Invisible to Atos

Its so easy to look at an article like this The bunion surgeons who are maiming their patients.and say, oh look at those nasty podiatrists, pretending to be doctors and getting all above themselves.

Yes I had corrective surgery for a mangled op done by a podiatric surgeon.  In fact it was what’s called tertiary surgery (third go), as the podiatrist actually got to try and put it right himself first in a spirit of forgiveness and ...well sheer stupidity on my part as it turned out.



But to say that the problem is that orthopods are being given a bad name by podiatrists is a gross oversimplification as many people pointed out in the comments.


I’m what’s known as a guinea pig.  When I was fourteen I had an operation on both feet that basically removed 50% of the functionality of my forefeet.  That is the medical opinion of orthopaedic surgeons. Nevertheless, with the fire of youth, I walked around like that for years, and 'fire' is the right word as being so fiercely in denial that I had any problem (a tendency of youth), I actually became a removal woman, spending all day on my feet, and lifting washing machines.  Needless to say this shaped my youthful personality making me pretty spiky, to say the least.  Pain will do that.

Then, when I had the bad surgery by the podiatrist, I lost most of the remaining functionality of that foot, the other remains in the same 50% functional state.  But what I gained from sitting down for an extended period, was the knowledge that my personality was completely different when I wasn't in pain, something I had not had any way of realising before.  In spite of the terrible mangled state of my foot, I did receive a gift from the experience because I got a part of myself back that had really been lost to me for years.

Needless to say that the original operation that caused that iatrogenic impairment (caused by medical science), is not done any more.  But it was originally done by an orthopeadic surgeon, not a podiatrist.  And that orthopedic surgeon was somebody whom we were told “nobody would say he made a mistake because he’s a very well respected surgeon”.

So his credentials are the reason he will not have ever made a mistake, not the facts or anything mundane like that.  Spot the confirmation bias.  So that explains the 'framing' of the article above.

So over the years, the story goes like this, Whenever I re-present with the problem, I’m told, oh well we don’t do that operation any more.  “Yes I know", say I, that’s why I’m here, because it didn’t work.  And each time I've had a different operation, I've heard the same thing.  Once a guinea-pig, always a guinea-pig I guess. Aren't we all.

Now I’ve got my courage together to try again, I don’t want to exist in so much pain, in fact after the last surgery I told the surgeon that unless he would fix a remaining problem in my foot where one small bone had still been left to take all my weight on every step, I didn’t want to stay alive.  That was fifteen years ago.  He refused, saying that it would be better to wait until I was much older and could only basically shuffle along anyway.

It might sound melodramatic on International Suicide Prevention Day, to talk of not wanting to live in pain 'just because' of an invisible impairment that involves some very small bones,  and I do realise of course, that on the continuum, it may not seem severe to an 'objective' observer and over the years I have certainly been roundly and publicly insulted for my 'pathetic little disability'.

But I can testify that when you reach the Pain Clinic, and they give you the book with the bit from Amnesty International in the back about how most people who live in chronic pain eventually deal with it by focussing on helping people who are being tortured on the basis that, as it never stops, you can identify with it, except that for those people, they are being hurt 'on purpose', you know you've reached the end of the line.

What it's taught me, over the years, is that you can never know what someone else is dealing with, that you can't see or know about and that judging others is futile and cruel.

This impairment, and being trapped inside for most of the year due to not being able to wear shoes, was what made me leave the UK in 2007 and trying to improve it is a necessity for me if I should want to choose to live again in my native land.

Obviously I can’t get health insurance for this problem because it is a “known problem”, a problem that was caused by medical science for which I have been a guinea pig.  That means that when somebody else presents with awful bunions, or needing metatarsal osteotomies, they do not receive the treatments I received, because due to me and all the others who received it, they now know it doesn’t work and do much better operations.

I'm just mentioning that because of the well-documented rising tide of disabled abuse that's been juxtaposed with the Paralympics.  Even I've experienced the aggression from people who've never even met me.  Here's what someone recently wrote about me "She’s not only shooting herself in the foot [referring to my walking impairment], now… she’s shooting the bullied children too!"  for advocating about bullying in schools with Human Rights, and this is by someone framing himself as an educational critic.  Having an impairment just seems to make you an easy target.

But It doesn't matter what kind of difference you have, in disability terms or any other, if you can be targeted, someone will do it.  My impairment is invisible to you.

And, obviously, to Atos as well.  It appears that when being assessed you get less points if your impairment is invisible and it's extremely unlikely, although I was a mobility customer for many years on high rate DLA, that I would qualify under current criteria.  The problem with that is, ok take the money away, but since they connected benefits and blue badges, it's hard to get the badge without the money..  Not having extra cash is one thing (devastating for many - but I had to give that up on leaving) but not being able to go out and park without having to do walking that I'm not capable of, that would basically equate for me as not being able to live in the UK again.

I had algodystrophy in my legs following surgery, a reaction to trauma caused by surgery, a somatic FREAK OUT.  I couldn't walk any distance at all without being in mind-sapping pain, because of one small bone in my foot.  And I still didn't get a result, due to the surgeon who came to my rescue after two botched surgeries refusing to help in spite of my begging him.   I have had a lot of time to think about that, while meditating on the "not torture" lesson from the pain clinic.

And if I've been a benefit scrounger due to this impairment, that raises interesting questions about doctors refusing to try and limit my scrounging by correcting an iatrogenic impairment.  I certainly don't hold to the "fix the disabled person" model of disability, and I'm not expecting to be pain free (that addictive state) after this op, but I certainly would have preferred to spend the last fifteen years of my life not being in chronic pain - wouldn't you?

It’s a rough gig being a guinea-pig for medical science.  But it’s given me a more compassionate perspective and a large attitude.  There is no guarantee whatsoever that this operation won't make the pain worse, and, in the face of the surgeon's refusal and caution about going elsewhere, it took so much courage from way deep down to try again, that right now I can't believe I've done it.  So don’t expect me to shut up about it anytime soon. :-)