Sunday 6 March 2011

A solicitation for sympathy


Despite being several inches over 6 feet in height, and having spent about 30 years lifting and shoving stone by hand, I rarely suffer from back problems - but I have one now.

I know what I am about to say is not the best way of soliciting sympathy, but before you reach for the keyboard to offer helpful advice, I do not want to be overwhelmed with ill thought-out suggestions concerning bloody chiropractors, osteopaths, eastern medicine, my weight, my diet, how much I drink, how to lift stone, etc. etc. - believe me, I've heard it all before and nobody (at the moment) knows my body better than I do. All I want is sympathy.

Lower-back muscle-seizure has happened to me about 4 times during my grueling career as a stone mason/carver, and the first time it did, I went to an osteopath (who was too fat and lazy to come to me) to make sure it was - indeed - muscular, and not to do with misplaced vertebrae.

I had to employ a charming young girl to put on my shoes and socks the first time, and that was only possible after having raised myself from my bed, which in itself took an average of about three-quarters of an hour. The osteopath simply refused to come to my house, which was a mile away from his practice - unless I paid him about 5 times the going rate, so I struggled into my car and drove to him in the centre of Bath.

When I had parked in his street and removed myself from the car (which took ten minutes), I found the right number of his street, and noticed that his surgery was in a basement. The only way to get down to it was via three flights of small, stone steps made lethally slippery with about 200 year's worth of algae growth. It took me so long to get down them, that he had seen me coming through the window, and had time to finish off his previous patient before I got there. He did, however, hold the door open for me at no extra charge.

Once stripped down to my underwear, I lay face down on his couch, wondering if he would have the strength to help me off it after the session had finished. He began by lowering a simple, infra-red heat lamp over me, then went off somewhere else for a cigarette or something. The lamp was on me for about 20 minutes. When he came back, I asked him how long he had been an osteopath, and he told me 'three months'.

He was not a young man, so I asked him what he had done before that, and he replied that he had been an insurance salesman. All the while, the heat from the lamp was doing it's work.

When he finally laid hands on me, his only comment was that I had particularly strong shoulders, and asked me what I did for a job. He was not surprised at my answer. When Her Indoors visited him with sciatica, his only comment to her was that she was wearing very interesting knickers, and that he didn't see underwear like that very often. Hardly surprising either, since he had only been in the profession for 3 months, and I assume that his previous job didn't normally expose him to women wearing only knickers. Judging by the look of him, I would guess that assumption to be correct.

Anyway, I declined his offer for a booking of a further 4 sessions, on the grounds that my fears had been allayed and - because I wasn't able to work because of back pain - I was unable to afford them anyway. I assured him that if my back was to get better soon and I was able to go back to work, I would book myself in with him and give him a load more money in the near future, then spent another 10 minutes climbing the steps to my car. This time, he didn't hold the door open for me.

It is not as bad this time, and I have learnt how to conduct myself in order to minimise the discomfort. It still hurts like hell though, and - without giving you the gory details - sitting down and standing up again is the worst bit.

Sadly, I have many things to do tomorrow, so I cannot just laze about feeling sorry for myself, which is why I am asking you to feel sorry on my behalf. You have my authority.

30 comments:

  1. Advice first....then sympathy.....

    Lie on you back on the bed...slowly lift your leg up so your heels face the ceiling....habe HI gently pull your feet towards your face...slowly. Stretches the spine in a way to uncompress the vertibrae. And take a Celebrex and walk.....I di work in orthopaedics and have had back trouble so I know what helped for me.

    And now the sympathy. Poor, poor HI....you'r likely very cranky. Dear girl needs a stiff drink.

    Seriously Tom, porr you. the little everyday things can be awful with a sore back. I wish you a speedy recovery.

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  2. Gosh my typing sucks today.

    POOR you i mean.

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  4. Does the pain in your back make the pain in your knee less painful?

    I hope your wife lets you smoke in bed.

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  5. Did you mean "pour you" (a drink) Raz?

    Yes thank you Jacqueline. That was just what I wanted. You seem to be the only person that has actually listened to my heartfelt request to NOT give bloody advice about how to cope with back 'injury' (it's not a bloody injury, otherwise I would not be so ill-tempered).

    You can bring me some Boris soup if you like, John.

    Thank you Grouch. My knee pain has gone now, and as usual, took so long to go that I forgot about it. She is not my wife and we have separate beds, but I stopped smoking in mine many years ago.

    I was talking to a good friend in the pub the other day, and he is the one in a wheel-chair, who is utterly paralysed from the neck down, like Christopher Reeve was. He asked me how I was, so I told him about my bad back. He listened in a concerned way, and offered his sympathy. THAT'S what I call polite.

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  6. Hang on a minute - although I got zero percent in my maths 'O' Level, some alarm-bells are going off in my head.

    If you are celebrating your 13th year as a nurse, John, and 16 of those 13 years were spent on a ward for the addicted, how come you are so experienced in Intensive Care, since you are - by your own admission - only 48 years old? Are you a prodigy?

