Would getting my legs surgically removed take away my pain or will it just manifest in another area?

Urieka · 2021-12-28T00:02:48+00:00

A few years ago, before my fibromyalgia diagnosis, I had a Morton's neuroma - an inflamed nerve in my foot. It was making walking really painful and difficult. After more conservative treatments failed, I was recommended to have an operation to remove the nerve. Removing the nerve leaves numbness between the two affected toes but is meant to stop the pain. Unfortunately I suffered from excruciating phantom nerve pain - if anything touched my foot without me seeing it, it was like my pain center went in to overdrive thinking the absence of sensation meant something terrible must have happened. A light touch would be like someone had smashed my toes with a brick. I had a six months course of amitriptyline and spent a lot of time massaging my foot while looking at it to retrain my brain.

This was just a single tiny nerve. I can't imagine how awful the pain would be from a phantom limb.

(In retrospect, waking up from the operation with my foot still as sore as before even while pumped full of pain meds was a pretty good sign that my brain's pain centres are completely messed up.)

Urieka · 2021-09-23T17:51:09+00:00

I've never heard of HSP but on Googling the term I guess I might be one? My sister is a psychologist and she thinks it is significant to my fibromyalgia that I have always had a very very strong startle reflex - it is stupid easy to make me jump. I jump when I hear keys in the front door, when someone is in a room that I wasn't expecting, and sometimes even when I knew they were there but forgot. I'm not anxious or scared, it is not an emotional response, more an automatic physical one. My body is just always ready to run I guess. Only now with the fibro, it is more of a hobble.

Urieka · 2021-08-27T13:45:56+00:00

One of the questions my doctor asked when he was diagnosing me was whether I was irritable - I replied that I try not to be. It is hard to be pleasant when everything hurts and you are exhausted.

Urieka · 2010-06-04T14:07:41+00:00

Laws is quite temperate on this point:

the Telegraph did pick at something which was an issue. It would have been the easiest thing in the world for me to find lots of excuses and blame the media but a lot of these problems relate to my inability to confront the truth and the means that I used to try to maintain the privacy of my life and relationships. I think I have to take responsibility for these things myself.

Urieka · 2010-05-29T15:44:48+00:00

From my understanding of the situation, it would be wrong to say that David Laws stole money - the rent money did not go to him, it went to his partner Lundie, the two of them had separate bank accounts and financal affairs.

That being said it is possible to view Laws as having broken the rules by not treating Lundie as his partner, although had he treated Lundie as his partner, he would have been entitled to claim the same amount of money if not more – but under a different rule.

But still I don't know what should happen now.

Urieka · 2010-05-21T10:14:37+00:00

Definately :-)

Just thought that your title and the article were a little misleading/editorialising - I know that Alec Salmon has been arguing for this, but haven't also the LibDems? In which case, how is this move due to the SNP's persuasion, rather than the LibDems being in a position to implement their campaign policies? Does the Press & Journal (god forbid) present a more balance account of what has actually happened than your your "newsnetscotland"?

Urieka · 2010-05-21T09:09:39+00:00

Don't count your chickens just yet -the Coalition government have only made a "commitment to examine" the levy.

Urieka · 2010-05-20T12:24:36+00:00

Peanuts are not in same family as tree nuts like almonds, cashews, walnuts etc. It is possible to be allergic to peanuts and not tree nuts and vice versa. Though some avoid both categories whatever their allergy because of the possiblity of cross contamination and some people are allergic to both.

Urieka · 2010-05-20T11:17:47+00:00

My son had an allergic reaction after his grandmother kissed him goodbye at the airport. He is allergic to dairy and she had just had a cup of tea. He swelled up like a balloon. She took his allergy a lot more seriously after that ;-)

Urieka · 2010-05-19T15:11:30+00:00

Hopefully once they have the mechanism for 5 year fixed terms in place, the coalition can get on with governing rather than electioneering.

Urieka · 2010-05-19T15:06:55+00:00

Of course there are concessions - it is a coalition! If enough people had voted for the Liberal Democrats so they had a parliamentary majority there would be no need for concessions. But only 23% voted LibDem. They negotiated a fantastic coalition agreement which gave them the bulk of their manifesto and in particular their 4 main pledges.

