Well, over a month has passed, and what a busy one! Ive had another installment to my pain management programme, changed my living room around so its actually accessable, recieved conformation of my retirement from my job, and recieved my amazing hand bike!
So 1st things 1st… the pain management programme. This was brilliant as usual. The kings hospital for veterans. We went over lots more mindfulness and recieved great advice on desensitisation. We are working on reducing my medication as well. Anyone with CPRS will tell you that pain meds are more of habbit, and achieveing a sense of control over this condition…they dont get rid of the pain at all. Nothing does! You do, over time get used to a certain level, but thats about it! So when i have a flare up, I usually reach for my morphine; basically out of habbit, rather than necessity. It does calm me down and stop my rolling about like a wet fish on dry land… but thats about it. Basically for those who dont know, a flare up of crps feels like your stump (in my case, but any area which a person has it, will apply) is literally on fire. Your pain levels sky rocket to 10++. Often you feel like youve reached a new hight of pain. Sometimes just to shake things up, the hot burning is replaced with what feels like cold burning! There are lots of other funky things that the affected areas do as well, but I wont bore you with the details! So the pain management programme is not taking away my pain, but teaching me how to cope with it better, which is positive 👏🥰
We changed our living room around, finally. It was rather crowded and i steuggled to navigate my way around our enormous sofa with my wheelchair. Now it is open and frankly…awesome.
The job…or should I say career, is a difficult one. I am not retiring because ive reached that age…ive been medically retired, because of my immobility and illness. I have been a registered nurse for the nhs for the past 13 years. I retrained after leaving the Army. I loved being a nurse, especially in operating theatres. Following my amputation I had high hopes, and wanted to finally persue my dream of going to medical school to train to be a Doctor. Why had I not done this before I hear you ask? Well, I did get accepted before my nursing, but I was doing A levels, and unfortunately half of them were cancelle half way through, and so I ended up applying to do nursing as a way of gaining experiance and hoping to lead to med school….then life kind of got in the way. So this was my window. The time when I could do it. But my leg unfortunately had other ideas. Or, should I say, stumpey!! You cant work as a Doctor if you cant walk! I was hoping to be an anaesthetist, which requires lots of walking, standing, running even! So, anyway, im digressing… the retirement. So I am being retired. I am really sad, I have to say. Especially with Covid, and not being able to help and contribute like I feel I should. But, I am also sad that it is the end of an era for me. My career is over, as are all prospects in this area. But hey ho…. life goes on, and I have lots planned as always.
The bike…. the amazing new hand bike arrived. A massive thankyou to the Aaron Lewis Foundation by the way, who kindly funded my amazing new bike. I never thaught there would be a time where I could not ride a bike, until now. I hated that my lovely Moda was sat, lonely in the bike shed. But now I can ride again. I went for my 1st proper ride today, and its amazing. Hard work. Legs are made for movement, and hoyking us about, but arms really are not…found that out! But I will persevere…. cant wait for the next ride.
So there you have it… I hope you are all staying safe in this strange new world of ours.
Lexi's journey through life as an elective amputee for CRPS. 