26. Is this the end?

It's been an eternity since I diarised my updates and the condition of me leg so here goes nothing.

Okay, wow, I just checked my last post and it was the 31st of May 2023. That's almost a full year since I have updated the trauma diary! Whoa.

So, in August after a long way around of finding a professional who could help me I had a consultation with a plastic surgeon to look at my hammer toes. Sounds weird but man they were such a pain in the arse!

Totally hooked and un-moving, getting my shoes on would hurt, walking even with the AFO hurt more because those bloody toes were so badly hooked and the knuckle would stuck upwards wearing on the shoe, and ah fuck it just hurt all the time, so once again I had to advocate for myself and get some help.

Which is what I did. It was actually the guys at Orthosports who made and fitted the AFO for me that recommended I had a consult with this gun Plastic Surgeon who had a reputation for dealing with weird delicate painful situations in peoples feet.

We met up, she looked at my toes and foot and leg and ankle and x-rays and said straight up, "I can fix that. I like a challenge!'

So the plan was to go in, slice each toe open down the medial side, detach the tendons that were pulled tight and pulling the toes into the claw position, then reattach them to the top of each toe and close it all up.

It sounded gruesome and the pictures are even worse but I knew I had to do something. Shit was dire, pain meds for three years, no anything happening and Dr DS who did the fusion said he couldn't do anything about it so this was happening.

And happen it did.

The surgery was a breeze, probably surgery number 14, 15 or 16 I just can't remember anymore but there was no crazy nerve pain, no crazy agony post surgery, in fact the complete opposite. By reattaching the tendons to pull the toes straight all of that super tense tightness I was feeling every single day was just... gone.

Hallelujah about covers it!

BUT - the worst was yet to come because I hadn't really thought it through. The recovery was hell, not because of pain but because I had to stay in another form of moon-boot with pins sticking out of my toes with my leg up and elevated above waist height for TWO FUCKING WEEKS!

I was just about ready to pull the pins out myself by the end of the first day. It is unimaginable to you dear reader how this played out for me. I had done it at least a dozen times before but now because I was able to get around and the AFO had helped me get much more mobile, going back into this state of stasis was just killer on my mental health.

I recognised the signs of depression pretty quickly and in fact after only one or two days I knew I had to get back on the anti-depression meds because I was thinking all sorts of dire shit. Running away, leaving home, not being worth a brass monkey, not contributing to my domestic situation, being a massive burden on Scotty and not being able to get outside and walk my little pooch, it was horrendous.

I started watching Manga movies on Netty and found it a good way to kill time and not think about what was happening. I can recommend Baki Hanma if that sort of thing floats your boat, it goes on and on and on but has some epic artistry and crazy fight scenes reminiscent of Dragonball Z but on a different level.

Cut to two weeks forward and it was time to get the bandages off, the stitches out and finally see what kind of mess my foot was in. I guess in a way because it wasn't too painful I was thinking it would look ok.

Man was I wrong!

When the boot came off and everything got unwrapped and I could see my toes for the first time, I almost fainted. It took me totally by surprise and looked like everything was so fucked up. I immediately named them my Frankentoes.

Doc was super impressed by her handiwork and cleared me to go home and take a shower but keep the site dry and I could start to get around on my knee scooter again.

Fast forward another 6 weeks and it was time to have those pins pulled out of my toes. And I ain't mincing my words here at all. She was going to hold my foot, grab the pins in a set of pliers and yank the fuckers out. I was horrified. Was there any pain meds before? No. Did it hurt, I can assure you that it does not.

Unbelievably she was totally right, although the video I took (and subsequently can't find) was a bit freaky for everyone else watching but I honestly didn't feel a thing, they just slipped right out of bone, flesh and into the bin.

Crazy.

And that was that. My toes were straight! It was a revelation putting my special shoes back on and being able to walk mostly pain free again, after three years.

And so it was. I kept going.

I went back to gym and started loading up weight onto my left foot like a crazy man, leg squats, hack squats, walking 50km a week, really I put everything into my recovery and for the most part is has been good.

Earlier this year after a few slight mishaps where I may have put a foot wrong or slightly rolled my ankle I thought I was going backwards again and so made another appointment with Dr DS to see how the union was progressing.

He wasn't full of good or bad news, but rather said I was quite lucky and that the plastic surgeon had done a great job straightening the toes and also apologetic for not recommending the AFO sooner, or not at all as the case was.

The union in the ankle was definitely better than it was a year ago but it still wasn't a complete union, maybe 40% at his estimation.

But a good sign that it was continuing to unite and that I should just go home and get on with my life.

So that is what I have been doing. I have even been to visit the motorcycle shops and started looking at different options including the Honda DCT 1100 which is a twist and go automagic motorcycle that doesn't require any gear shifting.

But the more I look at that thing the more pig ugly I find it and call me shallow but aesthetics are important to me and my motorcycle addiction, I have to get off after a wild ride, look back and go... fuck yeah, you and me made it out of here alive again!

So that's kind of off the cards, and seeing that so much time has passed now heading into the fourth year of recovery, I can start to imagine that as the tenderness of the tendon surgery eases more and more that quite possibly I will be able to change gears manually.

So I made a pact with Scotty, I won't buy one right now as we are heading into Winter and our work schedule picks up on weekends, but by this Summer, November or December ish, I will be buying another motorcycle and I will get back to riding. There is no doubt in my mind, it's a huge part of who I am, riding is a constant. It always has been and always will be no matter how bad I fuck myself up.

I just can't imagine a life without being able to ride.

It has been a hell of a journey, mostly torturous and awfully painful, loads of operations, bad opioid addiction, recovery, hard work and just good old fashioned determination that has got me here.

For now, hasta leugo.