Communication lets you down

Thursday September 22

Time moves slowly. I look at the calendar often, but it doesn’t move a lot. As far as I can tell, I need to stay here at least twelve weeks, this is the recommendation based on what read, the time needed to be safe to fly after such an operation I had. The information is frustratingly imprecise, full of words like ‘usually’ or ‘most people,’ rather than everyone and always. Is there some way of knowing you’re the special one who could travel earlier? This is inevitable, we are all different, and it’s almost certainly best to wait.

It is six weeks till the first check-up. Many things could happen in this time. I could have an accident, and everything goes back to the beginning, or I could feel amazing and wonder why I’m here!

What actually is happening is positive, if mundane. Gradually I’m feeling better and stronger. As the days go by I realise that I can move better, freer and further on the crutches, I can even take some short steps without them on a good day. I am not reacting badly to moving more, and quite quickly have started to reduce the painkillers I’m taking, something I started when I realised I was sometimes forgetting to take them and not noticing any pain as a result.

After about five weeks I’m up to walking around a kilometre in one go and am close to five thousand steps a day as a result. I feel that the only thing holding me back is that I am concerned not to do anything stupid before the hospital visit. At the same time, I’m expecting the doctor to be pleased with my progress and move me onto the next stage, which would be using a walking stick.

So, on September 22 I turn up at Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy with a lot of hope that things will be moving on.

I have the x-ray done and wait a bit to see the doctor. He seems happy enough with everything, but the main conclusion is, continue as you are. I am still on crutches!!!! No explanation why, all signs are good, he’s impressed with my progress, so why no change? Is he holding something back? Is there a sign that something isn’t as good as I feel and he’s saying?

It’s not till the next week when I meet a physio at the hospital in Cupar that it becomes clearer. At first, she is also confused, but when she sees the kind of operation I’ve had, it becomes clear to her. I need some extra weeks to allow the muscle to grow around the metal implants I have in the right leg. This information, the fact she’s happy with what I can do, all improve my mood a lot, as it had been quite down after seeing the doctor.

This is a major gripe I do have. Communication. While in general things get done, whether from the ambulance drivers, to the hospitals to a physio, as a patient you are fully at the mercy of people who may or may not communicate what you need to hear – what is happening (or going to happen) and why. Sometimes it is clear what to ask when the message is not as complete as I’d like, but often, as patient with no medical knowledge, it’s hard to know where to start. When you meet the right person, who looks at information about you and says exactly what it means, you are happy, you understand. When the person just mumbles a bit, you leave confused not knowing if things are good or bad.