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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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hey there pat, say, if you are up reading... check out "marty's ugly leg story" ... it is now bumped up near to the top front page, as of 3:03 michigan time... weds? night...
perhaps he may have something to share, as to stamina in just 'hanging in there' type stuff... *though he was actually in the hospital, etc.. :O
god bless... have a better night... ;)
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 6, 2009 - 03:35am PT
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Jeff, my good friend. I hope you are hangin' in there too.
I think of you every day. I keep thinking my problems must
be trivial. But this injury is, as Jan says, one of the
worst I've ever had -- and strangely I didn't break my leg.
But everyone, including the specialist have called this a
serious trauma and "a very big injury." I don't think they're
talking about the physical size of it. Probably more like
it has a big effect on me. I had no idea there are types of
injuries where the pain is untouchable by pain medication.
That was a new surprise. I can't imagine the things that
happened, say, during World War II, and how mere kids stormed
the Pacific beaches and got shot, the various injuries
they sustained...
When I was a kid and worked for the Rocky Mountain Rescue
Group I helped carry out more than one person who fell hiking
and broke his femur... Don't know why I mentioned that. I am
incoherent, to say the least.
Hey, did you hear our good friend Doug Robinson won the literary
award from the AAC? That makes me happy. He is a good man and
deserving. I seem to be blacklisted by them, probably because
my dues elapsed years and years ago and I never renewed them.
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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I know what you are saying Pat.
I ignored a tooth for too long only to find that if it is too degraded a local anesthetic won't work.
Second worst pain I have experienced.
Ultimately in this day and age we assume ourselves to be exempt from living with the kind of pain that people did in the past when it was glibly referred to as a character building fact of life.
'Tain't necessarily so.
Hang tough.
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 6, 2009 - 09:27am PT
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Well, I'm pretty sure no pain medicine would
have reached this, even if I had not waited.
That seems to be what I am being told. But
it's right that people should go to get the
needed help sooner. No doubt. I was kind of
dumb, in that regard.
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Double D
climber
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Hey Pat, best wishes for a complete recovery and thanks for all our your years of inspirational writing.
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 6, 2009 - 11:18am PT
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Thank you, double, very much. Some of my greatest
rewards are just the simple thank yous I get from people
around the country and the world. There is no way to
formally document such a thing as when Jim Perrin read
my little book "Direct Lines," said it was the best
climbing writing since Patey and Murray, and then I was
invited to be the guest speaker at the National British
Conference. Sure, I can save those letters, and his
column in High, but such information would never be allowed
in a Wikipedia biography. When someone such as Doug Robinson
or Tom Higgins tells me they love some piece of my writing,
it's worth all the effort, all the faith in continuing
this mostly lonely pursuit. I once got a letter from the
editor of a Chechoslavakian anthology, to tell me my Black
Canyon with Kor article was deemed the best in the book.
To see my John Gill biography, Master of Rock, published
in little Japanese characters... tickled my heart. Few
would appreciate that the University of Colorado President
one year chose me to write the inscription for the university
Christmas card. Talk about exposure. That little piece went
out to all the professors, alumni, and state dignitaries,
literally hundreds of thousands.... But that card, those few
words... are worthless to the factual, somewhat spiritless
nature of the Wikipedia biography, for example, and would mean
nothing if I were to apply for a teaching job. Many teachers
are hired, though, who are atrocious writers (and teachers). It
is nothing in the way of a credential... in the eyes of many.
But when I get a simple thanks from someone I don't even
know, it all seems worthwhile after all... It's that little
validation that gives me hope.
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 6, 2009 - 04:16pm PT
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pure, raging pain all day, no rest
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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hey there patrick.. oh, i am so sorry to hear this pain-news...
say, not sure if this will help:
but--i really enjoyed your share about your writing, and all the ways it made you feel good about the feedback.. i learned a lot about your writing..
thanks so much for shareing all this... and all due to a "thank you" that you said to a poster, jump up above...
very good job you have done, pat...
thanks for sharing more about your self and your feelings of joy...
hope you have better day tomorrow...
:)
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Hey Pat
I've hijacked my Dad's easy chair with a stack of pillows under my leg. I'm supposed to keep it elevated above my heart. Once situated here for sometime, the pain becomes very manageable and I'm getting caught up on creative laptop projects.
If I get up for a trip to the bathroom or stand up for any reason, the pain makes a quick reappearance. So consider if you've been slacking enough to nuture your injury. The degree of elevation makes a big difference for me. You results may vary
"I can't imagine the things that
happened, say, during World War II, and how mere kids stormed
the Pacific beaches and got shot, the various injuries
they sustained..."
Yup, I think a person with a heart considers what pain others must have felt when he has pain of his own.
PEace
Karl
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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hey there karl... say, get well soon, too! ...
i was not sure if this was an old injury of yours or not, as each time i was on lately, i had to a "fast read" :O
say, all for now...
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 6, 2009 - 09:54pm PT
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This has been one of the hardest days. Karl, when I
elevate my leg, I guess the blood starts to pool into
my hip, and my hip today is really painful. I can't
find a position where it doesn't feel as though I have
a newly dislocated hip. It's hell. But if I stay put
in the recliner, then the leg begins to hurt worse than
ever, and I absolutely have to get up if to do nothing
more than let that kind of pain subside a bit. It probably
doesn't subside, but it's a change of view. And then
it starts to hurt from standing up, so back down.
