Colin’s accident caused damage to his C5 vertebra, but it was an incomplete injury. This means that there is some nerve transmission between the brain and lower than C5. Although this is still quite high, and he has lost a huge amount of ability, he does have some limited hand function.
Since his right arm started working, he has worked a lot on being able to use his hand even just a little bit. He loves to go outside and feed the bunnies. Part of this ritual is also turning on the outside tap to fill the plastic rock under the tap. All our animals drink from here – the dogs, the cats, the bunnies, and even some birds drink and bath in there.
Colin always complains that I tighten the taps too much – a side effect of what he calls my “piano hands” and he is unable to turn the tap on or off without a huge effort, or sometimes not at all.
I used mouldable plastic eggs to fashion a larger handle for him. He has not tested it yet, but I am 99% certain this will work for him.
You can sort of see how short the metal tap is underneath the white plastic. The handle is now much longer, and the plastic sets surprisingly hard.
Thank you Pratley.