Ladders

I’m not sure I like them but they seem to be everywhere. We have one in the spare room so that the builder can get out on the roof. Yes, he is finally getting there with finishing the build. Although he is taking an awful long time – a very long time. I think he’s been working on the roof for almost 3 weeks. It isn’t a huge roof.

There are 4 skylights, but still, surely it shouldn’t take that long? I want to get on with decorating and sorting everything out but instead I am dodging ladders. There is also one outside the front door. I dunno, the ladders have almost become a constant reminder of stress. I can’t ignore that there is work still to be complete. And there is the simple fact we have no flashing on the roof or two of the skylights. That means drips.

He says he will be here today, but to be honest he has cancelled six days in a row. I just can’t trust him to turn up.

They are my first ladder problem, but there are others.

I have a lot of pain, having bony growths overtaking may hip joints, and to combat this I have painkillers. Due to the amount of pain I take a higher rate of co-codomol which, if you didn’t know, breaks down in your body to a form of morphine. Yes, it is addictive to an extent but I don’t appear to have an addiction. I don’t feel a ‘need’ to take them. If anything I refuse a lot of the time and simply live with the pain until I am too tired or too mentally exhausted. Then I will allow myself the minimum dose. So out of 8 I can take in a day, I take a maximum of 4. Doesn’t sound bad?

Well, that is where you have to understand the ladder. I am on what medics refer to the opiate ladder. This is ever increasing strength of painkillers. I’ve tried to explain this to R but the problem is that until you are on it there is no explanation. It is a bit like walking around with a constant reminder that you can’t ever get off the drugs.

Not ever.

They might give me a hip replacement, or maybe two, when I’m older but because my body does the whole bony spur thing there is a distinct possibility that other joints, or even the replacement will spur. R says I shouldn’t look for issues that don’t yet exist, and I guess he is right but the problem is that I like to know what is going to happen before it sneaks up on me. Now I know I make a drama from most things, hell, I’m a writer, it is what I do, but actually I like to look on the bright side. I like to see the positive, and I love to smile.

This is more constant though. I am aware that before the last batch of covid I was on about 3 pills a day and now I am on 4. That is one pill further up the ladder. I dunno why but the ‘good’ hip has started to hurt a lot like the bad one. I do need to tell the doctor but I’m not sure I want to know if I have more spurs – so catch 22.

So that medication ladder I hate.

Another one? Why, of course. And it is the least nice ladder. This ladder is a progression one and doesn’t go up, this one goes down. The medication one I always visualise as leading into the sky. This other ladder leads into a hole. A dark one.

I have osteoarthritis in most of my joints and cubital tunnel syndrome (there is more but on this ladder these two are the important ones). Cubital tunnel is different to carpal tunnel. Carpal tunnel results in a surgery to release the nerves in the wrist. Cubital is a little different. It is the nerves in my elbows that are being squeezed. I can drop stuff with no warning. My hands sometimes don’t hold onto stuff. It can be embarrassing, dropping a drink in a pub, or dangerous, dropping a pan of boiling water filled with veg, and it has no warning.

The fix is an operation, but it is complicated. The nerves run through the joint, and they are not separate. It can work, but it can also go wrong. It can result in the nerve becoming free and everything going back to normal, but it can also result in loss of feeling in the hand. I have been warned off this operation by my GP and physiotherapist.

The osteoarthritis is also something progressing. You see where I’m going? I can get bits fixed but I am on the ladder for both conditions. I’m sure at some point I will get the op on my elbow but it would have to be at the point where the result outweighed the risks. Similarly I will get the replacement parts as mine become completely unusable, but the real reason I am stepping down this ladder is that there is no cure. I can’t ‘get over it’ or ‘get better’. I have to live with it and it will get worse. I’m 46 and in the last two years I have gone from being pretty fit and able to hike anywhere I wanted to owning a blue badge (disability badge) and talking to occupational health.

Occupational health can round yesterday… I am getting some grab rails and bits so that I don’t get stuck. I’m also getting a step or two outside so I can get out the house easily. Randomly the back-garden is up to us but the front access we will get help with. The very nice guy walked around the house and pointed out where we could bring in other access and aids. And also told us that there is no hope of getting a stair lift onto our stairs. We are going to have to go for a real wheelchair lift if/when the time comes. Luckily the house will be okay for getting one installed, although I have everything crossed I never need it. This guy though with his tape measure and smile, made me look into the hole that my ladder leads to and shone a flashlight in there.

I’m not sure I like what I saw. We will be fine with what he showed us but it was a reality check.

I don’t like ladders. None of them. I wish my life was free of them, but I am climbing two and seeing the real-life ones are stressful. So I have decided I don’t like them. Not at all, not even one little bit.

Don’t get me wrong, everything will be fine and this post is helping my brain come to terms with what is going on and how life may not be quite what I envisioned. But at the same time, it is going to be very similar. I still have a family, and a garden, and a place to work and the ability to laugh. And really that is all I wanted from life. It may just be a little different in how we manage me getting from A to B and maybe I won’t teach as much as I thought I would. But I will write and I will draw and I will live my life quietly. R would argue that I am worrying before the fact, but if I know something is going to happen then I can plan. I can put raised beds in and I can get grab rails and I can carry on living a good and happy life. I can publish more books and draw more pictures. I don’t and mustn’t stop because of my ladders. I have to climb them, but I need to push them to the background. My ladders don’t define me, they are simply a small part of me.

I still don’t like ladders though.