The Outdoors, Sometimes Great, Mostly Not

March 26, 2021

My relationship with the outdoors is complicated.

About fifty years ago, my parents bought land on the Oregon coast. After they had four children, they built a cabin in those Oregon woods. A true cabin, with no electricity or running water. Dad painstakingly cleared a narrow path through the woods that eventually met up with a slippery, sandy, sometimes steep trail to the beach.

We all have good memories of time together at the cabin. But there is also a consensus that “Danielle doesn’t like the cabin.” Or “Danielle doesn’t like Oregon.”  For me, when I thought of Oregon/the cabin (which were the same thing in my young mind), I thought of gorse.

Gorse is a shrub with pretty yellow flowers. It’s also “an invasive species of worldwide concern” and is very familiar to me. Gorse is made of thorns. Gorse is made of thorns and tree trunks are full of sap. 

My siblings might have seen adventure and opportunity. For me, the Oregon woods were an unending obstacle course. And for a kid with cerebral palsy, an obstacle course isn’t fun. The springy, uneven, unpredictable forest floor, covered in twigs and branches and vines and rotting stumps and ferns and gorse. And what is there for me to steady myself with? Trees covered in sap. 

I did not explore with joyful abandon. Climb from stump to stump to stand tall atop the biggest one. Build forts. Leap across streams. The forest wasn’t accessible to me. It was an environment that was difficult to participate in, to be a part of.

I’m not exaggerating when I say that my most vivid memory of being in the woods around the cabin is of falling, and lifting my hand to pluck the gorse thorns from my sticky, sap-covered palm. I do have many good memories, too, but the strongest one is landing with a sudden rustle-thud that only that forest floor can produce, and assessing the damage. 

Even the ocean, when we finally made it down to the beach, wasn’t something I loved. Navigating sand is nightmarish, and the water was cold. Then I had to climb back up the steep, slidy trail. With wet sand in my shoes, chafing my toes.

I think the last time I slept at the cabin, I was in my early teens. When my sister got married there in 2009, and many of the guests went down to the beach, I did not even attempt to go. When I brought my own husband to see the cabin years later, he too, went down to the beach while I waited, safely seated, and imagined his trek through the trees.

When given the option to be outside or inside, I’ve mostly chosen inside. Inside is safer. Inside is easier. (Okay, both times I’ve needed stitches were inside incidents. Nowhere is safe. Just safer.)

But I also LOVE the forest. The roaring quiet. The dim coolness. The alive stillness. Trees feed the soul. You are compelled to breathe deep of the oxygen. Compelled to speak softly inside the majesty.

I don’t remember my first accessible hike. Not that there have been so many of them. Palisade Falls near Bozeman, Montana, in 2004, maybe. Then Glacier National Park, on a raised wooden walkway. Being able to walk beneath and among the trees without expending all my energy and concentration on staying upright is spectacular.

Sometimes I feel like I need to just be with the trees.

Wanting to take me to the trees again, my husband found Roy’s Redwoods Preserve in Marin County. It was my second spring break of the pandemic, the second year we did not go on a weeklong trip, so a day trip we took. Now, it turns out that the name is a bit of a misnomer. While there are some redwoods in this preserve, we did not reach a place on the trails where I was truly surrounded and sheltered by them. No alive stillness for me that day. Instead, I experienced a different kind of aliveness altogether.

Friday, March 26, was my first real outing with both my back support and my trekking poles. I also wore really supportive shoes with a stiff sole. This was my first trail that was not officially deemed “accessible.” We chose Roy’s Redwoods Loop Trail over the Meadow Trail, because I wanted redwoods, not meadow. The trail started off fine, narrow, but flat. Soon, though, I encountered rocks jutting out of the packed dirt, and inclines. And inclines with rocks. I surprised myself by navigating up those uneven inclines and over those jutting rocks. “I did it!” I said, like a toddler learning a new skill. My husband stood near when I hesitated, ready to assist while I attempted different footings and pole placements, but, I did it all by myself.

I wondered how much harder it would get, and how much more I could actually do. And how I was going to get back down. This loop was not small and we were not planning to do the whole thing; was it already time to abort mission? But I wanted to see if I could get to the redwoods that were supposed to be on this trail, so we kept going. For the record, here’s its official description: “For a peaceful getaway, meander down Roy’s Redwoods Loop Trail.” My husband meandered peacefully, while I worked through the most challenging terrain of my adult life. The pictures don’t do it justice. I didn’t think to pause for photos on the hard bits because I was a little too busy not falling.

Eventually, we emerged from the trees and found ourselves on the side of a hill. I looked down to my right and up to my left and realized I had hiked up a hill. We kept going for a while longer. We did not reach the redwoods, but we did end up meeting the Meadow Trail, so we did not have to retrace all our steps (some of which I’m pretty sure I couldn’t have handled going down).

The Meadow Trail was easier, but we still had to hike in a downwardly direction. Down is much more difficult. Instead of leaning up into my poles and heaving all my weight onto them as I step, I had to place them down in front of me without falling forward with them. There were a couple of legitimately scary moments for me, but I made it down all by myself. I hiked. I’m a hiker.

I would not have been successful if we had tried to hike with me just holding my husband’s hand. I would have pulled his arm, hard, the whole time, and still not have been able to do it. Without the poles and the back brace, it would have been truly impossible. I would not have even attempted to climb over/around that first jutting rock, because I would not have been able to stay upright. Good poles, good brace, good shoes. I have found a combination of tools that give me what I need to be able to do what I cannot do alone. To my knowledge, no doctor has ever suggested back support for me. I have been given exercises to strengthen my outer hips, to combat my side-to-side shift, since toddlerhood. My entire life–Strengthen those hips! Don’t let that hip drop! It turns out that stabilizing my trunk helps so much, enabling me to focus on the glutes. Yes, I’ve been doing my glute exercises consistently for months as well, but I can’t help but wonder if we’ve been going about this whole thing backwards. Strengthen hips=stable core? Or stabilized core=ability to engage other muscles.

If you have cerebral palsy similar to spastic diplegia with hip drop, I say try some back support and see what it feels like.

I have accomplished many things I’m proud of. Not many of those are physical achievements. Physical success is not something I often experience. As I continued to navigate obstacle after obstacle on that trail, under my own power, I suddenly understood how doing physical things that are hard can be almost…fun. Meeting a challenge. Here is a time when the term “physically challenged” is appropriate. I was physically challenged by that hike, and I succeeded. And I liked it. I want to hike again. With more redwoods next time.