SCHOOL AND JARRETT'S PAEDIATRICIAN APPOINTMENT

15th and 16th September 2010

During the night I had frightful pain in my right hand, it travelled up my arm in spasms and on waking in the morning it was tingling and had pins and needles. When I went to the bathroom I screamed out to Mum because one moment I was sitting there and the next thing I knew my right arm had dropped, it was heavy and the excruciating pain brought tears streaming from my eyes. Then I began to shiver a little, perhaps it was from the shock of it happening. Mum massaged it to see if that would help, but it didn't so once I was dressed we put it up in a sling so it would not just hang there, lifeless by my side. Having it elevated in the sling took some of the pressure off it but the pain was still throbbing from my finger tips up into my shoulder.

I had school and it was electives day and I did not want to miss them, especially textiles, so I took a deep breath despite my difficulties and we headed off. It was a cool day and the breeze was rather chilly but at least it was not raining, it had poured raining on Tuesday afternoon and become extremely cold. My class were finishing off some work from the day before and then it was time to go to electives. French was my first elective and we were practising our food likes and dislikes and giving a reason why. Then we had to look at a dialogue and answer some questions in English . Next week we are having our assessment and pretending we are in a French Cafe, we have to order some food and drink speaking only in French, the more complicated sentences that we can use the higher marks we will achieve. I am very nervous about doing this because learning French has been difficult for me to comprehend, I think that my sentences will be fairly basic, we are going to school especially for it next Wednesday. During French my arm pulsated with pain and I was almost going to ask Mum if we could just go home, but I did not want to miss textiles.

In Textiles we did some basic spinning by using a skewer with a paddle pop stick attached about two thirds of the way down the skewer with an elastic band to form a cross, then we had to tie a piece of wool to where the paddle pop stick was, we then did a special loop that made the wool sit along the skewer. We were then given some yarn, it was blue, one person spun the spindle we had made and the other held the yarn and gently pulled it as the wool that was along the skewer tightened and twisted it. It was amazing watching it spin and once it got going it spun very quickly into a piece of wool. I did some with Mum but then my left arm tired, so the teacher then finished it off with Mum. Next Term we are going to do knitting and crocheting, I am really excited about this because I already know how to knit and I am becoming rather quick at it, the only thing that stops me is when my arm drops.

Even though I had enjoyed Textiles, I was so pleased to be going home for the day, my pain had increased and I felt so exhausted, just like I had climbed Mount Everest. It was not only my arm and hand that I had pain, my ankle continued to be painful to bend, my knee was clicking and painful and my hip almost felt as though it was sitting out of place. A warm cup of tea, heat packs and panadol were the first things that I had when I got home and then I fell asleep, pain is demanding on my body and after my arm had dropped it had fatigued me. Mum thought about it and thinks that I may have had another seizure.

My nose was running when I awoke and the pain was still there but my arm did not feel quite as heavy so we took the sling off to see how it would go. Unfortunately without the support of the sling it became heavy and more painful so the sling went back on. I watched Tinkerbell and the Great Fairy Rescue DVD, it was a lovely movie about believing and friendship.

I had another sleep in the afternoon after my shower, when I woke up Mum told me that there was a surprise for me, my rollator had arrived, a day late but it had arrived! We adjusted it for my height and I had a little go of it but my ankle started to give way and had shooting pains when I attempted to put too much weight through it and with my arm out of action that made it difficult but I had a go, I think when my ankle recovers and my arm fixes itself that the rollator is going to help me to become more mobile. Rhiannon is so extraordinary for organising it, I don't know what I would do without her, she is the best physiotherapist in the world.

Jarrett had his paediatrician appointment in the late afternoon, he went for a run when he came home from school and then it was time to go, I could tell that he was a little nervous. He had to be weighed, measured, have his blood pressure and pulse done. He is not a huge boythat is because he does so much running, he only weighed 48.3kg, he is 162cm tall, his blood pressure is lower like mine, it was 90/68 and his pulse was fantastic, it was 64 the doctor was extremely impressed with that and it shows how fit Jarrett is. The results from his tests showed that he has a terrific lung capacity, that is because he does so much training, he definitely has asthma which is aggravated with exercise and the environment and the surprising result was that he also has something known as vocal cord dysfunction this is quite common in athletes who are also asthmatics, the doctor showed us figures from a conference he spoke at and five per cent of the American Olympic Team have it. Jarrett has to go to a speech pathologist to help him overcome this problem because when you have a vocal cord dysfunction your vocal cords tighten randomly, make it difficult to breathe, cause throat and chest pain so when he had his asthma attack at Nationals he also had the vocal cord tightening and this is what made it so severe and frightening. The doctor said that with the therapy and Jarrett's new asthma medication which is faster acting it will all be controlled quickly and he will hopefully have no further problems. He also said he will be watching for his name in future Commonwealth Games and Olympics, which you could see Jarrett was so relieved about, I think he was worried that this would stop him from running and his future dreams. He has to go back and see the paediatrician in January next year to make sure everything is improving.

After dinner I removed my sling again, this time with more pleasing results, my arm was not as heavy or as painful, however it was in my hand and it was almost like it was distorted. Throughout the night I woke with my hand feeling uncomfortable but found my arm was improving.

This morning my hand was still extremely painful and still a little distorted, it is still like that and I am unable to use it but I am grateful for the relief I now have in my arm, it now just feels a little weaker and I have some pain in my shoulder and neck from it. As Nalani is going into Hospital tomorrow, Mum wanted to do a bit of a Spring Clean today, I also decided to help, I got all my Christmas bears that sit in my bedroom and gave them a good vacuum with our special little hand held vacuum cleaner, it took me an hour and a half to thoroughly go over my eleven large Christmas bears. Of course I had to do it one handed so that made it a little tricky but I really enjoyed doing it because I could also rest at the same time.

We found out that Nalani is going to be kept in overnight at John James Hospital, her surgery is going to be done at 1pm tomorrow, we have to be at the hospital at 12pm which I must say is a bit of a relief for me as we originally we had to be there at 6.30am because they thought she would be scheduled for surgery first off the rank, although for Nalani it means she has to wait around and that may not be good for her nerves. Her surgery will go for about an hour, it depends whether the doctor has to do a repair or a reconstruction, he won't know until he goes in with his arthroscope. Then she will spend another hour in recovery to make sure she is stable. From there she will go to the ward that she will spend the night in, a parent can stay if she wants one but they have to sleep on a reclining chair and no food is available for them. She will then be coming home on Saturday morning with a knee brace on and on crutches, we have to take good care of her for a while so that she recovers quickly. It takes six to eight weeks to recover fully from the surgery and then she can start doing activities again, which I know she will be very pleased about. There will be lots of physiotherapy and home exercises for her to do as well as using ice for the first couple of days to help swelling and pain. I hope that everything goes well for her, I think she is a little scared as she has never had surgery or being in hospital before other than to visit me.

'Even when the skies are grey we can make our own sunshine from within, if our hearts are loving, generous and caring'