You Will Never Walk again

I need to know after all that did I go to the toilet?.....No, that's funny! I'm not busting anymore and I don't go for another 3 days and then, ( too much info hey!) Well after I do and it's an embarrassing experience (being in a ward with 3 guys) I don't go for another 6 days. I have an indwelling catheter and a bag. I have to have someone help me into a bathroom on a commode via a lifter (male wardsmen) and they have to shower me. This isn't right!! I only broke my back and they've fixed that now what's the deal? What do you mean I won't be able to use my bladder and bowels the same way ever again. What! on a bladder bag for the rest of my life!!! I have to retrain my bowels with what!! enemas, suppositories and gloves....holy holy this isn't right ....This is a nightmare, I'm overwhelmed by all the extra issues of the condition I find myself in. Too many.....toooo many, someone has to come in with something positive to hang onto about all this...
The 3rd day they get me into a wheelchair and I am to go to the Gym, for what! I don't get this, no-one from the hospital comes and speaks to me about what I have to do now.
I go with Jenni and they want to get me to transfer onto a plinth. How, I can't lift my leg over it's too heavy. I have no balance. I am petrified of falling out of the chair. I don't feel strong enough and yet I thought I was pretty fit.
Look, can I just put my legs in that machine so my legs don't forget how to walk.....if I do that everyday they will remember and just do it won't they?.. I have been up for a while and I'm tired I need a rest..back to bed...next day they want me up again.....Hold on... you get 4 days rest when you have a baby and I have just had major surgery and I have stitches in my back and on my hip where they did a bone graft.. not today..If I was ok to do all this gym stuff, why am I on heaps of pain killers still.... this is too real, like it's really happening and it'a not going away or getting better.
The days now run into each other.The food is terrible so I can't eat it. My brother Lee and his wife Lisa have come to see me. Lee looks so sad and I can tell he is not handling this at all, my other Paul rings from Texas USA. Damn what have I done!!! The phone rings all day and Jenni has to take the calls as I can't say it again "I fell off the ladder and broke my back"
My girls Donna, Suzie, Jenni, Tina, Alison and Billie-Jean come visit with some of their partners and my newest grandchild Lola around 5 weeks old.She is hard to hold as I have no balance. I'm a grandma, I'm supposed to be able to cuddle and play with my grandchildren. This is punishment. This isn't fair...., I had planned to do so many things with my 12 grandchildren. All that is going to change.
My Sydney friends drop in too. I'm moved in and out of the men's ward when no-one has an infection. I can't believe still that this is real. The surgeon has come in to tell me I will never walk again, again, like he has to make the point. But I can feel things, I tried to move my toes and my right toe moved. Alison was there, she saw it. But no, even though I tell the nurses I am told again. You will never walk again.
Nightmares every night, I am dreaming about the fall over and over. The crash of the ladder.....oh why couldn't I have held on and not fallen back onto it. Why didn't I check it better....Why was I in such a hurry....oh yes I needed to go to the toilet..why didn't I just hold on until Rick was finfished in there...all day and night I'm thinking.. thinking.
Every night staff come in to turn me over to stop pressure sores. Every 2 hours... I'm tired it's too much to come to terms with.I can't turn myself or move my legs as they are too heavy... I'm sorry... sorry... my girls have all been crying .. so have some of my friends. I get lot's of phone calls from friends and family far and wide.They send flowers and cards and I am in the hospital bed in the ward so I feel that I am just sick and that I am going to get better and my legs will start to work. I have to go to see the social worker..she's nice..she'll fix things she is sorting things out. I have to fill out forms to get on a disibility pension......Oh my God... I've lost my job...I loved that job...I will have to live somewhere else...can't go back to Ricks house...I'd be there on my own in a wheelchair....it's miles out of town.....he's miles out of rego with everyone... He has not been very supportive. People blame him for having such a dangerous house...but I chose to be there....that's not his fault....They are angry that it happened to me, they can't fix me either....but my girls come everyday and stay with me. They go to all the meetings with the doctors, nurses, social workers and occupational therapists and take notes on all the medications I have to take and what they are for and ask how they can help me....

