The MStakes and MShaps thread

[agate]

People with MS seem to be especially accident-prone. Mobility problems and vision problems and fatigue all make it likely that we'll lose our balance, fall, drop and spill things, break things--we're all accidents waiting to happen, or at least it seems that way.

I'll start this thread with a misjudgment of mine yesterday. I'm sitting here trying to get over the shooting pain in my right leg that I now have, probably from having to deal with that little mistake.

It was nearly bedtime, and I was moving my 4 movable little plants from their tray to a counter because I use the tray for the humidifier at night, and the plants spend their days on a windowsill but can't spend their nights there as the poor darlings might get to cold or the blinds and curtains would brush against their tender leaves.

Pampered plants? You bet. These are plants that are headed for the patio in the warm weather.

I'd moved the biggest plants and left the other 3 on the tray. Before moving them off the tray I made the huge mistake of moving the tray a couple of inches, neglecting to notice that the tray wasn't well balanced on the counter. So off it went, along with all 3 plants, and on the carpet--exactly where the inspectors would see any stains on the carpet on Monday when they will inspect--was a huge pile of wet dirt, smashed plants, and broken crockery (one of the pots was a clay pot and broke into lots of pieces).

It couldn't wait till morning IMO. I just had to try to save the plants. So I fished out what was left of them out and cleaned up the mess on my hands and knees, very glad to have that kneeling pad handy. Using a small dustpan and small whisk broom, I got the worst of everything up, the dirt back into the pots, and the plants reinstated. But it was tiring, especially at the end of a day when I'd already done laundry.

I don't blame eyesight or shaky hands for this one. It was the thoughtlessness and carelessness that happens when I'm tired.

Maybe this thread can be a place where people will report on any similar incidents (including falls but with luck there won't be any of those!) that were probably due to MS.

[Jeanie Z]

:) My fall in February happened because my pajamas got caught on the scooter seat turning handle. I could not get back to the commode or forward onto the scooter and finally my weak MS leg gave out and I went down.

I saw that my foot was going the wrong way and knew it was broken. I used the alarm panic button and the paramedics came and took me to the hospital. I wound up with surgery inserting an 18 inch long 1/2 inch round rod, a plate with three screws by the knee and two screws at the ankle. I do not remember anything about the hospital other than when I first got there.

Three days later I was in rehab and in bed for 23 hours a day. I was only allowed up when PT came and they only did leg exercises sitting on the side of the bed. I was not allowed to bear any weight on it until 8 months. I had a catheter but when I called to have my diaper changed it sometimes took three hours.

The first x-ray the bones looked like rows of bb's on either side of the bar. After 6 months I signed myself out and ordered 12 hour a day aides because my good leg was getting weaker. After two months of aides I was able to transfer to the bedside commode and to the scooter.

I went through almost all my life's savings for aides and co-pays. My insurance would not cover them. I have had two falls since I came home but both times someone was there to help me up. I am having to be super careful.

I have been on LDN since 2000 and did not have any new symptoms, but now I am a lot weaker due to being sedentary. I am hoping my new insurance will pay for PT again. Jeanie:)

[Lazarus]

:) My fall in February happened because my pajamas got caught on the scooter seat turning handle. I could not get back to the commode or forward onto the scooter and finally my weak MS leg gave out and I went down.

I saw that my foot was going the wrong way and knew it was broken. I used the alarm panic button and the paramedics came and took me to the hospital. I wound up with surgery inserting an 18 inch long 1/2 inch round rod, a plate with three screws by the knee and two screws at the ankle. I do not remember anything about the hospital other than when I first got there.

Three days later I was in rehab and in bed for 23 hours a day. I was only allowed up when PT came and they only did leg exercises sitting on the side of the bed. I was not allowed to bear any weight on it until 8 months. I had a catheter but when I called to have my diaper changed it sometimes took three hours.

The first x-ray the bones looked like rows of bb's on either side of the bar. After 6 months I signed myself out and ordered 12 hour a day aides because my good leg was getting weaker. After two months of aides I was able to transfer to the bedside commode and to the scooter.

I went through almost all my life's savings for aides and co-pays. My insurance would not cover them. I have had two falls since I came home but both times someone was there to help me up. I am having to be super careful.

