If you would like to start my amputee journey from the beginning click here
I had been doing my gimpy PPAM aid walking for a while now and I was just waiting for my appointment at Seacroft, the NHS prosthetics clinic in Leeds.
Cabin fever had massively set in, and I had only moved over to Halifax for work, so I didn’t really have a social circle over there. The majority of my mates were back over in Burnley.
To combat this, I did what any 32 year old would do and arrange a sleep over!
I got a lift over to my friend’s house in Burnley with my crutches and my wheelchair and we had one plan. The pub. I hadn’t really been away from my house overnight since I got back from hospital, so as you can expect I wasn’t prepared at all.
Just like coming home for the first time, every little thing that would never even cross your mind, now needs to be thought through and planned for.
In what order am I going to get things to get out of the car. How am I going to get from the car into the house. Will the wheelchair fit through the doors. Nightmare. But I got there, so we would make the most of it.
I was wheeled the short distance to the pub, where the first terrible discovery was made. The only pub in Burnley worth drinking in is not wheelchair accessible! It took one person to hold the door open as I crutched up the big stone steps, and another to lift my wheelchair in. So once I was in, I was in for good.
Familiar, friendly faces, good food, and good beer. What more could you want after being stuck within four very small walls for ages! I’d had a great time, and it was exactly what I needed. Although the large quantity of beer, after not really drinking for a long period of time, on top of the pretty strong pain killers only really went one way.
We had managed the procedure for getting out of the pub half cut, and were outside talking to a few people before the wheel back to Oli’s. Then something inside me, even though I hadn’t really been outside that much in my wheelchair, thought that it would be a piece of piss to wheelie off the curb.
No. No it wasn’t.
As my wheelchair had a stump board fitted, my stump was pointing straight out in front of me. I fell forward and landed all my weight on the bony, tender end of my stump.
People quickly jumped into action and scooped me back into the chair. I frantically rubbed my leg saying, “I’m fine, I’m fine,” whilst inside I was panicking, thinking I’ve done something horrible. It was clearly time to be off.
We got back to Oli’s and took a look, and I had a right egg growing out the end of my leg. I tried to sleep it off but it was equally as egg like in the morning, and even weirder in colour. This was more of an issue than I feared as a couple of days later I was off to Seacroft for my NHS prosthetic appointment.
I attended the appointment just to see what they would say. I still had a very strange shape on the end of my leg. For the first appointment, I would see a doctor who’d take all my details etc., and then meet with the guy who would be my prosthetist. He would then start the prosthetic process.
Unfortunately, my failed attempt at wheelchair stunts meant that we couldn’t proceed. They made me another appointment for two weeks’ time for the swelling to go down.
I was absolutely fuming with myself. In this situation, it’s super easy to be really hard on yourself anyway. And when you have been psyching yourself up for a part of the journey, only for it to be delayed by a stupid mistake that you have made, it really gets to you.
You can jump straight to the next post HERE
If you find you need some support, don’t be afraid to speak to friends and family. If this isn’t possible please consider giving the Amputation foundation a shout at amputationfoundation.org or even get in touch with me via my contact page
I have also started putting together a page full of different amputee charities to fit various situations, that you can find here