But I can't sit still. I have to move or it just gets
too horrific. Today there was so much pain it was starting
to affect my mind. I mean, I had all kinds of anxiety this
afternoon, strange irrational fear. Maybe all of this is just
getting to be too much, and because I don't seem to have
much control over anything, and because it is my
temperament to be in control, it creates an uneasiness,
and as the days of pain go on, there is more of a panic attack kind
of thing, a sense of urgency, of the world coming to an
end, a strange awful impending doom, or something...
probably chemical. Nothing seems to help. The same old
cry... echoes through my darkness.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Sounds rough Pat. As you say, there is an element of this injury that runs against how you like to roll, and that might be the first line of your defense against it driving you nuts.
I mean the doctors can help you (maybe) with the pain and healing the best they can, and beware if you have a bad doc, because they exist, and often even good docs make mistakes.
But there's always a certain amount of our misery that is just our resistance to our own experience. For that we have to surrender our fixed attitudes and embrace the reality we can't change.
That's my plan anyway. I'm trying to find way to do the most productive or creative things I can while I'm stuck here on my butt.
Sounds like elevation is what the doc is ordering for you so I wish you luck in finding what works for you
PEace
Karl
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MH2
climber
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Pain is as individual as personality. There is no measuring tool for it other than what the sufferer describes to you.
We have little old ladies in the nursing home on up to 500 mg morphine daily for arthritic pain, and that isn't the top of the scale.
It helps that you do post here, Patrick, so we don't have to speculate quite as much about what is going on. I think it was 1972 when Toby O'Brien brought to Poughkeepsie a new Colorado publication called Climbing, from which all I can remember now is a whimsical piece on taking kids climbing in El Dorado - T2 and the Armadillos.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Hi Pat-
I'm just checking in on you again as I do every morning.
The talk by the Dalai Lama was very interesting to say the least. I think I will post up a separate subject on it and it will be interesting to see if his four hour talk coincided with your four hours of pain free sleep.
One thing that concerns me about the kind of anxiety you're describing is that it might be the result of toxins being released into your system. It may be a part of the healing process in reabsorbing all the blood and lymph, or a sign of infection.
Keep measuring your temperature, please and go to the doctor immediately if it rises!
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 7, 2009 - 12:59am PT
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Karl, I would be fine if it simply was a matter of lying here
on my butt. I could do that as long as necessary, were there not
such fierce pain.
Since I have pain meds from all the adhesive capsulitis history, I
don't need more, but they don't work at all, as I've said before. They
don't touch this pain. I am thinking of trying another patch the
specialist mentioned. But they're two hundred dollars per box,
and you can't buy them individually. No guarantee they'll work any
better than the others.
Jan, yes I am too hot, then too cold, then too hot, chills and
then overheated... put my coat on, take it off. Something wierd.
Tonight for a couple hours I had the worst pain of the whole
three stinking weeks. It now makes me angry, and I find myself
start to drift to sleep, then wake up in a fit of anger -- where I
kick my legs and then spend a half hour trying to deal with the
resulting agony. It must sound as though I am milking this thing to
the hilt. Believe me I will be happy when there is nothing else
to report...
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Hi Lois
I had surgery a couple days ago for ruptured Achilles Tendon so your advice has become rather mute. I'm in a fiberglass cast and will be for 6-8 weeks with no weightbearing. They told me to avoid NSAIDs but I have Vicodin so it ain't all bad.
How did it happen?
http://www.yosemiteclimber.com/Zodiacthreelegs.html
Thanks for thinking of me! Better take care of Pat, it's his thread! But come on Lois, the one thing you've got going here is helpful medical knowledge but if you are knowingly talking out your butt but giving medical advice anyway, what good is that? Read the thread!
Peace
Karl
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C. Small wall climber.
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your advice has become rather mute Difficult though it may be to imagine LEB doing anything mutely. It seems almost a moot point. But hopefully she'll have some good advice for Pat, once she fully understands his circumstances. He's not as young and robust as say Karl, and it sounds as much as anything that he simply needs to somehow get more comfortable.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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"He's not as young and robust as say Karl, and it sounds as much as anything that he simply needs to somehow get more comfortable."
If Pat isn't as young and robust as I, maybe we need to take him to the vet and put him to sleep!
;-)
Did I write "Mute" wishful thinking perhaps. I can blame everything on the Vicodin these days, generic though it may be
Peace
Karl
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Patrick Oliver
Boulder climber
Fruita, Colorado
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 7, 2009 - 02:50am PT
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I guess I'm too out of it to know what you folks are
talking about. I mean, what is an NSAID? And, Leb, what
is your medical training? And, though not to be
ungrateful, oh heck, I'm too tired right now. More
icing...
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Starman
Trad climber
Sterling, MA
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Hi Pat... my first post on the Forum after lurking for a solid ten years. It won't be an exciting one, but I thought I would answer your late-night questions. A tiny bit of help, for sure.
1) NSAIDs are "Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs." This includes everything from lowly Ibuprofen to more powerful (and stomach-caustic) drugs that decrease inflammation.
2) LEB, I recently learned, is a Nurse Practitioner. IMHO that's a pretty good tag to wear--she can professionally do much of what an MD could do. It's real hard to help much from a distance, tho.
I'm recovering myself, from a herniated disc in my back. Second time; first time I had surgery and promptly got infected in the disc space. I only mention these things for two reasons: I can empathize somewhat and wish you all the best; and I am going through a bit right now myself, so I'm awake in the middle of the night.
One thing I learned during my surgically-infected spine episode back in '86: there is a level of pain that can't be mitigated. I'm not sure to what degree many medical professionals realize this, if any. I was so wasted from Morphine that I couldn't speak at all. The pain was still excrutiating.
So Pat, from a Supertopo Newbie--> I'm just another of the 'silent ones' that has always respected and admired you for your writing as well as climbing adventures. Now, I'm pulling for your recovery and--especially-- relief from your pain... Sleep well, man.
...And since it's my 1st post: hey y'all. Good to be here. Sorry for the post's length. Throw another log on the campfire for me.
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