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.