for her elbows and her head; she continued to breath, be completely alert, able to eat, etc. For a woman of such great vitality, this situation felt absolutely tragic. During a three month hospitalization she regained much of her upper body, but had lost forever the ability to control her bowels and bladder, or walk normally, her spinal nerves being damaged. While in the hospital the nurses turned her frequently, and due to good previous nutrition Eva did not develop any bed sores; unusual in a woman of 78. My decision was to bring her home, rather than send her to a nursing home. I made this decision more from a gut reaction than from sensible consideration of the difficulties, but I do not regret the years spent. We renovated her farm house, across the street from my home, accessible by wheel chair, both inside and out. I hired a few friends as part time care givers, and Eva came home in early March of 2002. Eventually I decided that she would wear diapers, as the indwelling catheter caused frequent urinary infections. By this time her bladder released urine continually. As a nurse I worried about her skin integrity, both from the pressure of bed rest, but also from the irritation of urine. Because we could not afford 24 hour nurses, Eva spent the night time hours sleeping in her home; she could call for help if needed, but I could think of no realistic way to turn her every two hours or change her diaper in the night. From the beginning of her return, I instructed the helpers to apply a small accumulator pad to her coccyx (the base of her spine) for a few minutes several times each day. We also used the full body accumulator on her nearly every day for 10-30 minutes. We continued her natural foods diet; as we live in such a northern climate, her meals were not strictly raw or fresh, but were organic and vegetarian. As the years passed, her mobility and ability to sit up, or even leave the bed at all, became limited. Moving became painful. We placed foam pads over her mattress, as well as a fleece layer, but all layers shortly became compressed. We did not always remember to use the accumulator pad on her bottom as the other daily personal care tasks for Eva mounted. I realize now that her vitamin D level was likely low, which may have contributed to her pain with movement. Unfortunately, in the midst of so many health issues, her doctor and I neglected to test for this deficiency. Her doctor is a wonderful man. He let us care for her in the ways that we liked and gave us advice if needed. He was not aware of our regular use of the accumulator, although he was aware of Eva’s connection to Wilhelm Reich and her own belief in many alternative therapies. Her doctor made home visits occasionally, and remarked many times how amazing it seemed that Eva continued living as long as she did, with such vitality. Eva became thinner, which put even more pressure on the bones of her bottom. In the last several years of her life, an occasional red, broken skin area opened on her coccyx; when this happened, we remembered and again applied the local accumulator diligently. Healing then occurred within a few days. In the last year her nutrition also suffered because she disliked the taste of food; Eva had more difficulty chewing and swallowing (even fresh juices), which along with her increased bedridden state, made keeping her skin healthy more difficult. During the last year of her life Eva began to dislike the accumulator blanket, although she would still allow the local treatment of her bottom. She suffered at times from more dementia, but also was often realistic and coherent. Eva knew that she would never walk the fields or garden again; “hop around”, as she called it, and wondered why she didn’t simply die. During this year her doctor kindly offered her in-hospital palliative sedation (intraveEva Reich, 2002 24 Renata Reich Moise Household Use of the Orgone Energy Accumulator
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