The 10th February was not only my Nan’s Birthday but also marked my 3rd month as an amputee. The last couple of months I have done a reflection/summary of what I have been up to and I don’t see that this month should be any different, especially as not much happened today. So what has happened? Let me just scan last months posts……..right back, yes wow what a month and probably the most up and down I have had to date. I am going to break it down into the good, the bad and the ugly.
The Good
Always nice to start on a positive I think and that’s how the month started. There was a plan in place to start reducing my medication which was very important to me. If fact that is still top of my list as until I can get of the Gabapentin and Amitriptyline I will forever struggle to shift the weight. For once I am working hard, in fact giving my recovery 110%, I have too no second chances here. As a mini fruit of my labours, say a blueberry because this is a mixed positive negative thing, I was moved into the advanced physio class. A positive because my hard work is paying off and I am walking well with the leg, the negative I have more work to do and even harder sessions. There was the chance to see some of my friends at Army Cadets when I had a meeting with our Commandant about the disabled facilities, well the lack of them, at our Headquarters. I am able to play Kinect Sports, well half the games on each season anyway, to help with exercise a Balance. To finish on a high note Lynne now seems to have sorted the problems with the socket an since I saw her last I can do much more on the prosthesis.
The Bad
Unfortunately the bad came in very quickly at the beginning of the month. I was unhappy at seeing Gail so low and struggling with her confidence in walking with her prosthesis. I wished there was something I could do to help her but the answer to all her problems lay within. There was many negative emotions and feeling this month, pain, sadness, anger and frustration. Nearly all this negativity came from just one thing, the socket of my prosthetic leg. It pretty much consumed the whole month, who would think a piece of plastic could have such a massive impact on your life but it did. I kept going with it and persevered until I could stand it no more, over a week was spent in the wheelchair alone. Snow, as lovely as it is has hampered my progress as I have been unable to get out and practice walking along the street. Of course the last thing that is making me exceptionally unhappy is my weight. I don’t think I have put much more on recently but I so desperately want to loose some.
The Ugly
My mood was bad, I was grumpy, low and snappy which wasn’t very pleasant for my parents. My groin was red, stinging and the skin was peeling, on the odd occasion it bleed from a small area where the skin had worn away.There we’re many times this month when I seriously felt like giving up with the leg. I would have been happy to to spend the rest of my life in the wheelchair, the leg was making my life miserable. After being so happy after the surgery, being positive, moving on and not having the pain I have had, I was so annoyed at being brought down. People who know me are not panicking about this text as they know that I wouldn’t give up that quickly but you would never believe how close I was.
So a new month has begun and with the socket sorted (apart from the leg length) I am on a high again, even though the weight situation has not improved. What will the next month have in store?
