A loss of humerus

This is all by way of explanation for why this blog might have big gaps in posting from time to time in the next few months.

As I get older (70 last birthday!) I seem to spend more and more of my time engaged in:

• dealing with current health issues - which is mostly about bone rubbing on bone
• managing future health appointments
• attending such appointments
• having surgery to correct the bone-on-bone
• recovering from surgery

My other half has decided to join in the fun as well. After his recent medical emergency, he now also has a set of appointments etc he wants me to attend as well.

Over and above this I still need to do my exercise every day to keep my osteoarthritis at bay. That's as in "not deteriorating any faster than it is already".

Anatomical Studies of the Shoulder - by Leonardo da Vinci

Last week I had surgery as a preliminary to my reverse shoulder replacement - hopefully in the next few months. I have bone-on-bone arthritis in my shoulder with "significant glenoid retroversion of 20 degrees"

Unlike my ankle fusion (just two titanium pins), my new shoulder will have quite a lot of kit inside AND wants to be kept rested for something like six weeks post surgery. So I'm already practising doing everything with one arm.

a lot of kit for a reverse shoulder replacement

Plus my knees have suddenly started hurting a LOT in the last 6 weeks or so - and I suspect I've probably lost a big chunk of cartilage in my right knee (given I'm now very experienced in how osteoarthritis progresses)

So in top of everything else, I now have 

• shoulder exercises to do before the surgery; 
• plus I'll be in a sling for several weeks afterwards and then doing yet more exercises to get my range of movement back (it's very limited at the moment).
• Plus I need to do my new knees exercises to stop me falling over while I've only got one operational arm!

Last week I did rather a lot at the beginning of the week - surgery on Monday, followed by two major exhibitions on Tuesday - after which I could barely walk and flaked out for most of the rest of the week.

I obviously also need to work more on my expenditure of energy and remembering to rest!

At the moment, I'm late on

• my review of the RI Annual Exhibition
• my review of the LAOTY Series
• other stuff I have on my list of things to write about

and I will get round to them as quickly as I can - commensurate with getting all my exercise done and not getting too tired.

So please bear with me. I'm not giving up this blog - but from time to time my body is giving up on me - and needs my attention!

I do find it easier to post "quickies" on my Making A Mark Facebook Page - so if you do want contact and to see what I've noticed, do please follow me there at https://www.facebook.com/makingamark2/