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  7. Maybe you are 18 years as a nurse, but it still doesn't make sense to me. Grouchy needs to be reassured about your qualifications as an addict specialist.

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  8. I use to teach relaxation training to low back pain patients when I did Physical Therapy for a living. But I won't impose. Sometimes moaning and groaning soothes the 'poor me-s'. But, when you are tired of peeing in a milk jug next to the bed, give a PT a yell.
    Pain is so subjective that no one can understand/interpret the degree of discomfort YOU are experiencing.

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  9. You probably don't deserve this but, poor you anyway. I know pain so you have my sympathy.

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  11. Thank you, mybabyjohn. I certainly do NOT deserve such sympathy from you, especially since I stopped following your blog because I found it so bloody boring. For that reason alone, I am doubly grateful.

    So now even YOU have started to give fucking advice, Grouch -as if I need that sort of bullshit from someone ELSE who thinks they are qualified to dish it out.

    Do ANY of you (aside from dear Jacqueline) listen to anything other than what is going on in your own fucking heads? Your inflated egos astound me.

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  12. ROTF!!!!!!! oh, that made MY back feel better!

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  13. That's all right Tom, I'm grateful you stopped as well. And you're welcome.

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  14. Oh my, well I have had back issues for years! Years I tell you. My husband has herniated discs! We first sympathize with you since that is all you desire. But I know you want more... Bath of epsom salts, as pathetic as that sounds, works well. As does alternating ice and heat. Moist heat is best. My husband usually rounds out the treatment with a couple of shots of Jack, but I prefer Chardonnay or Vodka. But I digress. Epsom salts help a lot as does the ice and heat. I also visit a chiro a couple of times a month and go to the gym regularly to keep limber. Getting old sucks. Ann. Go with the Jack Daniels.

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  15. Despite the fact that I am furious that you should continue to offer advice where none has been asked for, Boston 'Lady', I have to concur with you on one point - alcohol is the only palliative that works, once you have discounted the illegal ones which are based on opiates. Since opiates make shitting about twice as difficult as it normally should be, then they have their drawbacks, but these drawbacks can be successfully ignored if you swallow enough codeine. I myself use codeine as a recreational drug - when I can get it in the right strength - 3 % is just not good enough. It is good enough to give you constipation, but not good enough to actually make you forget the pain, WHICH IS THE WHOLE BLOODY POINT!

    By now, some of you may have noticed that I have taken on the persona of a certain Beef Eater of the Tower of London for this post, just because I always like a little laugh, and it's a nice little experiment.

    I am not saying that you shouldn't take this personally - just the opposite. My next (immediate) post is round two of his tour, and if I had attended it when I was about 17, I may well have joined the army.

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  17. WTF are you on about now, John? What upset? I'm having a laugh, that's all. I really do not mean all this nasty abuse I am throwing out right now (take note, mybabyjohn...!) Having said that, I could make an exception in your case.

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  18. Some of you more observant ones will have noticed that John Gray has deleted all his comments on this post WITHOUT MY CONSENT!

    This is - in the trade - what is known as 'flouncing off in a huff', and is yet another example of how some people can bugger up a thread purely in order to save face in a situation which may show them up in a poor light.

    Nothing but a written resignation can save him now. (but it won't be accepted)

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  19. yes ...deleted.......I have no idea when you are joking or when you are serious so I thought it best to fuck off and take all my words with me!
    ...I am a middle aged man....it is in my job description to flounce off

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  20. that actually should be "Middle aged GAY man"
    turns and flounces off yet again!

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  21. Oh dear - I start off with all the right intentions (upsetting everyone and alienating friends) then it all goes horribly wrong. If you're middle-aged, then what am I? (don't answer, you bastard).

    Look at the next two posts I put up tonight, then all will become clear. I plagiarised an act with this post, that's all.

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  22. Oh and by the way - I have come to love you and everyone else on this site over the last few months, so PLEASE don't take me seriously if I sound like I don't! X

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  23. I've never really had back pain so I can offer no advice, lucky for me. Poor Tom. I hope the pain will pass. 10/10, eh?

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  24. I'm just catching up with the blog posts Tom - would have commented earlier. A bad back is horrible. Hope you're better soon. Lots of love and tea and sympathy from me too.x

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  25. Thank you, Bris and Moll (and thanks to the rest of you too - despite my feigned belligerence!)

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  26. Oh, poor Diddums, etcetera. Join the Bad Back Club! The ONLY treatment, as I keep telling Himself, is a good hotel by a beach somewhere warm.

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  27. Watch it, Cher. I don't mind sympathy, but I hear a hint of piss-take in your deliverance. If I could afford a warm beach (as well as all the alcohol) I would be there now.

    Anyway - today (8th of the month) my back is a lot better, so I may not need your condolences for much longer. Please don't stop praying for me though.

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  28. Praying? That's a call too far, Tom!

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