To set the scene/background.
4.30pm,Wednesday, 20th January, 1993. The school holidays are still on (the kids are driving every parent crazy with, “I’m Bored” and “What can we do now?”), no better excuse needed than to call a extraordinary training run for the Avoca Beach Rugby Club, Golden Oldies – Whitepointers, followed by the obligatory couple of cleansing ales and review the hits and misses.
At the ripe old age of 38 (personally believing I was just about to hit my peak) I was still playing competitive Rugby (albeit NSW Central Coast standard).
As part of my not too conscientious training regime I’d again decided to ride my pushbike to training a leisurely 2 k’s to our local ground, Heazlett Park.
After checking both my daughter’s (Lisa aged 10) and my helmet were securely fixed we headed off to training (all down hill). I’d arranged to meet Christine (my wife) and eldest daughter Jacqueline after she had finished squad training and Chris had finished the timetable as the local swimming instructor.
The proposed 2 kilometre trip lasted a mere 250 metres. And as yet, an inexplicable fault with front wheel caused the forks to collapse and catapult both Lisa and I over the handle-bars, with me landing head-first onto the bitumen road.
Thankfully, after mystifying local doctors and staff at Gosford Hospital with my condition, the decision was taken to order an emergency transfer, via the CareFlight chopper, to Sydney’s Prince Henry Hospital, reputed to be one of the best Spinal Care facilities in Australia.
That’s where an amazing adventure begins for this soon to be diagnosed Incomplete Quadriplegic. An adventure of continual denial of the Doctors pessimistic prognosis. An adventure in staying alive – if not physically at least mentally. An adventure in trying to keep one step ahead of the nursing staff who were instructed to ensure we didn’t miss out on our “little blue” tablets, twice a day (the anti-depressants). You know the ones. The kind of tablet that keeps an entire ward in a state not dissimilar to the ward depicted in ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’. And no prizes for guessing who became the ward’s Jack Nicholson. Good old Brad. “He’ll know our rights.” “Is that right Brad?” “Hey Brad, am I supposed to be having a blue tablet before or after my breakfast?” That’d be right. Brad, spokesperson for the infirmed, protector of the cripple and now my fellow ‘Inmates’.
An adventure that has been ongoing for many years now.
Seven weeks into my supposed rehab at PHH I hadn’t so much as twitched a finger or wiggled a toe. Things were looking pretty grim. Maybe the doctor’s diagnosis was correct. I ended up spending the next five and a half months as an inmate of PHH. During my stay I struggled with the facts so bluntly delivered by the ‘Spinal Team’, made up of Occupational Therapists, Physiotherapists, Nursing staff and the venerable Spinal Registrar ‘gurus’. In all honesty ‘they’ don’t really know exactly what is going on in your body and more importantly, in your mind. Medicine is certainly an unexacting Science. If you don’t personally come to terms with the situation you find yourself in you start wasting away and inevitably become domiciled in some sort of nursing home catering for the chronic and physically disabled.
Believe it or not, I am one of the ‘lucky’ ones. Well-educated, yet no Scholar. Happily married. A healthy and happy Family. An amazingly resilient and supportive network of family and friends. And colleagues and associates from either my sporting background or my 18 years spent within the Ad Industry.
There were certainly a lot more hilarious stories, than tragic ones to come out of my stay. I think humour has always been my ‘escape’ and way of coping with situations I’m not sure I can handle. Interestingly enough, a Spinal Ward is not, as is the common perception, a place full of leather-clad bikies visiting a mate who didn’t manage to handle his over-powered Harley, or trendy thrill-seeking adventure extremists, whose last recollected words were, …“3, 2, 1 - Bungi”.
They’re people like you and I, ordinary people.
In most instances it’s a case of down-right stiff luck.
It’s how you cope with your new challenge that determines the length of your sentence.
It is a very very personal thing.
Some funny stories to follow…………….
