Julie Burchill: I have a confession about my wheelchair
When my NHS home physiotherapy ended early last year, my physio’s parting words were: “Remember, this isn’t the end of your recovery – it’s the beginning.” It was a lovely message to keep in mind, but I knew what she really meant, though being far too well-brought-up to say it: “Get off your BOTTOM and PRACTISE WALKING WITH YOUR ZIMMER FRAME, you lazy cow!”
This is a difficult one for me. I know in theory that the more time I spend putting one foot in front of the other – albeit with the assistance of a metal implement which is a byword for infirmity, so not strictly my accessory of choice – the better it is for me. On the other hand, I’m loath to do it.
For starters, I’m phobic about falling – imagine my already broken body with a broken wrist! If I couldn’t write, I’m pretty sure I’d go mad. That’s the other thing: writing takes me out of myself. Losing myself in words – as I’ve done in public for half a century now – I forget my disability, even, miraculously, when I’m writing about it; it’s like the very process of writing alchemises the pain.
I’m meant to set an alarm and totter around on my frame on the hour – but that way I’d lose the transportation of creation. And I do see it as tottering rather than walking; I used to be such a long-legged swaggerer, who my friends would plead with to slow down. Now each step is a painstaking act of will – little wonder that when I see my mates these days, I simply take the easy option of slipping into something more comfortable – my wheelchair – and chirping: “OK – you push, I’ll pay!”
I’m probably unhealthily attached to “Wendy” – but a wheelchair just feels a better fit for someone like me. There’s the slightly imperious angle – it’s like a sedan chair crossed with a car – and the fact that I can go at a decent speed with even a semi-fit pusher. (I don’t have an electric one as I don’t want to go out alone – I may be stolen!) When I see old people in the street painstakingly making their way with their three-wheeled walkers, I admire them immensely; I just can’t put myself in their sensible shoes.
But of course the fact that I spend so little time standing means that the return of the dreaded pressure sores is more probable, and having suffered two stage threes (look it up, if you have the stomach – they’re grim) I am always fearful of the next one. “Would you look at my bum, please?” has become a greeting I never dreamed that I’d be using so freely to strangers with the slightest medical qualifications.
As I’ve written before, a rare thing that makes me feel sorrow is whenever my husband expresses hope that I’ll walk again. When I relate my tottering achievements to him, he’s like a kid at Christmas. it makes me want to glue myself to Wendy, as I know he’ll be disappointed when tottering is as good as it gets. But because my spinal injury is what they call “incomplete”, and because I can stand up and bear my own weight, it seems somehow selfish and negligent not to totter. What about the people whose total spinal injuries mean they can’t stand at all? What if a miracle happened and I learned to walk again?
In one way, suffering life-changing disabilities overnight means that you become far more relaxed about everyday problems, as the most seismic shift imaginable has already burned your life down around you. It’s like the scene in Spinal Tap where Nigel, David and Derek stand beside Elvis’s grave. “It really puts perspective on things, though, doesn’t it?” – “Too much. There’s too much fucking perspective!” In another, life fills up with fresh worries every day, as all the little things that might go wrong around the house will now be much harder to put right without assistance. I don’t even want to think about a plumbing emergency; the results could well resemble one of those “disaster movies” so popular in the 20th century.
Who could blame me (unless they were a medical professional or a prissy prig) for living life the way I do – rising at dawn to write, and by lunchtime being ready for a lovely wheel-out to local watering holes, with physio a distant memory? I have to take each day at a time, because I’ve learned the hard way that making either assumptions or plans is futile.
Looking up at the blue sky from the ease of my chair, moving effortlessly along thanks to my companion, for a brief time I am transported back to the time when I took movement for granted. Attempting to walk, as my familiar yet foreign feet teeter into their next move, I am forever staring at the ground, my eyes downcast, as if perpetually mourning the loss of my once-lovely life. Forgive me if I make the easy choice.
