I fall down a lot. So many hard falls, but as of yet not a single fracture (knock on wood). I am clumsy at times and have never been graceful. Maybe if I could have taken ballet lessons…

That awkward stage children go through, well, that’s me, I just got there and didn’t move on. My husband sums it up simply, “Honey, you need to slow down, you don’t watch where you’re going.”

My daughter-in-law mused one day, “It’s funny how Lyne is always around when you fall; it looks a little bit suspicious.”

It’s true, he has attended many of my accidents, but I fall down when he’s not around too. Like the time I climbed up in my son’s tree house years ago. It was unoccupied at the time since he had outgrown playing in it. It was a good place to store my empty flowerpots. My friend Theresa had come down and dug up several free plants from my yard. She is very agile and could have scurried up the ladder and retrieved the pots like a squirrel. But, oh no, your grace had to do it. The ladder had become dilapidated and as I climbed up Theresa called out from below, “Be careful, Kaye, that ladder’s not sturdy.”

As I descended with the pots, one rung broke and I lost my balance. I dropped the pots down to Theresa, trying to regain my grip. About that time another rung broke. Falling freely now, I went down each remaining rung on my rear end, finally landing on the last rung.

I don’t go to the doctor often, but the intense pain told me to go. After X-rays the doctor said proudly, “Your coccyx isn’t broken, just bruised pretty bad.” He then said, “You’re going to feel it for a couple of weeks or more. Just take Tylenol or Ibuprofen, whichever one helps, and warm soaks are about all you can do.”

The term is not in the medical books, but he could have just said, “You’re stoved up.”

Sitting down was bearable, but the getting up was so painful it took my breath. It lasted a good two weeks and through the influence of a now empty Tylenol bottle I told myself, “You’re lucky, nothing was broken.”

My husband shared my thinking. He said, “It could have been worse, you’re lucky you didn’t break a bone, you could have been laid up for a long time.” Then as an afterthought, “You have got to watch what you’re doing!”

Now, at my age it’s called “Fall Risk” and that requires a diagnosis and an ICDN code. I don’t think they have one for “Stoved Up.”

Kaye Steadman is a storyteller and author of the book “My Name's Not Verly”. She can be reached at kayesteadman@aol.com or follow her on Facebook.