Does OHS qualify you for a Handicap Parking placard?

[Illinois Al]

It's great to hear from your peers!

It's great to hear from your peers!

Thanks for everybody's input! That's one great thing about this forum, I appreciate and respect the opinions of people in the same situation as I am.

Everybody pretty well confirms what I had been thinking, that although legally I could use the placard until it expires (it was properly issued to me after my [pre-op] conditions had been vetted by my PCP), I should stop using it and be thankful that my AVR surgery has enabled me to do so.

The experience has certainly made me sensitive to, as somebody said earlier, "hidden" disabiities that are readily visible to observers.

 

[Rich]

For those with disabilities from surgery or other hidden disabilities it is just fine.
If your surgery went well and you have no problems other than normal recovery than absolutely not. Walking is in my opinion the very best and simplest rehab there is.
When my wife was laid up for six months with a severly shattered ankle, she had a handicap parking permit. But the abuse I saw during that time was unbelievable.
Now our county sheriff thinks so too. He has enlisted many, many volunteers who have been trained and given the authority to ticket any and all offenders.

 

[aussigal]

I love Dawn-Marie's idea of writing a quick note to "help" the offending people qualify for disability by breaking a couple of legs for them!...lol...

I used the shopping centre's wheelchairs for a few weeks post OHS and I always went out with a helper. That solved the problem for me.

 

[Susan BAV]

Over the years, I've had a few strange experiences in regard to handicapped spots. Probably a lot of people here have had similar experiences.

Shortly after my first heart surgery, my dad pulled into one when he took me to a cardio followup and the old parking attendant started yelling at him and I thought it was going to get ugly. I don't know if they had placards then but I was 17 and probably looked like I didn't need it even though I was in such pain with a 12" long incision through my back. We may have been in the wrong, in that gravel lot a hundred yards from the hospital.

That was the only time my dad ever took a handicap spot. He was a very fair-minded person and wouldn't even personally use a handicap spot in his last miserable days as I drove him from the hospital (while he had a picc line for chemo and was on a feeding tube) to the radiation center for his daily radiation in the below-freezing midwest ice storms that last brutal winter. I found a way around that by racing out to the car and warming it up and picking him up at the building entrances. I probably offended someone though.

Once I was riding with a relative who was on oxygen who had a placard but out-of-state plates and I just happened to hop out of their vehicle first when we parked and a woman began yelling at me, not having seen the relative climbing out with his oxygen tank. It was an unpleasant experience of course.

Several times recently I've helped a very old and crippled friend with some errands, doctor visits, etc., and she always brings her placard -- she badly needs it -- and several times I've hopped out of my car to race around to help her out and caught some angry looks from assuming persons.

Regarding people who use placards who don't seem to need them, I think, "what do I know?" We, as heart patients, realize a person may be much more ill than they appear.

 

[briansmom]

I have had this same dilemma for my son. He is post op, but pre-pre-pre (I hope) transplant. He has a lot of problems with his legs also. On the other hand, we do want him to walk. On the other hand (i'm running out of hands) some parking lots or events require him to walk way farther than he really can. I have just about decided to ask the doctors to authorize one and plan to use it for him only when necessary.

 

[geckley]

I was given my placard 2 months before my MV repair. I used it because of my sever PH. After surgery I hardly ever use it. But....... there are those days when I just feel under the weather. I don't know if it's because of the humidity or the weird temp changes here in the mid Atlantic. But some times I go out and walk 3-4 miles and the next day I can't even walk to the end of my street before I'm litteraly gasping for air. So I use mine in extreme cases only. I do however, look for any non handicapped spaces that I think I can manage on the bad days. I only use it as a last resort. As a side note I used it on the second day after I was out of the hospital at the drug store to get my meds. And a gentleman much older than me started to cuss me out because I had my wife park in the handicap space. It gave me great pleasur to rip open my shirt and show him the still fresh and spotty mangled mess of a scar that I have. He quickly turned his face uttered an apology and shuffled along his way. That was probably the best medicine I ever got just to see his expression.

 

[Nancy]

Had the same experience when Joe was home only 2 days after one of his surgeries. He wanted to go to the market with me. We had a temp. handicapped card for him, and I parked in the handicap spot. It was a chilly day, and after we finished shopping, Joe asked me to warm the car up for him before he got in it, and he waited in the market until the car was warm.

A woman who just got out of her car in the adjacent handicapped space, started cussing me out. Fortunately just at that time, Joe slowly walked to the car. He was white as a ghost and having trouble moving and I had to help him.

The woman's husband said to her, "I told you not to say anything, because you don't know the situation."

There are many people who look just fine, but have major health problems. PH is one of those. Some folks with PH do not use oxygen, but have a lot of trouble walking any distance (you know why they use the 6 minute walking test to measure PH symptoms).

Heart surgery would be another, not obvious unless the scar was visible.

Joe didn't get a permanent card until he just couldn't manage to walk more than a few feet w/o difficulty. But he did have temporary ones a few times.