Can We Just Acknowledge That?

So, I went through surgery last August, and then I went through a rough disability patch at work, to working full-time. I jumped back into a corporate climate that required me to work overtime without prejudice of my condition. It was tough. I attended therapy 2-3 times a week, and worked 9 hour days, then came home to give piano lessons for another 2-3 hours. This is on top of the housework and chores and pets as my husband works full-time and goes to school full-time while he is also in a band that practices 2 nights a week.

And, come to find out in late February of this year, that further treatment was necessary. I needed an ulnar joint leveling because the doctor that leveled my radius, did not create the room necessary and the ulna was now too long and not in line with my carpals. This was causing severe arthritis to develop on the bones, putting me in stage 3B. It's frightening.

I was barely making it through a work day. I would often cry at my desk, forcing myself to continue to use the computer non-stop for 9 hours straight. I would take little breaks to complete my occupational therapy exercises, making me look ridiculous to any passersby in my office as I work on the end of a row of cubicles that everyone in the company, including the director of my department, passes all day.

So there I was, forcing myself to work, pushing myself to complete what needed to be done and contribute to the team. It was impossible. I would go home and want to collapse, do nothing. I would be so exhausted at night, that I either passed out, or couldn't sleep. I was going to work every morning with dark puffy eyes, leaving work in the middle of the day for therapy, skipping lunch and shoveling it down in the car, returning to work, going nonstop from 4am to 3pm ... then going later until all my piano students had left for the evening. There was no time for rest. There was no time for making dinner. There was no time for me.

It's now July, and I am once again on disability from work. I've been home since March 23rd, and have been utterly miserable. I'm afraid for my job every day. I am afraid for my financial situation. I get pennies, and then I have to pay all my medical coverage (because they no longer take it out of my paycheck on disability), and then pay all of my medical bills. This leaves me no money to pay rent, no money to pay utilities, no money to buy groceries.... 

And then once again, I am alienated by the people I work with. They stress me out. I have certain ones who just want to text me to complain and say "When are you coming back? I can't deal with this anymore!" And then I have the ones that promised to visit or help me out and just like last time, they conveniently forget out me once I'm out of sight.

Then I get the people who TELL ME WHO I AM. I get tired of it. I explain my disease to them, and they completely disregard the information I disseminate. Well, let me tell you who I am: I am a person with a debilitating bone disease that cannot be cured and who knows her own body and its limits. Don't touch my arm. Don't tell me to get more sun on my scar. Don't tell me that you can't wait until I get back to work. Don't tell me I'll feel better. Don't say that I can ride a bike or roller skate. Don't tell me I should be resting. Don't say I shouldn't pick up my nieces and nephews for hugs and kisses. I am a person who lives Kienbock's disease. It's part of me. It's part of who I am. It does define me to a degree. I'm fragile. I'm vulnerable. I'm scared. I'm stressed out. I'm sad.

I'm a person who just had a very rough surgery and who is still recovering from the trauma of it all. I'm having a difficult time. Can we just acknowledge that?

Did the doctor just laugh at me?

There's this super fancy hospital in downtown Heidelberg. If you get off the Strassenbahn (street level train) at Bismarck Platz (where the pedestrian shopping zone is) and turn around, you'd never know the building was a hospital. It looks more like some sort of government building. I never really thought twice about that building, regardless of the fact that my husband and I were always down in Heidelberg doing something or other.

When I received my referral to a specialist, it was bizarre. I first had to go see a regular orthopedist in downtown Mannheim. The doctor's office wasn't like any I'd ever seen before, of course, I was in Germany not America. But, on my high school exchange program, I did visit a local doctor's clinic with my exchange partner - but that's beside the point. Anyway, I always love new experiences in Europe like learning about social customs or local traditions, etc. This was not an experience I was prepared for.

So the doctor's office (like every other office or house in a city setting in Europe) was up behind a storefront building. It was hard to find at first because there was no sign so my husband was merely going off the street addresses. We're both skeptical because once you get behind the building, you have to go up these narrow steps and then it's like you're in some one's backyard garden or something. We enter the building, and head to the second floor like the paperwork we got from our insurance told us to do. Once we get inside the actual office, it's more like ... an office. Nobody's wearing scrubs or coats. There's no check-in desk. There is however, what looks to be a closet with sliding glass doors that are obscured by its bubbled glass. My husband shrugs at me, peeks around a corner and sees a bunch of chairs and heads to do what else? To sleep of course.

I stick my head through these glass doors because really, there is no one else around in this office besides the two women chattering away and clacking at their computer keyboards. I greet them in German; ask if I am in the right place. A young girl, maybe 3 years younger than I am, confirms that I am and I tell her who I am. Then some burly German guy barges in through the doors and starts babbling about an appointment - so I know this must be check-in. It's just bizarre is all. I mean, this room is tiny to say the least, and I stood there for about 10 minutes filling out paperwork in German and answering a bunch of questions in German.

When the girl has finished my paperwork, I go to wait for my "Termin", my new word for my appointment. I apparently used the wrong word when I was making conversation but I'm used to German nuances for the most part - you know, being corrected in the middle of a sentence or conversation as if what you were trying to say depended on it - even when you don't ask or want to be corrected. Yeah.

Anyway, we must have waited almost an hour which is rather unusual for Germans who are known for their impeccable punctuality and timeliness. We are escorted to an examination room, and it too, is a closet. Literally. I mean, the one wall was full of cabinets with labels on each door and drawer, and the on the other wall was an exam table that I was sitting on - my knees were almost touching the cabinets. My husband could barely fit in this room - he's a big guy, over 6 feet tall with really broad shoulders and he was uncomfortable.

So, when the doctor comes in, he starts speaking English automatically. It annoys me when Germans do this. Their practicing English is WAY more important than your learning German. But, I suppose I can understand that medical issues and expressions are not commonly learned so perhaps it wasn't rude, just politely convenient? Anyways, it doesn't matter because I can't say "dead wrist bone" in German anyhow. So I tell the doctor what I was told by Dr. R. He doesn't understand what I am talking about, so I hand over a CD with my X-ray images and tell him that they took them just a few weeks ago.

After disappearing for a few minutes, and reappearing, he hands me the disc back and says there's nothing he can do for me. I say "what?" He laughs at me. "I don't know why your doctor sent you here."

Am I missing something? Did the doctor just laugh at me?

He explains that at his clinic, unlike in American orthopedic clinics, they merely do diagnosis, and minor treatment like casts and splints. We're talking these people only deal with regular old broken bones and sprains. Great, right? He wants to know why I am there. I tell him this is where my doctor sent me to get treatment. So, he thinks a moment and says he has a friend who is a specialist in hands who works in Heidelberg. He gives me the name of the clinic and our appointment is over.

After a rather harrowing experience waiting to get clearance to go see this specialist in Heidelberg, we are happy and have an appointment for the fall of 2009. I spent hours on the hospital's website reading about the doctors, the clinics, the famous patients from all over the world. Steffi Graf was a patient there. Rich business men from Russia come all the way to Germany to be seen by these doctors. I haven't even been to this place, don't even realize I've seen this place, and I like it tremendously. Little did I know it's that big building downtown in an area I know well and love.