KosAbility is a community diary series posted at 5 PM ET every Sunday and Wednesday by volunteer diarists. This is a gathering place for people who are living with disabilities, who love someone with a disability, or who want to know more about the issues surrounding this topic. There are two parts to each diary. First, a volunteer diarist will offer their specific knowledge and insight about a topic they know intimately. Then, readers are invited to comment on what they've read and or ask general questions about disabilities, share something they've learned, tell bad jokes, post photos, or rage about the unfairness of their situation. Our only rule is to be kind; trolls will be spayed or neutered.
I graduated last week, it wasn't the kind of graduation you may be thinking of, it was just a strange moment when my Orthopedic surgeon told me that I didn't have to come back to see him unless it was necessary (And when I say orthopedic surgeon, we're not even talking about the actual surgeon who put the hunk of metal into my arm and the six screws).
But that's it, I told the nurse, no more appointments unless needed and she said, "You graduated!"
It felt pretty uneventful. The breaks in my forearm were finally imperceptible by the x-ray, although the plate and screws are the reminder that it had been broken in a couple of places and displaced, fragments missing and needed to be put together.
It's just an arm, I think, and it was just a car accident, a broken forearm, one bone, radius bone and why then is this taking so much time?
I wonder a lot about that as I type here and the pain travels up my forearm, my hand still swells often, six months after the fact. The doctor said it was a really bad break.
Sigh.
Not only did the arm break, my shoulder froze, I still can't make a full fist and do not have a full range of motion with my wrist and hand. I wonder if my Rheumatoid Arthritis and Fibro make this harder.
Lots of wondering. (Warning, photo of a scar)
But this temporary disability seems like forever. I wasn't allowed to pick anything up over 5 pounds until now and even yesterday when I picked up some trays of pasta for the office lunch, it hurt my arm. Still seemed too heavy, imagine downward facing dog? I was advised not to venture that way.
And I have a scar, it's fading, not like this. We took this photo at my doctor's office after the staples came out. The arm went into a cast for another six weeks right after this. It was immobile for a good two months.
I tried clipping my nails last night, I can do the left hand just find, I am right handed but when I try to clip the nails on my right hand, I don't have enough strength to push the nail clipper all the way down and when I manage, it hurts.
It hurts deep inside my arm and I wonder sometimes, are they sure I graduated?
It's just one bone, a radius, it helps your arm twist but really? Six months to heal, and I still have a hard time doing things like typing? I am impatient.
So, I am a bit behind on a lot of things around the house. For some odd reason things are difficult to do with just one hand. I feel partially disabled, temporarily without an arm and yet here it is, right here and now, it's supposedly healed and yet it still hurts like hell a lot of the time.
And there seems to be a very ugly feedback pattern between the shoulder, arm and hand that doesn't want to rectify itself.
I have started doing acupuncture and after some months of physical therapy, I did regain some range of motion in my shoulder (Which froze up due to immobility and being stuck for two months, but it was already hurting prior to my accident) but it is now impinged and I can't quite get it all working. I have bone spurs that click when I lower my arm making the top of my should hurt.
And even before all of this my upper back was notorious for wicked knots, just awful tense fibro kind of trigger points that causes pains in other places. It's part of the deal with Fibro, I am starting to believe why it's making the rest of the arm so difficult to heal.
And so part of the shoulder feels better and the muscles in the upper back ache, I get them to relax and the hand tenses up. I went to occupational therapy today and as my therapist rubbed my hand, my shoulder ached again. It all feeds into each other and as I take steps forward, there seems to be steps back.
It's a feedback loop and it is not happy. And I can't seem to get the mess to work.
Granted, I can close my hand a bit more than I could a couple of months ago, but the tendons are so tight and knotted up that I just can't get it all the way closed. And it gets so sore that using it becomes a nuisance at times. Writing? It hurts.
Right now, as I write, the whole arm is aching, from shoulder blade to finger tips and yet, hey, I graduated.
It's why you don't seem me around much, I find it difficult to write, feeling out of place and not finding much to say. I have been finding myself more and more of out place in many ways, in many places and yet I am trying to find my way back, yet again.
I am continuing with occupational therapy, acupuncture and I am exploring massage therapy and Active Release Techinques. I am willing to try anything.
I heat in the morning and do my therapy when I make time for myself, I should be icing my hand every two hours which is difficult when I am work.
But hey, I graduated.
The RA and Fibro are still there too, so the days when fatigue and aching have plagued me elsewhere makes me want to scream. And I look about the house and think, well, it will be tidy and clean someday.
I have taken some other things into my own hands, such as my nutrition. My epiphany in all of this is that ultimately my health is my responsibility and that ultimately if I want to get healthier and stop the decline I need to radically change where I am going.
I have examined what I eat and where my health needs the most support. I am eating raw this week, I have cut out as much processed as I can, when I can, which is a challenge when cooking is painful and holding certain things is difficult (yes, cooking has been almost impossible in some ways).
But I am determined. Graduating is not enough. Just as I have been wanting to go back to school to get a Masters or a Ph.D. I am not satisfied with graduating from this broken bone, I want to actually go further and beyond merely graduation but make things better than they were before, I want to find the good in this.
The arm will never be the same, but who is to say it can't be better in other ways. Who is to say that I can't be better in other ways?
What is the opportunity in this? No really, what is it that I can learn from all of this?
Yes.
Something good has to come of this. I am determined to make this good. I have to.
And some goodness in my life:
Emma, my sweet girl who stayed with me as I recovered:
And my Charlotte, who makes me want to be better in every sense of the word: