I'm gonna apologise up front. Didn't intend to make this a long post but it's mad the things you remember when you're baked and start writing 🙈🤣.
TLDR: shit happens and weed helps.
Had back problems for years due to a protruding disc, that was mis-diagnosed because I started with psoriatic arthritis around the same time(2009ish).
Weed helped me with pain relief alongside co-codamol, but I also found it good for appetite, sleep and just my all round mood and mental health while I went through the methotrexate, sulfasalazine, leflunomide, humira ordeal trying to free up my joints so I could get back to work.
MRI scan found the dodgy disc around 2015, had surgery to shave off the protruding bit but that didn't work very well so it was 4 years or so of epidural steroid and nerve blocking injections (evil procedure to go through 😖), NSAIDs, gabapentin and sitting on the waiting list for fusion surgery.
Life got interesting when I had the fusion done at the end of 2019. Initially it was amazing.
Sciatica gone.
After a couple of months of recovery and rehab, I was in a lot less pain, cutting down on the co-codamol and thinking about starting to come off the gabapentin, and just using the weed to relax and ease the remaining aches and pains, that were a lot more manageable, at the end of the day.
Much success 💪
So may 2020, middle of the initial covid meltdown, I've been back in work full time for 3 and a half weeks working on home extension, already worried about the possibility of being banned from working ("they wouldn't close the entire country down, would they?" 😷👀).
5am. I'm in the kitchen doing stretching exercises and drinking tea while I wait for my morning round of pills to start working.
I'd been giving myself a couple of hours to get get my body in gear every morning before being picked up.
I was leaning over the breakfast bar, using it to lift most of my weight up off my feet to stretch the bottom of my back out. I lowered myself down and took a step towards the kettle on my right and SNAP!
Left leg gone 🙈
tibia and fibula both completely separated and my foot/ankle wobbling about whilst I lay on the deck screaming.
9 days in hospital with no visits allowed waiting for a surgeon to glue me back together and I'm back home with a bottle of morphine and an 18 inch titanium bar with 16 screws stopping the wobble.
The surgical wounds took a loooong time to heal up and I wasn't discharged until January 2021. Took me a while to start trusting my new bionic left leg, but by March I was back on light duties at work and starting to feel a little bit more positive about the world.
This time I managed 2 weeks of being a productive member of society before a flipping egg yolk size blister appeared on my shin, burst and carried on leaking what I thought was blood.
It actually took them nearly 4 weeks to get me in for an "emergency" xray that showed osteomyelitis had travelled along 3 of the screws, into the bone and along the titanium, which basically required removal of all metalwork, a tablespoon size chunk of bone scraped out and one of those fancy pico dressings for a month while the massive hole on my shin tried to close up.
Mean time, the sciatica is back due to "irritation" of the nerve, and I'm hobbling around on a leg that i trust less than I'd trust Michael Jackson to babysit my kids.
My head is fooked.
I think I may have ptsd.
Pain clinic won't do anything until I've had counselling, that I've been waiting for since October 2021, and it feels like the pain specialist's attitude is basically deal with it 🤷🏻♂️
Body is knackered, head is knackered, I applied for pip in June 2021 and am still waiting for a tribunal date after being diagnosed fully able bodied over the phone.
So for all of that shit 👆 (there's more but most have probably given up reading by now 🤣), the one constant comfort has been the beautiful miss Mary Jane and her ability to stop me from feeling like shit 24/7 365.
She's helped me to deal with an absolute shit hand of cards, in many ways, and I love her very much 🥰😅.
If you got this far, we'll done! Treat yourself to a cannabis product of your choosing 😉👍
