Don’t give up, that’s all people kept saying to me, that’s all I kept saying to myself. But it was so difficult, I was lying flat on my back on the floor, and the task my physiotherapist had given me was to stand up. But how was a person supposed to stand up when they couldn’t use their hands?
I looked at my hands - which were locked inside splints that stretched more than a third of the way up my forearms - both were functional, yet both were useless. My wrists were the reason why, I had torn the scapholunate ligament in both of them.
I know, go me. Around a year back I had been late for work and so had been running, but I had tripped and to say I had had a rough landing would be an understatement. Even still, I hadn’t realized the gravity of what had happened at the time. I did now.
“Come on, Jared,” my physiotherapist said, “you can do this. You don’t need my help to stand up.”
One thing my physiotherapist was not short of was the belief that I could do this. That I could stand up on my own accord. She had been telling me as such for the last several weeks.
“Use your elbows, Jared,” my physiotherapist said.
I was trying to, but I couldn’t angle my body in the way that I needed to get my feet below me.
“Roll onto your front, lift yourself using your elbows, then walk your feet forwards until your knees are beneath your body. You can do it, Jared. I believe in you.”
She made it sound so easy. Maybe it was? I tried one more time, but the moment my forearms touched the padded mat, the pain was so great that I immediately collapsed.
I looked at the door in front of me. To get through it, I would have to pull it open. How could I pull it open without using my hands? My fingers still worked, I wondered if maybe I could risk using them to hook the handle?
The thought of doing so, the risk of aggravating my wrists, it was too much to bear. Crazy, I know, but the pain in my wrists, if even an ounce of pressure was put on them… only a person who felt it could understand.
But I had to learn how to open doors; I couldn’t give up. In fact, I was going to go for it, I was going to try to open the door.
My fingers were hooked around the handle, all I had to do was pull, but my own mind was working against me, refusing to send the signals to my arm. Pull, I demanded, pull. No, yelled my body.
“Need a hand there,” came the voice of a helpful soul.
I did, I stepped aside, and the guy swooped in and easily pulled open the door, but as he stood there holding it ajar for me, a rather awkward expression filled his face. No doubt he had realized the wording he had used when asking if I needed help.
“Thank you,” I said. “And don’t worry about the Freudian slip, I did need a hand.”
He laughed, I laughed.
The cool air breeze was brushing against my face as I made my way through the park. One thing I could still do without any trouble was walking; that’s why I loved doing it. The problem was I could see rainclouds forming in the distance, and they were coming this way. There was a bus stop not far from me, no way would I be using it. Hands were a necessity for getting on and off a bus unaided, and I was not asking for help.
Maybe I should call a taxi? Or maybe my wife?
That would mean using my phone, and it was zipped up in my pocket, and the price of getting it out, the difficulty of actually using it once it was out. No, I was better off just hoping that I made it home before it started raining. Besides, no way was I giving up the chance of doing the one thing I could easily do on my own. Screw rain, screw everything. I was doing this.
The rain started to pour. God help me.
By the time I reached my front door, I was soaked to the bone. I wished I could push my hair back, wipe my eyes. My wrists would not let me. It was ridiculous, my fingers worked, my thumbs worked, my elbows worked, my shoulders worked, and yet because my wrists were the way they were, all were useless.
Christ, it was then I remembered. I had to open the door, which meant using a key.
Just as the horror of that thought was engulfing me, the front door opened. My wife must’ve seen me, though part of me now wished she hadn’t. Her eyes, the horror in them. “Why didn’t you…” She cut short, I knew why, she had been about to ask why I hadn’t called her. She already knew the answer.
“You should have taken shelter until the rain had passed!”
She was right, I should have done. I had no idea why I hadn’t done. Maybe I just wanted to get home.
“You better have a shower,” she said. “It will help you warm up.”
Baths were off the table for me, getting in and out was too much of a risk - it was amazing how dangerous baths were when you couldn’t use your hands. Was there anything I could do?
With the warm water from the showerhead pounding against my flesh, I stared through the misted glass at my wife who was sitting on the edge of the bath texting on her phone. I knew who she would be texting, the family chat. She would be telling them all how stupid I’d been walking home in the rain.
She wouldn’t really be saying that, at least I didn’t think she would be. Maybe she was, she would be right to be saying it. But it was more likely she would be trying to come up with a plan of action so that I didn’t get caught out in the rain again in the future. That was what my wife was like, what my family was like, they would support me until they had not an ounce of anything left to give, and then they would still keep supporting me.
That was why she was sitting in the bathroom. I couldn’t open the shower door without her, nor could I get dried without her. Christ, how embarrassing. I was an invalid. A cripple. I couldn’t even get dressed without her. What was I? A child?
Don’t give up.
I was trying not to.
“You ready?” she said.
I was, and so she opened the door, and then began drying me like she would a child. The way I felt… this was not what I wanted for us. We were only in our forties… I could not let this be her life.
I heading for the only place that made sense. I was nothing but a burden, not only to my wife and family, but to society. I was that drain that would take and take and take, but never be able to give back, and I could not be that. I refused to be that. I was approaching the bridge now, but it was only once I reached the center that I realized the problem: how could I climb over the railings without using my hands?
I started laughing, how could I not, and I was glad because doing so made me realize how foolish what I had been about to do was. All that support that everyone was giving me, that my wife was giving me. I could not throw it away. For her love, her support, I had to keep fighting. Find a way forwards, and I knew exactly what that meant. Finally, I knew what I had to do.
“Come on, Jared,” my physiotherapist said - yep, it was that time of the week again. “You can do this!”
I couldn’t, but I was going to anyway. No matter what, somehow on this day, I was going to make it onto my feet on my own accord. It felt impossible. It was impossible. But I was going to do it.
“Come on, Jared,” my physiotherapist said, “you have what it takes to stand up!”
I didn’t, but I had to find it. I was lying flat on my back, and with every ounce of strength I had, I lifted my torso off the mat without and forced myself into a sitting position,, the only thought in my mind: wow it was hard to sit up without using your hands. From there, I rolled onto my side, leaned on my right elbow, and began attempting to get my feet beneath my body. Elegant, this was not but my feet were now beneath my body, except I was not balanced, and I collapsed back down onto the mat.
I wanted to bellow in fury, but instead I screamed in pain. My wrists. Christ, that had hurt.
My physio was going to call off the session. I couldn’t let her. I couldn’t give up, and I didn’t give up, I tried again and again and again, but before I knew it, it was time to give up, the session was over. Worse, my wife was at the door, I could see her through the glass, which meant not only had she seen me fail, she was here to walk home with me. I had told her it was unnecessary, that I could walk home alone. She obviously had decided she didn’t trust me. Christ, was that what this had come to? I had to get up.
My physiotherapist went to help me up. But I couldn’t fail again I had to do this alone. It was now or never. “One last go,” I said.
I started nodding to myself, then with everything I had, I sat up, then I leaned onto my right elbow and started scrambling with my knees in a desperate effort to get my legs beneath my torso. Christ, why was this so hard?
Forget that, just stand up.
I nearly was. My knees, I was sitting on them. Just one more step from here and I would be up. I carefully balanced myself, then pushed my body upwards until I was standing on my knees. One last push, except I was losing my balance. Not again.
The door opened, my wife. “Come on, Jared, you got this.”
She was right, I had. I made it to my feet, and the moment I did, I knew everything was going to be okay.
Thanks for reading, I truly hope you enjoyed this! This story was inspired by my experiences of losing the use of my hands during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. I wanted to capture how desperately hopeless it can feel when injury has struck you, especially a severe one, but how if you never give up, you can overcome anything and be unstoppable.
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