Day 30 – To be late is to be on-time

Today was a chilled but slightly unsociable day. Two of my patients didn’t turn up to their sessions, one of them had already been rearranged and I’d won a bet for him not turning up on time with one of his friends I’d also been treating. The latter has now been transferred to a much later ward which I sarcastically put down to my excellent therapy skills helping him towards going home. I was stupid enough to believe that I now had one less patient to treat, only to walk onto my ward attempting to find someone else and then being face to face with two new patients who I did not know, and they clearly did not know me. So, it’s clear that during my last day of work tomorrow I won’t have a clue what I’m doing unless I try dig out their notes early in the morning which requires bypassing the Nursing station and sliding into the ward note area unseen which is usually incomplete with files missing etc.

I had some ace sessions with others to make up for the other two though. My old patients May and Tee I treated collectively in the same 30 mins, as I was lucky enough to find Tee in a wheelchair instead of lying flat in bed so I wheeled her over (slightly against her will) and let them fight over my orna. With May sat on the end of the bed she was working on core strength due to no supports and Tee was working on her shoulder strength following a break she’d sustained at the same time as her spinal fracture. We had a real good giggle. We have an age range of 17-25 years and they’re the sort of company that would make you young forever. I was sad to find out however that I won’t be treating them again now and most likely Tee will blame me and probably not talk to me but fortunately, since they are no longer letting us out of the CRP grounds now, I have a promised chocolate bar ready and waiting for her.

My first patient of the day has a wife who I admire so much but also the happiest smile you could want in the morning. It’s just a shame that his legs don’t have the same motivation as their spasticity remains a challenge to me everyday though his upper body is becoming more compliant. His wife sleeps on the side of his bed sitting on a stool as all other visitors have been banned from entering the CRP due to CV. The only people allowed in or out are the staff – and a pizza we ordered yesterday. Another patient who I play basketball with, Abd, has a baffling issue with his balance. It is baffling because every exercise I gave him he smashed without effort and it got to a point where I’ve given him exercises the other PTs have said they’d struggle with and yet they’re about perfect for him. And then you ask him to stand unsupported and his hips just say no, so walking is also a tough one without crutches. But I enjoy this session because I see the finish line so close and his motivation and good humour always makes it good; today he managed to stand unsupported for 5 seconds and this was a huge milestone!

I’ve missed treating Sol recently, but I always stop and say something to him even though we don’t understand each other in the slightest. Sol, Abd and Al seem to make up the ‘cool kids’ and Al is the only one I didn’t treat though I believe that I did manage to get him out of the wheelchair. His only issue left is a dropped foot and were I staying longer I’d be researching what to do in the absence of something like FES.

I didn’t play well at basketball today and damn I wish I knew Bangla enough to know what was said on the team though most of the time we get the jokes and usually end up saying something back. It took two minutes to tape me up sufficiently after gloves had proved no avail as my hands got unbelievably sweaty literally rubbing salt into the wounds and did me no favours, so I threw them off and ploughed through. I got no extra today!