LIMA — “Last one to the monkey bars is a rotten egg.”
Those words, or something like them, were what Nikki used while goofing off with her children at a playground in May 2015. She ended up being the rotten egg. She tripped and fell, fracturing her left hip.
“As fast as I was runnin’, you’d of thought I was in the Olympics. I didn’t know I could run that fast,” she said of her mad dash.
Nor did she realize, until she tripped and stumbled, how adroitly she could move through the air, like an Olympic gymnast. “I did a triple flip before I actually fell, because I almost caught myself twice,” Nikki said.
The Lima mom fractured her left hip and hasn’t been able to work steadily since. It’s been more than a year.
“I’ve been off and on, because I’ve been having to get some sort of an income in,” said the single mom. “But it ain’t been lasting long.”
That’s because the type of work Nikki does as a state-tested nurse’s aide involves lifting, bending, pushing and pulling. It means Nikki is trying to do for other immobile or physically impaired people what she can’t do herself.
“Your mind says, ‘I can do this, I can do this.’ Or, ‘Maybe I can do this with somebody helping me,’” she said of her attempts to return to work full-time. “But then when you do it, it’s like, ‘Oh my God!’”
She said the experience has given her a new perspective on her clients.
“Usually, on the job, you’re like, ‘C’mon, Johnny, you can move faster than that.’ Well, no, he probably can’t,” Nikki said. “It was kinda bittersweet. From doing that job, I was actually on the other end real quick.”
Nikki is seeking financial assistance from The Lima News’ Empty Stocking Fund to help keep Christmas for her children, ages 9, 6 and 3, and for her new 6-month-old baby girl. Christmas toys are not the only need, however. Nikki could use the help of an extermination service to kill bed bugs she discovered a few months ago.
“I bought some of this stuff,” she said, pulling out a bottle of pink insecticide. “It wasn’t cheap.”
But the bed bugs haven’t disappeared, and she’s learned that they are tough to get rid of without professional help.
“I didn’t know we’d be in this predicament,” she said ruefully. “But here we are.”
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