I have been on LDN since 2000 and did not have any new symptoms, but now I am a lot weaker due to being sedentary. I am hoping my new insurance will pay for PT again. Jeanie:)

Oh my gosh Jeanie.."I had not realized the extent of these recent distresses. You are one amazing woman. Wishing you the best in this new year.

[Sunshine]

I curse physics when this happens. It’s bad enough to be so ill, it only seems fair that physics would occasionally cut us a break and not follow its own rules.

[Sunshine]

I was so mad that they made you wait so long to change you.

[Howie]

This is a good thread to retell my story. I was DXed in 98. I had ON which lead to an MRI, and I had multiple lesions. My second exacerbation was a bad one that ended my working days.

It was then that I told my wonderful doctor I wanted to try the antiviral med Valtrex. I did it daily for a year and a half, then stopped it.

That was 18 years ago. In that time, I have not progressed, or had another exacerbation. Like Jeanie, I'm very sedentary, and that has made me weaker. I still walk, still drive, and life is good.

[Virginia]

Well, I had an MShaps last night. Not my first, but a bad one psychologically. I made potato soup in the crock pot yesterday. Last night I was dishing it out, holding the soup bowl in my left hand and using my right and a big spoon to dish it out. The bowl was about full and my left arm holding the bowl just gave way. It crashed to the tile floor and shattered. My ankle and low on my leg was slightly burned (not anything serious), the potato soup was all over the floor mixed in with the shattered bowl. After I saw to my ankle and lower leg, I had to try to pick up the larger pieces of the bowl. Then I had to take paper towels folded over and get up all the soup. Since I cannot stoop, due to not being able to get back up, I held on to the counter with one hand while trying to get the soup up with other hand. I was also concerned about any shattered pieces of the bowl being mixed in with the soup.

One thing that kept going around in my head is that I bought that set of china with a close friend who has since passed away. She is the one who gave me the name of the Neurologist who diagnosed me and insisted I call him. Right after I moved into this townhouse in April 1993, she and I were sitting at my kitchen table and I told her I needed some new kitchen china. She said she knew exactly where I could get some Noritake that was on sale that would look really good. I said "let's go". We got in my car and took off. I have an eight place setting of all the plates, cups, bowls, sugar, creamer, salt and pepper shaker, and two serving dishing. During all this time I had, since my hands became so awkward, put just a few chips in some of the bowls, but nothing really bad. Laura broke off a handle on the sugar dish and I am going to get some super glue to fix that. In all these years, though it has been used everyday, I had never broken a piece of it. Kind of a downer.

[agate]

Oh my. I'm so glad you weren't badly burned!

Years ago I gave up on china and glass and just never use them any more. It's all plastic (I like Lexan) but food and beverages really don't taste quite the same in plastic. It might be something to think about even so. Could you save the china for use on special occasions?

Something similar happened to my neighbor who is 97 just the other day. She gave me a call and wanted her helper's number so she could call her (the helper lives right in this building by a very lucky turn of events) about cleaning up a container of soup she'd spilled when taking it from the microwave.

It was one of those cardboard containers of dried soup that you can put in a microwave, and so there wasn't any broken china or glass, luckily.

I didn't think she should call her worker (usually the helpers discourage clients from calling them in such situations) and so I went up there with my Mr. Clean mop gadget and one of the disposable pads for it and cleaned the mess up pretty fast. Bless her heart, she had already been trying to clean it up.

I can't get on my knees either, and so we were like a comedy routine, trying to clean up the spilled soup without getting down on the floor, but we did it.

She'd like to try one of these Mr. Clean mop gadgets, and so I've ordered one for her through Amazon, and she can reimburse me. It might just be handy for her at such moments. I've had mine for about 15 years. I do have to keep buying refill pads but it's well worth it if I don't have to get on my hands and knees to wash floors or drag out a bucket of water and a mop. It gets the floors tolerably clean.

My objection to china and glass is that when they shatter, they can splinter into tiny shards that are very hard to see--and very very dangerous if you run across one with your hand (or your bare foot). Back in the day when I was still breaking glass and china, I would think I'd cleaned up every bit of it, and weeks later I'd still be finding little bits that I'd missed.

Virginia, it sounds as if you solved the problem.Paper towels to the rescue! --I like to keep lots of rolls of them on hand. There are times when I go through them very fast.

I hope there was enough potato soup left for you to have some.