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Garden parties: Partnership offers therapy for wheelchair-bound

By Debbie Arrington, McClatchy Newspapers, Source: MCT News Service

SACRAMENTO, Calif. _ Sandy Abilovitz found renewed strength in home-grown vegetables.

Although he can't get down in the dirt and dig, Abilovitz created a garden this summer in his Sacramento, Calif., backyard with the help of his caregiver, Nathan Demesse.

"This project gives me a purpose," Abilovitz said, "and most importantly, I get to eat the fresh vegetables and fruit."

Demesse said: "He designed it, did all the planning. I just followed his direction, and it turned out amazing. I had never done anything like this before, but this is so exciting, and so fulfilling."

They make unlikely gardening partners. Abilovitz, 77, had done little backyard farming since his youth in Israel. Demesse, 28, emigrated to Sacramento as a child with his family, political exiles from Ethiopia.

Both agree: Sacramento weather feels a lot like home.

"The growing climate here is very much like Israel," Abilovitz said.

The garden was the suggestion of Abilovitz's son, Aaron. Behind a shed next to the air conditioning unit, a forgotten triangle – long ago covered by lava rock – became fertile ground for three 4-by-10-foot raised beds.

Less than four months later, the modest vegetable garden boasts a bounty of tomatoes, corn, peppers, cucumbers, eggplant, strawberries, yellow beans and peas. Huge cantaloupes ripen on a wooden trellis.

Fed a diet of steer manure, the heirloom tomato vines now tower more than 8 feet on improvised cages built of 6-inch steel mesh. The biggest – the aptly named Goliath – weigh more than a pound apiece.

"The secret to their success – underground irrigation," Abilovitz said. "I put soaker hoses two to three inches under the ground. The water goes directly to the roots."

Always a doer, Abilovitz is a retired mechanical engineer with a degree from University of California-Berkeley. College is what brought him to California. He moved to Sacramento to work on the state aqueduct project. Later in Antelope, Calif., he ran a successful wrecking yard, specialized in foreign cars. His hobby was restoring vintage convertibles, including a 1954 MG TD and a 1968 Jaguar XKE.

But a fall in his garage last year caused brain trauma. Abilovitz lost the use of his legs.

"It was a real crisis we've been going through," said Sharon Abilovitz, his wife of 49 years. "I think it's wonderful that he's gardening. He needs something to keep him occupied."

Horticultural therapy is a relatively new idea with ancient roots.

"While treatment and rehabilitation have typically been offered in health-care facilities, many have found that a garden offers a complimentary health-care setting that helps to restore physical and mental health to those who work the soil and watch seeds grow," wrote Sharon Simson and Martha C. Straus, editors of "Horticulture as Therapy" (Taylor and Francis, 2005), a comprehensive study of how plants can help make people feel better.

Simson and Straus recommended gardening as particularly helpful for persons who had suffered traumatic brain injury. Other therapists use gardening as a constructive outlet for Alz heimer's or dementia patients – and a great stress reliever for their caregivers. Gardening slowed patients' mental and physical decline and kept them active.

Connecting with plants can ease depression, says the American Horticultural Therapy Association (ahta.org). This professional group has seen an increase in interest in gardening therapy. The reason is simple: Gardening makes you feel better.

For potential gardeners with disabilities, the AHTA suggests: modifying garden areas to include wide, gently graded wheelchair-accessible entrances and paths; using raised beds and containers; adapting tools (for example, long-handled trowels that can be used from a wheelchair); and using plants that stimulate the senses with fragrance, texture and color.

Garden partners from different generations – such as Abilovitz and Demesse – get another potential bonus. In the book "Blue Zones," Dan Buettner found that many of the longest-lived people in the world socialize regularly with people of other generations or live in multigenerational households.

With nearly a 50-year age difference, Abilovitz and Demesse spend time in the garden each morning, talking tomatoes and making more plans.

"He's been having a hard time, and this keeps your mind off things you don't want to think about," Demesse said. "Every day, there is something new in this garden as you watch it grow, and it makes him happy. It's a beautiful, beautiful thing."

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     PHOTOS (from MCT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): garden-partners