Tag Archives: health

Disaster Back

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‘Wow this is amazing! I’ve never seen anything like it before!’ exclaims the fit man in khaki shorts as he holds my left foot in his hand. Should I feel pride or shame? I briefly consider changing my name to Madame Piedmonstrueux and charging a fee. The skilled athletic therapist is responding to my malformed appendages in a familiar way. When an orthopaedic surgeon first diagnosed my condition in 1999, he beamed ‘These CT scans are definitely going in my special teaching files! I have not encountered such a case in over 25 years of practice’ ‘Oh. But can anything be done to correct my problem?’ I asked. He laughed hollowly, back turned while walking out the door. And no, his name wasn’t Dr. House. The podiatrist was more helpful, fitting me with orthotics that (among other things) tipped me forward to relieve some pressure. All the same, he ‘played with’ my feet, bending and twisting them for over 20 minutes, a glint in his eye and small smile on his face. It was kind of creepy, but that’s what I get for being such a freak of nature.

What exactly is wrong with me? Here is the official medical description of my left foot based on the CT scans: ‘Seen best on the reconstructed views is bony ankylosis between the left sustentaculum tali and the undersurface of the talus medially. Just lateral to the area of the fused sustentaculum tali is an additional bony bar extending across the subtalar joint between the undersurface of the talus and calcaneus. … Certainly there are degenerative changes at the site of articulation at this time.’

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Health versus Fitness

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‘I’m back!’ I greet the lovely young woman at my gym as she swipes my card, for the second time that day. ‘You look more alive every time I see you,’ she sing-songs in response. ‘Do you mean that I look fatter every time you see me?’ I inquire, unplucked eyebrows raised. ‘Well … yes,’ she admits somewhat sheepishly, like that towel-wearing locker room guy on TV who makes fun of his teammate’s volumized hair. I’m not sure why, for I like long hair on a man. Let me specify that I mean scampish, carefree, tousled hair on the verge of needing to be cut, not greasy hair in a ponytail draped down the sloping spine of an otherwise bald man. So you will no longer be surprised to hear that in Quizzaz I chose Severus over Lucius: 

His menacingly alluring hair fills me with a desire to obey.

Even a  threatening cane can’t save Mr. Limp Locks.

[This one’s for you, G-Smash, even though your Lelo is named Ralph.]

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Healthy but Abnormal

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This morning I was eating freshly baked pumpkin-spice-oatmeal muffins at a cafe–I had brought them in a tupperware container as a gift–with my adorable but injured graduate student. Her surgeon, she explained, had recently diagnosed her as ‘healthy but abnormal.’ We giggled and sipped on the cappucinos that the sexy-but-too-thin-for-my-liking barista had brought over. Oh that’s great, I said. Can I use it for my blog? Of course, she enthused, before describing the simultaneously painful and pleasurable itch-relief she had felt when her surgical staples were removed. She knows where I live. Is it wrong that I am compelled by everything corporeal and abject? Probably not. Is it troubling that I had an adventurously erotic dream about Mantracker last night? Most definitely. Oh Mantracker, the passions that lie behind your steely blue eyes…    Continue reading →

Vibrant Physicality

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What does health feel like? This question is challenging, especially if you are trying to be specific. According to S. van Hooft, a Dutch sociologist who never uses his or her full name, health is an enigma. It is ‘a state of being which is absent from consciousness and experienced only in its negation by disease and injury.’ I think, however, that a perception of health can be present immediately after an illness is over. Continue reading →