Crippledom

Ah yes, I'm getting used to 'crippledom'!  It's mighty interesting on one level whilst infuriating on another.

Tootling along in the wheelchair you often get 'the look' as Ann and I call it. The 'look' is meant to convey compassion, pity, and care but somehow comes out all wrong and only looks like cringeworthy patronising shite!  The 'look'  can be hilarious as Ann and I have graded them from 1-10 according to minor to major horror looks. We'll turn to each other and say..." Did you see 'the look' there?"

" yeh"

"4"

"I'd say 6 "

So it goes in hilarity. Or sometimes we see 'the look' together, turn to each other and at the same time say " the look" and roar with laughter.

Then it's the freebies.  The coins left behind in the coffee machine " here you have them" , subtext
" you poor cripple you" .  Or the newspaper, " no need to pay"....or the free bag pack in the supermarket because the person just will not accept your donation. "Ah no, don't bother".

Then the apologies..." Oh I'm so sorry" as they turn around and discover you are behind them. "What for? You could say but that might embarrass them. " oh sorry" is said about 10 times as you go around a busy supermarket. You feel like saying, " look mate, I" m behind you, I don't mind being behind you, don't jump as if I've got more right to a free corridor in the supermarket. I don't. I'll have to wait" .

Then the charity. " I'll pay" ( no you friggin won't)  er..." No it's alright I'll pay" , " no, please I'd be happy to pay" ( and I'd be friggin unhappy to let you) .." Ok,thank you" . Anything to get out of the situation quickly. Or the " you go ahead" in a Q I'm in . Why? I can Q just  like you.


Then the help. Well you know I don't mind the helpers. I welcome help. I like the door being held open, I like the biscuits on the top shelf being given to me, I like you running to the station person to get the ramp. Yes. I like help.  Of course it's best pre-fixed with " can I help?"

Then how about the people who judge your degree of illness/disability and pronounce your true disability/non-disability as if they really do know better than the tests results, the consultants or yourself. Self appointed judges ...yep they gotta be right. Sigh....wearyesque , why bother explaining, these people are so sure as sure is, you won't ever educate them.

Last but not least ...then the jokers.  The shouting from the top deck of an open top bus to two cripples going side by side down the foothpath...." Who is winning the race? ". " keep the speed limits" , " love the hat" ....gee, do I know you? No, I don't ....intrusion in my space is seen as ok. Ah SHURE we're having a laugh....yeh, SHURE !  A laugh. Have a laugh.


Have a laugh

Crippledom is interesting...

The 'gift' of a GOOD physiotherapist

Some of us are fated to have need of a GOOD physiotherapist.

Riddled with osteoarthritis and contorted by Dystonia (a neurological disease causing muscle spasm with twisting of limbs and lower back) my need is ultra-great. Pain is a constant companion. With arthritic crumbling neck, lower spine, hips and knees I know my need for physiotherapy.

The body is a wonderful thing ... for example, if in pain, muscles try to protect and they do so by going into spasm (this is not the spasm of Dystonia, which is quite different, though similar) and if muscles could speak they would say; " I'll go into spasm here and hold this joint tight so Margaret won't feel the pain of bone grinding on bone (arthritis)" . So my lovely muscles trying to prevent more joint damage of 'bone on bone' creates MORE pain by going into spasm. if I were to chat to my muscles I'd say "hey mate , you are NOT helping me here".

So it was I crawled to my GP in the most dire, excruciating RED hip pain ever.

x-rays ordered and a week later results. "Yep, your hip is now 'bone on bone, with bony spurs'. Jeeze, I thought, hip replacement, that's gonna take months if not years to get done. How can I endure this pain much longer? The GP up's my morphine dose and refers me to Orthopaedic Consultant.

Yesterday I went to the physiotherapist. Not the HSE ones that give you a sheet of paper with diagrams of how to do exercises on it. But a HSE physiotherapy manager who actually DOES physio. I mean he knows spasm. He knows muscles. he knows hands on.

To advise you all....very rarely these days do HSE physiotherapists do hands on, manipulative physiotherapy. Why? because it takes a good half hour to hour of intense physical work they have either no time for, don't want to do or cannot do because they are allocating only 10 minutes per patient to save money.  There are not enough physiotherapists. Personally I sometimes think it sheer laziness.

The HSE explanation for pictures versus 'hands on' is a nice exercise in preventing cognitive dissonance. That feeling that you are a complete fraud. So to prevent your guilt you accept as truth... "There is no evidence that hands on physiotherapy is any more effective than exercise".

Bullshit.

The 'hands on' is absolutely mandatory if you have dystonic spasm or muscle spasm from skeletal 'safeguarding'. Spasm hurts. Spasms are knots of knotty, hard, scrunched up muscles. No amount of 'exercise' gets scrunched up spasm-ed muscles 'un-scrunched'. In fact all that happens is the spasms become fixed and even more scrunched up muscles results.

How do I know? because I friggin KNOW!

I had marched into my physiotherapist and announced; "you are NOT touching my hip" in bolshie 64 year old figgin agony mode. But this gentle Muslim man, married with two children and a goatee beard, living in Ireland, has golden hands. "lie down on your tummy". He smiled benignly.

Ah Achmed, you put me through your 'hands on' wringer last night. I screamed at you; "too hard", I then tried a different tack and plaintively squeaked "I don't think I like this very much",
to which he laughed and....continued....and continued.

Arriving home I realised...no pain. No pain at all.  I mean ...NO FRIGGIN PAIN....nada, nothing, nothing. (well I tell a lie, a little bit but not the searing, burning, stabbing, awful pain I had for the last three weeks).

you know what. I think it was not my hip, but a slipped disc in lower spine. I know I have several bulging discs there. I think...he must have realigned my lower spine a bit.

whatever he did...I love him.