they explained that, but they said that it was.

What amazes me now, is that I don't bump into things nearly as much any more, and I'm sure that's related to the huge amounts of B12 I've had since I had tetanus... I remember that the one therapist had tiny tiny moons -- but on each of her fingers, so I didn't think B12 could be a problem for her... but now that I have tiny tiny moons on a few more fingers, I can see that while that's great, more improvement is needed.

:)

(((((((((((shiney sue)))))))))))

I just hate falling. I am so careful now.
I've read your posts to see how you got your black eye... did you fall recently?

I'm in bed today because without sleeping enough lately I have even less balance than usual and I just cannot risk falling and breaking something.

I wish Nide could hang out in bed or at the beach for a few days and let his body heal... I think total rest is amazing for the help that it brings.

I too have some times of great numbness...or at least my feet will feel wooden or dead...but i can still feel things fine with them. Don't know what I would do if that progressed and I couldn't drive. Sometimes the driving (the pushing of the pedals) certainly increases my pain but I just have to bear it. So sorry that some of you can't drive! Perhaps one day again!