Hospital referral

I’m waiting to a surgeon about my arthritic hip, no-one will give me a time frame. I saw my rheumatology consultant about a fortnight ago, all he can do is confirm I’m on the waiting list.

Where I am if you are given an appointment, you take it. I know people that have missed weddings, funerals and holidays just to be seen by someone.

Have you tried being without the painkillers? They can make things worse, talk to your GP first though. Pain killers do nothing for me unless they are epidural or strong enough to knock me out.

Been close to 20 years with 4 buggered disks. I gave up long ago on any type of surgical fix. I even stopped going for my yearly mri’s about 7 years ago now.

Looking back I should of kept them up, but I got sick of the same msg every year.

Now I just pop tablets ten fold, as you said, and have learnt to second guess evey step and bend. I can do zero heavy lifting these days, well for the past ten years, and I can only do light labour work for a max of 3 hours.

It’s a good job I went and got me self one of them education things. Otherwise God knows what I’d be doing. I reckon I’d be a driver of some sort, probably long distance. Long long distance lol. Or f1 driver of course.

Can’t take any anti-inflammatory drugs, I get stomach ulcers, even with aspirin. I’ve posted before about meditation, it works for me, although I was first taught it by an Army mate from HK and have been doing it so long, it’s almost second nature. Victor Lim was a Taoist Buddhist, which is distinct and very different from Indian, Hindu Buddhism. I would recommend anyone to try to learn the techniques, but from a good teacher, find one here:        http://tinyurl.com/y9vm3j9z    Vic taught a lot of squaddies how to meditate.

There are online courses, but they are useless, a good teacher will show you how to teach your own mind. It’s not BS, you have to go into it with an open mind and persevere. If you try it with a cynical attitude, you will get nowhere. You don’t have to go the whole Taoist route, simple meditation and learning Tai Chi is enough.

JB:

” I can’t take Codeine ”

That’s my SWMBO’s problem: she can take nothing more than Paracetamol. Codeine doesn’t work, actually makes things worse. She was once given Co-Codamol, the result was literally a knockout: she was in a daze most of the time. Her GP and consultant found out years ago that she is totally susceptible to any strong pain killers, they just knock her out. I cannot teach her meditation, because she is resistant to allowing her mind to clear. That is one of the reasons why she also sleeps poorly, she cannot relax and has to worry about something all the time. We are opposites in one way, as I am the eternal optimist and she is the glass half-empty type of worrier. Our daughter is like mum, son is like me only more so: most laid back guy you could meet. So is daughter’s partner, which makes family parties interesting!

Living with pain, I find easier with meditation. Learning to meditate was a milestone in my life, I was just beginning to use it properly when I had bad injuries – fractured skull, cracked and/or broken ribs, broken legs. I had a long time on my back to teach myself how to do it properly, and it is mostly about teaching your own brain and body. I know I go on about it, but it literally changed my life.