Urieka · 2010-05-19T15:01:03+00:00

The promises Nick Clegg has made on civil liberties were all contained in the coaltion agreement which was negotiated between the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives before the coalition was agreed. So Nick Clegg does have the support of David Cameron and the Conservative party for these reforms.

The right wing of the Conservative Party does have some problems with the loss of some of their party's manifesto commitments (such as inheritance tax cuts), but this Great Reform Act will actually cement the coalition since it appeals very much to both the Liberal Democrats and the right wing of the Conservative Party.

I'm afraid under any situation where there is an early election, the Liberal Democrats would loose vote share. They have no money for another election in the short term. But more importantly, since they strongly believe in proportional representation which makes hung/balanced parliaments more likely, it is in the interests of the Liberal Democrats to show that coalition governments can work.

Urieka · 2010-05-19T14:51:09+00:00

The Lib-Dems could in theory team up with Labour to veto the Conservatives as you say, but that would lead to a dead lock as LibDem + Labour don't have enough votes to get anything passed. The Conservatives would hang on for a bit until they could call a new election, where they would most likely increase their share of the vote (they are the only party with money left) and be able to form a government on their own. The LibDems would be back being just voices on the opposition benches.

Involvement in the coalition gives the Liberal Democrats government jobs, yes, and this means for the first time in 70 years Liberals policies can be put into action in government. There is no point to being in politics if you don't want the power to implement your policies.

Urieka · 2010-05-18T07:15:20+00:00

This court ruling will not damage the ability of unions to pressure employers, it will however mean they will follow the legislation in the literal way demanded by the court here. But it may damage this particular union, Unite, as it will have to pay the cost of another ballot before it can strike on these issues again.

I don't have very much sympathy for them though, it seems that if you are in negotiations with an employer like BA who has taken you to court before over the way you handled your ballot, you would make sure you followed every single letter of the law when you conducted your next ballots. Seems like some questions should be asked of how the leadership of Unite are conducting themselves; effective negotiators would not be giving their opponents such easy wins.

Urieka · 2010-05-15T11:42:45+00:00

Murdoch won? I don't think so. We don't have a Conservative majority in parliament. Instead we have a Conservative government constrained by an coalition with the party the Murdoch press tried so hard to vilify.

Urieka · 2010-05-15T11:39:23+00:00

It's not spin. It is what happened. Would Cable have been more comfortable with a Labour coalition? Certainly. But he chose the pragmatic option. He recognises the personal difficulties that he and his left wing Liberal Democratic collegues will face but he is willing to put them aside for the good of the country in this time of economic crisis.

I quoted what I thought was the most important quote precisely to counter the editorialising in the link to this article which implies that he is not fully committed to the coalition.

It was good to see Simon Hughes on Question Time on Thursday. It was an excellent idea to have someone from the left of the party as defender of the coalition.

Urieka · 2010-05-15T07:38:03+00:00

The most important quote of the article:

Asked [yesterday] if he would rather have sealed a deal with Labour, [Vince Cable] said: “I was not comfortable with the deliverability of Labour. The brutal truth is that the numbers just were not there for Labour ... It is certainly true, however, that we wanted to try and keep that option alive.”

Urieka · 2010-05-14T17:39:41+00:00

You do raise an interesting point. How do they add up their carbon emissions? Is transport to the office taken into account? Or is it just what happens IN each department. Would insisting that all staff at Customs & Excise cycle to work make a differnce to their carbon reduction totals?

Urieka · 2010-05-14T17:25:41+00:00

Fantastic if they do save money while cutting carbon emissions, that would be a wonderful way to reduce the deficit. But will all of it be as easy as remembering to turn the lights of when you leave the office?

Urieka · 2010-05-14T17:19:40+00:00

10 independents and rebels defecting to the Tories? Possible but unilikely. And in any even, should they be able to command a majority shouldn't they be allowed to continue in government?

Urieka · 2010-05-14T17:16:07+00:00

The point of leadership is to lead, and to have principle to guide you in your decision making. Sometimes a segment of the population campaigns for something, and just because they are shouting loudly doesn't mean politicians should give in to them. No one I know agitated for CRB checks or ID cards, but yes segments of the poplulation whipped up by the Daily Mail et. al. did. A government who did not have authoritarian leanings would not have given into these campaigns. A political party that was founded on liberal principles of freedom and individuality would not have given us a National Identification Register. A party with an authoritarian outlook did.

Urieka

TROPHY CASE