|
Post by allenuk on Sept 5, 2012 0:01:01 GMT -7
Like many of you, I'm always on the look-out for pain relief, and having kidney disease makes many drugs and things dangerous.
But I thought when I found 'Tiger Balm', a concoction of various herbs and smelly things, that I was on the right track. I tried it on my 'good' foot which gives me a lot of pain, and it did seem to work - not perfect, but some relief, which is all you can ask.
So the other night I thought I'd try a smear on my stump.
As the kids say, Big Mistake.
It's now a day and a half later, and I'm just beginning to recover. It must have somehow got through the skin to the nerve endings still dangling about at the cut end of my leg, as it hurt like hell, made the skin inflamed, and then got itchy as well! (Can't be allergic, as on my foot it was fine.)
It's now subsided a lot to the point where it is just madly itching, so I take it it's getting better.
A lesson learnt.
A
|
|
ann58
Female Member
Posts: 278
|
Post by ann58 on Sept 6, 2012 11:57:15 GMT -7
Have used that on my shoulder {arthritis} helps there., think you need to use some benadryl, main thing do not scratch. Hoping this might help or whatever you use for itching.
|
|
|
Post by allenuk on Sept 6, 2012 12:18:18 GMT -7
I use Eurax to counteract the itching - works well for me - but it really is mind over matter NOT to scratch, isn't it!
Thursday pm now, and the stump is almost back to normal - at least I can walk around without wincing.
But it goes to show that we're all one very small step away from being stuck in a wheelchair (no, I didn't go quite that far, luckily).
A
|
|
|
Post by ann- on Sept 6, 2012 21:37:20 GMT -7
Sounds painful Allen, and glad things are almost back to normal now. I have skin grafting on one of my stumps so am 'ultra' careful what I use on it, but that more from the skin perspective than the nerves.
Got to take you to task though on what you said about being 'one very small step away from being stuck in a wheelchair' .... now have you been watching the paralympics Allen !! As a bilateral, who seems to have enormous problems getting legs made to fit (!) I have in recent years had to get my head much more around using a wheelchair, there isn't a lot of choice! so now most days I juggle my time between walking and wheelchair use .... and you know, its not really about being 'stuck' ... the hard part is the environment, so its about getting the right wheelchair, and whether its inside house getting it reasonably accessible or outside where there are the obvious obstacles ... but its more about getting out there and doing what you want to do ..... and I do find it physically much harder than walking on prosthetics .... but its definitely not about being 'stuck' and sometimes you can actually achieve more juggling between walking and wheeling, I do it all the time!
Sorry Allen, not meaning to offend, but I had to get that in.
|
|
|
Post by allenuk on Sept 7, 2012 2:55:07 GMT -7
Ann - nothing you could say (or at least very little) would offend, so apologies unnecessary.
For a (semi-)active single-leg amp, who is used to being able to get around, albeit sometimes painfully, on two 'legs', the thought of having that freedom instantly taken away is hard to take. But I can see that someone who has faced (and lived) a life without both legs means that you have a totally different perspective on these things.
A.
|
|
|
Post by ann- on Sept 9, 2012 23:34:44 GMT -7
Allen - thanks, nice of you to say, though I know how difficult it can be to get your head around the wheelchair thing especially if you are an amp whose been used to wearing prosthetics and walking, and even as a bilateral that was my history, I hadn't used a wheelchair since probably, the first few months after my accident so I probably felt much the same as you, but did come to see it from a different perspective, after some years of problems getting prosthetics to fit and not walking and getting about as low mentally as I could get, I got an inpatient referral to one of our prob most well known, or perhaps now only, specialist inpatient prosthetic centre. Going there was very much a wake up call, I'd gone there for an assessment but what I saw made me realize that I was missing out on things through lack of a wheelchair, so instead of taking away freedom, it actually gave me more freedom and independence when not wearing the prosthetics, if that makes sense.
Although getting a wheelchair still wasn't an easy process, you wouldn't believe it, would you, but still lots of red tape, and because I 'did' walk on prosthetics as well I was only classed as something like a p/t occassional user, so once back home realized that I didn't qualify NHS-wise for some of the chairs I'd seen at the rehab centre and that the NHS chairs I was offered were pretty heavy and I thought, disabling in themselves, as wouldn't have been accessible in my home or for me to independently get in and out the car. So I started investigating and found out about the voucher scheme and in the end with the help of the voucher purchased my own chair, which isn't top of the range but has good manoverability indoors and, although again not easy, I can take it apart/reasemble etc from the drivers seat in the car.
Though, its not something I use day in day out all the time, like I said before, I juggle things depending on the legs, when they are comfortable I mainly walk, but to be honest I have spent so many years now 'trying' to get prosthetics that are right/comfortable, I wouldn't say I have given up on them as I am still walking and having fitting sessions, but I have realized that I don't have enough years left and time to waste sitting around waiting for 'legs' that are going to be comfortable enough to wear 24/7.
Though I don't understand 'why' in this age of technology, it is so hard to get well fitting prosthetics here in the UK, although I know its very much a postcode lottery, the system is the same in every NHS centre I've been to (and I have been to quite a few) virtually the same techniques are used, the same materials and they are all very much overloaded with patients and not enough staff ..... it wasn't like this when I started out with prosthetics.
|
|
|
Post by allenuk on Sept 13, 2012 12:42:40 GMT -7
All settled down now, thankfully - I've still been using it on the ankle bone of my good foot, still without problems, but I'm not going near my stump with it.
I suppose it's possible that the skin on the stump, although it isn't broken, is just very thin, particularly having been enclosed in a liner for much of the past seven years.
A.
|
|