Kerri also started seeing me to help me with stretches. We found out I laughed, rather than screamed, when a stretch became too much. An occupational therapist's job is also to look at hands, so Lindsay saw me every week to look at the movement in my hand. Lindsay also saw another patient called Dean, who befriended me. Dean was about my parents' age, and had right-side weakness. We discovered he had had a stroke on exactly the same day as me, just a few hours before. When I first came onto the ward, he'd been lent the ward's electric wheelchair, so he used to carefully creep down the corridor like a snail. He was put back in a manual chair though, because it encouraged him to have a better posture. Lindsay told him off for teaching me how to scoot, which he sneakily did when the therapists weren't looking. He didn't really teach me though; scooting is common sense.
I also used to be taken off-ward to see an occupational therapist called Marie in a special workshop. She was parent aged, very experienced, and her job was specifically to look at patients' hands. Initially, she had a kind of strict teachery demeanour that developed over time into a wry repartee. Marie looked a lot at the sensation my arm. My sense of touch, even now, is not localised. For example, I know my fingers are being touched but I can't tell the exact specifics, like which one. A standard thing that is done to work on sensation is to immerse the hand in containers of materials with different textures. So, Marie used to dunk my hands in bowls of pebbles, of popcorn, of buttons, of hammer-beads, of rice etc. This was funny, as I told her.
We also did other hand tasks like the mirror test, where you hide your stroke hand behind a mirror and look at the reflection of your moving other hand, trying to trick your brain into believing it is seeing the inactive hand move. In theory this helps the neuro-pathways mend. It didn't really do anything for me, but was still interesting. Marie also had a lego-piece-sized sensor that worked for computer controls. She would stick this on my twitching thumb and the miniscule twitches would control a computer game. I could make a monkey go up and down a tree to fetch a banana. The games were very simplistic, and the graphics awful, which I used to complain about. We also played games where I had to put a stick in holes in a board. She would basically have to hold the stick in my hand to do this, as I had no grip, but it was all about stimulating that brain.
The therapists also ran a therapy group each week, where they would gather all the relevant patients and do appropriate exercises with them. In the run up to Christmas we had one where we made the ward a giant snowman out of plastic cups, using staplers. I wasn't much help practically, but provided vital moral support. Another week we played Christmas charades. I was by far the most enthusiastic (and vocal) player, and I tried to use my left arm, but acting when seated, with an arm down, and not being allowed to talk, is a trial.
Eventually, my hand started curling up. This is because the muscles tighten, and fingers are pulled inwards. I was trialled with botulinum toxin injections (more commonly known by the brand name 'Botox'). I got Kerri to write this on my schedule as 'stabby stabby'. Rachel gave the injections to me in February, under the eye of one of the doctors (who obviously didn't get the memo that we were going to inject my shoulder as well, and so was surprised when I fluidly took my top off). This injection into my wrist, as well as shoulder and leg, wasn't permanent. It paralysed certain muscles to give my brain a chance to utilise that muscle more. After 2 weeks, my fingers were lying flat again, Botox giving them respite.
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| Rachel made me a badge for my injections (not the bear). |
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