The USS Quad Damage

Anything you can do I can do better...

...except for just about everything

The site is getting way too much Sunny-related content on it. In order to save us from this painful conundrum, I realised that it was time to talk about my (and your) favourite topic – me.

As you may or may not know (I can’t remember if I ever mentioned it), some time last year (or perhaps the year before) I visited a bone specialist about some pain I was feeling in my ankle. About half an hour later I had been told I was losing my ability to walk and had an appointment with a nearby radio-...something to see if I had CANCER. A few hours later it turned out that only one of these things was true. Here is a hint – I am not undead.

Up until recently, things were looking good. Althought the issues I was having with my ankles weren’t improving, they weren’t getting any worse either. Losing my mobility was something I was able to put into the back of my mind – something to worry about in 15-20 years and thus not something to worry about at all. Unfortunately a series of issues that have occured over the last few weeks to months have prompted me to make yet another visit.

The first issue is with my ankles. They have been getting “tighter” and I have found that I have lost even more range of motion compared to my last visit. Stairs are absolutely killing me.

Secondly, my knees just plain fucking hurt.

Problem the third, I have either a new or previously unnoticed tumour in the back of my upper left arm, which is where what I think is called the tricep. Ideally this is an old one that has escaped my notice since new tumours that occur after puberty generally mean the big “C” word. This has been causing some really intense pain when I move my arm in certain ways, particularly when the muscle is flexed (that is, picking up heavy things and the like).

Lastly, in what I think is related to the previously mentioned issue, but then I am no doctor, I am beginning to lose the feeling in my left hand. I can only assume this is because the growth in my arm is crushing a nerve or something like that.

I won’t know until I do see the specialist, but I am fairly certain that I can be expecting to have surgery done during the next few months. It is unlikely I will have anything done about my ankles or knees though. Although these weren’t the words he used last time I saw him, he explained to me that knees and ankles are “hard to fix and easy to fuck up”. Should it be that I do need something done, it would be my eleventh surgery. In a strange, demented way I look forward to another. I enjoy wearing short-sleeved shirts purely on the basis that people try their hardest not to look at or ask about the rather unique scars I already have on my arms, and more scarring can only make it more fun. Maybe I can tell girls that I received them by saving a stray dog from the jaws of a marauding lion?

What does bother me is the actual process of seeing a specialist. The actual doctor who was “responsible” for me has long since retired, and every person I’ve gone to since learns about my disease as I tell it to them. Indeed, my local GP that I have to go to first so I can get referred to the specialist knows more about my condition and my history with it than the specialist when I first saw him.

Now nobody fret! Nathan is not venturing into emo-land (I save that for the cameras). I will not be slitting wrists (cut along the vein damn it!) nor “going down to the la-li-lu-ra”. I am exactly the same person I always was, except now I can only hobble away from axe-murderers and pot-smoking girl scout leaders in the dark.

And so with me being a cripple, Tim the Hunchback of Notre Dame and Sunny an all-around spastic, this leaves Harpreet, Michael and Paulo as our fittest and most athletic of members. Pretty scary huh?