22 days later I am sent to Moorong Rehab in Ryde

"You gotta lot of nerve to say you are my friend"--Bob Dylan

I am drifting, the next minute Rick says the ambulance is here. I awake and the ambulance men are at my side asking me what had happened and I tell them and I tell them the pain is really bad they put a needle into my hand to give me something for the pain. The next thing I remember is Suzie being next to me and she is reasurring me that I'm going to be ok. The ambulance guys don't want to take me to the hospital by road so they ring for the helicopter service. I am getting really cold now. I need a blanket, I'm so cold. The news comes back that they have to wait for a helicopter from Tamworth as the one from Lismore is in service. But it's a wait of 4 hours. I just want to get to the hospital to get fixed. This is not good. I am too cold, I don't want to wait. They have a board under me, they are moving me, they have moved me closer to the fire. I can hear the helicopter and they say they have to land in the next paddock I remember being carried to the helicopter over rough ground.
I don't know who came with me but next I am at the hospital. Suzie, Jenni and Alison are there, my sister Linda and Mum and Dad. They all look so worried. They have been there for hours waiting for me to arrive. They have known since around 9 o'clock and now its 12 noon. Alison is crying with Suzie. I have to get X rayed. I am told that my back is broken and I have to be flown down to Sydney straight away. I am packed up in what feels like polystyrene pellets and hung in a hammock ( I don't know if that is right, it's what I think I can remember) in a plane to Sydney and my daughter Jenni is with me. She is scared of flying but I'm glad I'm not on my own. I'm also glad that I'm able to stay asleep and not feel too much pain.

Next I'm in North Shore Hospital and the doctors saying that they will operate on me tomorrow as it is too late now for a theatre. I'm upset as I want to be fixed now then the pain will start to stop.

It's the next day. I am given the option of either have rods and screws in my back and be able to move about straight away or be put in a cast and stay rigid for 6 weeks, which might not be successful. Rick has arrived with my mum. I'm in so much pain now so I tell them to do what's best and they go for the rods and screws....... I'm away again....wake up in a bed in a ward with Jenni there..... it's so good to see her...good on ya Jen

I'm in a ward with 3 blokes... and I'm in alot of pain and the phone is ringing.....Oh God, this is not good..but Jenni is there...and mum..all day...I'm sleeping...

The phone keeps ringing and everyone is calling me to see how I am and wishing me well. I'm amazed at how many people know now. I'm getting visitors...brother Lee and wife Lisa, my friend Joanne and Winky.... so many people ring and come but I am under the influence of some pretty big drugs so it's all a bit blurry. I am aware that the other patients have to listen to me saying over and over " I fell off a ladder and broke my back"

Rick has come in a few times but is not keen to stay around. He goes visiting his friends and goes site seeing. He has not behaved well and has said and done some silly and unkind things. I'm so dissapointed... I lived with this guy....I thought he would be there for me, I thought that he cared about me....I thought he loved me....he was having a bad time and he was blaming me. He said that I fell off a ladder and ruined his life....... It was his ladder in his house.

I will wake up and it all won't be true..will it? Please God don't let it all be true... I'm going to get better and tomorrow it will be different......

In the Blink of an Eye

It was friday morning 18th June 2004 My usual day off work. I was going to meet my daughter Suzie in town to do lunch/shopping. I was at Ricks house which is where I lived and around 8 am Rick is already using the bathroom and I NEED to go..he aint gonna be quick so I will have to go upstairs to the bathroom up on the unused 2nd floor of the unfinished house. The ladder leading up was against the wall and leaning on the upstairs floor. Better give it a shake and make sure its safe. It's not extended as far as it usually is but I'm bustin' and it is a bit iffy but when you gotta go you gotta go. Climbed up and OOPS its starting to slip. I yell out to Rick "shit the ladder is slipping" I try to stop it moving with my feet which means I'm now holding onto the floor of upstairs. That ain't working it's going. I shout "the ladder is gone" and I hang on to the floor as I hear the ladder crash down and hit the floor. Shit! Shit! I can't hang on and I fall and land across the ladder.
I can't breathe! My body feels weird and my legs are heavy and I can't move them.idon't know how but I KNOW I HAVE BROKEN MY BACK .
Rick comes out of the bathroom and asks me if I'm o.k.and I tell him I can't breath and I've broken my back. He asks me how I know and I tell him "I can't feel my legs but you have to lift my head off my stomach as I can't move it and I can't breath like this" He lifts my head b and shoulders back and says I have blood on my head as there is blood on his hand. I am back on the ladder so he wants to pull me off it by my legs but I tell him not to as it might make my back worse. He has to hold my top at the waist and get me off so that I am flat on the floor. My legs are just laying on the side. But I can now breathe.
"Rick call 000 and get an ambulance, call Suzie and tell her what's happened and tell her to ring the other girls and let them know." It's starting to hurt alot now and I still need to tell Rick what to do so I can leave the pain in my body and wait for them to come. "Go lock the dogs up and open the gate and leave it open for them" Tell my girls I love them, I love you Rick, don't let me die" "Don't let me die"