For newcomers

At the bottom of each post there is the word "comments". If you click on it you will see comments made by followers, and if you follow the instructions you may also comment and I always welcome that. I have found many people overlook this part of the blog which is often more interesting than the original post!

My blog nick-name is SIR HUGH. I'm not from the aristocracy - my middle name is Hugh which relates to the list of 282 hills in Scotland compiled by Sir Hugh Munro in 1891. I climbed my last one (Sgurr Mor) on 28th June 2009

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Friday 16 June 2017

Pot off!

Yesterday - appointment 9.55 am Lancaster hospital The plaster was removed using that panic-striking mini circular saw with a fear inducing high pitched whine. How on earth do they work? They seem to go dangerously near the flesh, but I have never heard of any resulting fatalities. Once the initial incision is made they have an ingenious tool that works like pliers in reverse forcing the crack apart. At one point there were three of them working on me, one holding my arm in an unnatural position and the other two cutting and prying.

Then it was off to x-ray (follow the red arrows on the floor). Again I seemed to be the exception. She wanted my arm in a position it refused to move to - much pain trying. She then had to manoeuvre her machinery into what seemed to be a rarely used vertical option combined with supporting my arm on various foam blocks.

Back with the consultant I was told the x-ray was ok and he prescribed a support gismo and muttered a few scanty instructions about exercise and I was bundled off into another room. Two nurses arrived carrying a selection of three hideous looking mechanical contraptions one of which they fitted to my arm - it looked like part of the Forth Railway Bridge. My arm will only straighten to about 70 degrees but the consultant had prescribed "no restriction" on the dial setting of the support thing so that in theory my arm could extend fully if it could physically do that, so I couldn't really see the point, and the two nurses seemed a bit vague about this monster's value - as I type it is lying abandoned on my study floor.

My arm feels lost and doesn't know whether to participate or not in certain actions, and on the whole I feel less adept and in control than I was under the discipline of only using one arm and the protruding fingers on the other. The arm is weak and my wrist feels as though it is sprained. Last night I had severe pain in my shoulder and didn't sleep, but it is ok during the day. The nurses again vaguely mentioned exercises, but I am awaiting an appointment at Kendal with the proper physios, meanwhile not being sure whether I will do more harm than good if I start exercising before I have had professional instructions. I always half suspected that I overdid it with my knee. I was told that I could let the arm dangle when appropriate, thus encouraging self-straightening.

8 comments:

  1. Yay! to having two arms again - I'm sure it will soon feel natural. What ever you do, though, don't go falling over for the next few weeks!

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  2. Splendid news - I just knew you'd be de-plastered! It won't be long before you're back on the front line and on active service.
    :-)

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  3. Excellent news Conrad. The trail awaits you - post physio of course.

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  4. What a relief to lose your plaster! Now your muscles must recover, your nerves rewire themselves, and your joints need to loosen up - so some hard work ahead... but the worst is over.

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  5. Gayle - your comment received in duplicate again (second version now deleted by me.) I reckon I should get NASA to design me some ground reading electronics. I must say I've been scrutinising the paths much more assiduously on my recent walks from home. Did you notice you got a mention from Big Brother RR in comments on my last post "football"?

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    John J - I hope it's not like the Battle of the Somme.

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    afoot - It's a question of the trail's motives that is of some slight concern.

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    Ruth - I'm working on it. Day 2 now and things are feeling a tiny bit better.

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  6. Excellent news. I hope you have a speedy recovery from here on in.
    Many, many years ago I broke my arm quite badly and had to have it fixed under a general anaesthetic. When I came around it was 2am, I was on a ward, it was dark and I was extremely disorientated. A chap was using one of those curious saws to cut a sort of expansion crack in my pot. You can imagine that this was both confusing and alarming, I felt like I'd woken into a horror film and proceeded to scream the place down. Fortunately, my Dad was on hand to calm me down!

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  7. Beating the bounds, (AND ALL) - Hi Mark. It's not really so good as I seem to have made it sound. I can't straighten my arm enough to, say put a biscuit in my mouth, or get down to tie shoelaces and put on socks. I know that physio should bring about some improvement, but as far as I can tell there seems to be a solid full stop on the bending, but I may be wrong. I have just been out and sat in the car and at a pinch I could drive, but I will leave that for another week until my arm settles down a bit more and re-unites itself wth my body. I reckon this has been a pretty serious fracture that will eave me with some permanent restriction.

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  8. I'm blaming the foreign phone network for sending my comments in duplicate. I promise that I'm only pressing 'publish' once. We've moved country again (Sweden now) so I wonder if the echo will follow me?

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