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Thank you very much, Marcella. No knees. Both legs amputated above the knee. I transfer from bed to chair by waddling like a duck on my stumps. With bed raised slightly higher than chair and chair facing bed and me sitting up on stumps and turned toward chair, I lean as far as I can to one side, then move the opposite stump forward as far as I can (not far at this stage). Then lean the other way and move the opposite stump. After I get all the way on to chair, I turn myself around. Takes me about 5-10 minutes to get completely transferred and ready to go, but I git ‘er done. Will get faster as fresh stump heals and I get stronger. Similar procedure gets me to and from commode or shower bench and hopefully to and from driver’s seat.

Since you are accomplishing transfer without legs/knees, I will inform the dog who throws herself down the stairs, that, if you can do that, she can surely use her legs to get down the stairs.

I'm so glad you are doing it by yourself - running your own life.

My husband was in the hospital and ready to go home. I had all his stuff packed but the nurses had not done the paperwork. See, he was not their patient anymore, and they had washed their hands of him, it didn't matter to them when they got the paperwork done. I told him to ask for a coke, then rolled him out of room to in front of the nurses station and he told them he wanted a coke. Then, I said, do you want to serve his lunch, now? Suddenly, they were running around to get the paperwork done and we were out of there.

I have used their psychological mindset to get what I needed for my husband. I would put on my white blouse with my “Dr.” nametag on it, and take him to the emergency room when he had to go there, which was several times during his various illness (it always happens on the weekend, right?) When the receiving nurse would see that white blouse and nametag, she would take him straight to the back to a doctor. The doctor, seeing my name tag, would describe exactly what he was going to do, and I'd respond with something like, “Yes, I agree, that is the thing to do.”

I did whatever was necessary to get them to do the right thing right then.