What is your most undesirable emotion?
I believe that mine is the feeling of inadequacy, as I travel through this journey as an amputee. I rely so much more on others and for peer support from fellow amputees I have met. However, as I rely on others, I find myself feeling more capable of assisting others with their challenges. It is much more enjoyable for me to listen to others and learn and understand them.
A few months after my amputation, I received a letter from my daughter. She explained in a profound way her emotions and feelings over the previous ten years and how she had mourned and suffered with me through this immense trial. This letter made me realize that I was not the only one affected, but also my “We” and “Us” collective group and especially my family were impacted.
The following is part of the letter my daughter wrote. The entire letter is in my book, Our Family Amputation:
https://www.amazon.com/Our-Family-Amputation-Possibly-Happiest/dp/164299524X/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
“Some walk through the battlefields with four limbs, and others crawl with one, some with none? To each their own obstacles. Each of us feeling inadequate and helpless. Trying to make it to the finish line. If I could be your legs, I would. If I could be your back brace, I would. What can I do to be there for you? How can I be a better daughter? Tell me, and I will. I will always be in this fight with you, however I can, as inadequate and irrelevant I may feel. Though it doesn’t feel that love is enough, it is the only thing I know for certain.”
These feelings of inadequacy are extremely debilitating. We all may feel inadequate in helping others. My daughter demonstrated intense desire to show care and support, despite her feelings of inadequacy. What causes feelings of inadequacy? My daughter mentioned that we go through life with obstacles. Can you identify the obstacles in your life that are causing you to feel inadequate or unprepared to help others or ourselves? I sure can in mine!
In fact, when I began swimming, this thought came to me in a profound way. First, it is germane to describe my amputation briefly. After the doctors sawed off the femur bone, they attached the hamstring to the quadriceps muscles around the end of the femur bone that remained. The quadriceps then atrophy over time, and the hip flexors begin to take control and overpower the hamstring, pulling the stump forward all the time. While swimming in a horizontal position, it is critical that I constantly flex that stump backwards and up out of the water as much as I can, or it counters my progress and speed dramatically, for it acts like a rudder and holds me back. My weakness of hamstring muscles was a considerable obstacle and made me feel inadequate at swimming. One of the most important exercises my therapists taught me was to lay on my stomach and stretch the left leg backward and up, strengthening the hamstring to counter the pull of the hip flexors. Doing this has turned my weakness into a strength and it is no longer an obstacle unless I allow it. My feelings of inadequacy are so much less poignant now regarding swimming. We can overcome all our obstacles and make them strengths, I am confident of that!
We can all develop our own techniques to thwart negative feelings about our past experiences, our own mistakes or those of others, and our own perceived disabilities. This amputation has caused me to reflect on all the things I am now inadequate at doing. Whereas before, I was very proficient. I need to constantly focus on techniques to convince myself that, “I can do this and I will”. Use a pause or, a tapping, sing a song, think of a poem, phrase or do something else that diverts your thoughts and creates awareness that we need to focus on positivity.
Amputees experience what is referred to as phantom pain or sensation. The brain has tremendous power and recollection of past experiences, which many times become obstacles for us. In my case, I had ten years of pain that my brain remembered, and it continued to generate those pain impulses, even after those body parts had been removed. Medical staff taught me a technique to gently tap the wound area and most important, turn toward and look at it while I tapped. This reorients the brain to recognize those painful parts of the body had been removed and that the phantom sensation was just that, false, and not real. Many times, I would be in bed and my brain imagined the painful knee, tibia, fibula, ankle, and foot dangling through the mattress below and emanating previously felt pain as powerful as before. Those pain signals would persist until I used the technique taught to me and the brain would stop interpreting them almost immediately. This technique really works!
When I’m wearing the prosthesis and feel phantom sensations, I can’t use the tapping technique because the socket, with a carbon fiber shell, does not allow me to touch my stump. However, using a mirror or focusing down on the prosthetic can deliver similar results. It is not as effective but still works. So, if you ever see me looking in the mirror, please don’t think that I am being vain, okay! I am just addressing phantom sensations. The other point, we may need various techniques to help us overcome our obstacles and become aware of others and be a force of positivity.
I encourage us all to develop techniques to overcome our obstacles and use them to assist others in overcoming their trials, as we conquer and achieve adventure in all of our lives.