learning to accept that i'm lame || (Co-host Reupload)
07/22/2023 - Republished 02/03/2026AKA a reflection on my first year being unavoidably mobility impaired, AKA happy belated birthday to my cane.
semi-organized vent/ramble of thoughts and feelings about my own disability, pain, and the journey here. very long, and very sparingly edited. enjoy.
it's been a little over a year since my (still entirely mysteriously acquired) hip labral tear got worse. i'd been living with it since one random morning the november prior. it got worse after i went to my doctor about it; he performed an examination to test my range of mobility that ended up worsening my injury. it hurt in the moment, but i was able to get the bus home fine afterwards by myself. by evening on the day after my appointment, the pain got so much more severe that i had to go the ER. i left with a prescription for some very strong painkillers and a few more doctors appointments to book.
pain meds that make me feel awful, a too-long wait before i can muster the strength to shower (and longer still to shave and cut my fucking hair), x-rays, MRIs, a diagnosis. hip labral tear. i'm no stranger to leg pain, i've had an unexplained recurring pain in my shins for years at this point (that the specialists and the x-rays and the MRIs ordered for that were never able to diagnose), and the yearning for the quality of life improvements (and, to be honest, the acknowledgement of my pain) that a mobility aid could offer wasn't new to me either.
it's still excruciating to walk for more than a couple minutes while unmedicated at this point. i just wanted to be able to get myself to the 7-11 three blocks down the road, literally just that (it was summer, and the siren song of a coke slurpee or a weird mtn dew was strong). but i couldn't. and like i said, i had restrictions on my level of mobility before, a three block walk would on a good day only start to make my shins ache on the way back, but i knew i wouldn't make it halfway there like this. i was devastated. i was disabled, no getting around it here.
i heard it wouldn't heal on its own; physical therapy to manage, surgery to fix. we drove the 5 minutes (15-20 minute walk) to the local rite-aid to pick up a cane. i'd just been let go from working here a few months prior, so that meant i could beeline right for the stand they displayed them in instead of limping around for too long while we searched. i liked the purple one with the swirling etched patterns, but i don't like the offset style handle, as i just learned. a red one then, derby style soft-grip. i adjust it to what i think is probably the right height, walk the aisle of painkillers and wrist braces, and i find that it helps. okay, cool. it still hurts to walk, but there's relief here. thank fuck.
this sudden shift in my life preceded — and complicated — another big change: moving out. moving cities, moving in with my partner and roommates for the first time. it made packing hard, unpacking harder. it made uncertain my ability to secure a job and pay my share of the rent past what i'd saved up for this. i had those savings, about 2/3 of every single paycheck i ever received working retail pharmacy, but it wasn't much, i wasn't at the job long at all. enough through the end of the year, but not the rest of our lease after that. i hadn't expected to be let go from that job, i hadn't expected it'd be this hard to find something new. (a year on and i still haven't found anything.)
i got moved in alright, though. kinda sucks that the bedroom's upstairs, but the cane helps for that too. made it clear to the people living with me that i couldn't (can't, still, mostly) pick things up off the floor or from low shelves and cabinets, i'm going to ask for help with this from time to time, can we move the cutting boards somewhere i can reach. i can't stand or walk for too long, let's invest in a chair tall enough to use when cooking at the stove or washing dishes. i have this metal, slightly-cushioned folding chair, let it be my priority seating like on buses, the couch is too soft for me to sit for very long on. it works out.
by october i'm in physical therapy. it was scary at first, but honestly really great. lovely people, a genuinely supportive environment, i only got misgendered once. two buses away, though. i was worried about exercising in a common room (that, besides the gender complication, is my biggest fear about gyms and such), but nobody judged. and what's more, it helped. a lot. emotionally too, it's pretty good for your mental health to get out of the house and talk to people you don't live with once a week, who knew.
this has been mostly chronological but i'm gonna jump ahead and around here now.
i can go on multi-day trips with my friends. i can walk to the store. i can pick some things up off the floor sometimes. the couch doesn't hurt to sit on so much anymore. i can walk a block or two without the cane.
i have two canes, the second one is the same black foldable that i think almost everyone has, seemingly. i have a little clear back for concerts that it almost fits in. i lost the thing that's supposed to hold it when its folded, but a rubber band works well enough til i find it again. i made a shitty little strap for it since it doesn't have one. i got a weird callous on my middle finger from it while we were in seattle.
an incredibly kind friend bought me a wheelchair. i'm still too nervous to take it on the bus too much, but i take it to the grocery store when i can, taken it shopping, to cafes, to omegamart when we went to vegas. i've just started putting stickers on it. i really love it.
i still haven't found work. couldn't get remote work so i stopped looking, couldn't get work within my ability so i started lying, but even applying for jobs that i know would make me worse again, no luck. giving up on all my self-imposed (for preference or safety) restrictions hasn't made a difference so far. i make a couple of bucks every now and then from my t-shirt designs and the odd commission, but no job yet. i got close a couple times. i've been submitting applications while taking breaks from typing this up.
i don't do my home exercises as much as i should. my pain medication is once-a-day, take it in the morning, if i miss it i'm fine for half the day but really feel it after that, an oh-shit moment usually. i still need to take as-needed naproxen sodium, no other OTC painkiller puts a dent in my hip pain at all. (i shudder to think of the state of my liver, honestly.) i have a few pills left of the one that makes me feel terrible, for emergencies. i don't need the cane in the house anymore, most days. i can sleep easier. i get better, slowly, even if i'm not always doing it right.
but i still need the cane, the chair sometimes. still can't usually get stuff from the low cabinets or off the floor. i need to sit on public transit, i can only sit on the right side of cars, front passenger preferably, going too fast hurts me. it still hurts ambiently, i still need to take my meds, still should be doing exercises more than i should. my PT, last day i saw her, told me to take her card and call her the day i'm off the cane, and i don't think that day will ever come. i do not want the surgery to fix this, both because the recovery sounds awful and i can't do that, and because i simply do not want to. i'm worried that counts as refusing care, but i simply don't see anything wrong with having to use mobility aids, even if it's for forever.
i worry a bit that i make disability too much of my personality these days. but it affects my life so much and did so in such a short amount of time. i worry that it's wrong of me to choose to stay like this when there's a way to stop being like this, but i think that's kinda bullshit also. i dunno if that's weird. i like my cane, i like my chair? i don't think some people understand that i'm okay like this. i just wanted it to hurt less. my cane's a part of me now, and i'm cool with that. it's cool, i like it. i keep saying that here but it's just true.
that's not to say i don't feel any grief or ill effects. obviously i'm in pain. i do kind of mourn the loss of my previous mobility, the relative ease with which i used to navigate the world. i've only got one hand free when i'm out of the house, and my left pocket rarely sees use. motion can hurt me, people look at me funny. i can't always keep up with my friends, or do what they do. i'm particularly upset about the very real possibility that i just can't do concerts without a seat anymore (so much for mosh pits). it's rough, having to remind people of my limitations multiple times, having to learn to say "no, i can't" and be firm. sometimes i have to do things that hurt me.
but there's levity here, too. i pose with my cane, make jokes with it, stim with it. i think it's a little sexy honestly, i think i look good with it. it adjusts tall enough that i can wear my huge platform boots with it, and that is so cool. i like it artistically, it's a cool piece of my character design now. i like being the friend that has remedies for what ails you, my half-drawer of pain-relief items. i like the amicable small talk i now make with other disabled people, or the commiseration and understanding. there's also just a certain catharsis in it being visible now.
i'll cut myself off here and resist the urge to go "AND ANOTHER THING", haha.
happy disability pride month. 🖤
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