Let’s call it a character building experience…
You know how sometimes you have a new experience and you all of a sudden you learn a whole bunch of things that maybe should have been obvious already but you never quite thought of? Like how it takes a lot of space to move around on a knee scooter? And how people who leave pee on the toilet seats in accessible bathrooms are assholes? And how an awful lot of the things in your house are out of reach from a seated position? Right, so the broken leg has made sure I know all of that. And it’s also been a good reminder that sometimes the first thing that pops into your head to say to someone when they’re hurt is maybe sometimes not the very best choice. I want to talk about that a little today.
I’ve gotten three basic types of comments about my leg. One of them is awesome and helpful and encouraging, and two of them are not quite as great.
But before we go any further, I absolutely know that all of the things folks have said to me about my leg have come from a good place. And I totally understand wanting to say something but not being quite sure what to say. So if you’ve said any of these things to me or to someone else, please don’t worry. I’m not upset, and I’ve totally said something similar myself. But on the off chance you find yourself wanting to say something to someone in a similar situation in the future, this is what I’ve learned, and maybe it can help you.
- Not quite so great comment type 1: “At least it wasn’t your arm!” Or the variant “At least you can still knit!”
Why that’s not awesome: Right now, I can’t walk. That means I can’t get to the second floor of my house, so I’m sleeping in my office. Leaving my house requires a helper and involves scooting up and down my snowy front stairs on my butt. I can’t take a walk outside and get some fresh air. Getting in and out of the shower is now a group activity. Moving around the doctor’s office is hard, navigating a restaurant is exhausting, and using the bathrooms in public places is gross.
Personally, I would much rather be unable to use an arm than unable to use a leg. I would be more mobile and independent if I could walk. And while I will probably eventually be able to find a comfortable way to sit and knit, I haven’t found it yet (the stuff I’ve been posting recently is all stuff I knit before I fell and stored up because I had hoped to take some time off over the holidays).
But the bigger problem isn’t the specific aspects of my situation (those are going to vary from person to person and day to day). It’s that telling someone some variation of “hey it could be worse!” is almost never helpful. The fact that it could be worse doesn’t make what is going on any less lousy. Bad things aren’t a competition, and it’s ok to be bummed about a situation, even if something worse could have happened.
Recommendation: Consider not saying “it could be worse” or a variation on it. I’m know you mean it in the very best possible way, but it might not be as encouraging as you intended.
- Not quite so great comment type 2: “Let me tell you about all the horrible, painful, expensive, never-ending issues you can expect now! And while I’m at it, let me offer some medical advice…”
Why that’s not awesome: I get it, I do. It’s totally natural to want to chat about shared or related experiences. And if I’m talking about my upcoming trip to Norway and you want to talk about your Norwegian grandmother/your recent trip to Sweden/this neat documentary you saw about reindeer, that’s fun and helpful and interesting and a great way to build connections. But if all you’re going to do is tell me about how unsafe airplanes are and how I’m bound to get kidnapped and how my trip will be a disaster, it becomes less awesome very quickly.
All that hearing about possible awful outcomes from my injury will do is stress me out. I realize that’s probably different from person to person, but I’ve heard from enough other people to know that I’m not alone in feeling this way. And as for a diagnosis/treatment plan/outcome prediction, I’d much rather let the medical folks taking care of me tell me what I can expect and what to watch out for in my specific case (after all, they’re the ones who have talked to me and seen the injury and checked the x-rays).
Recommendation: Consider not sharing horror stories/worst case scenarios unless someone asks for them. And please think really hard before offering a diagnosis/medical advice based on a tweet/blog post/ig post, especially if you’re not a medical professional.
- Awesome, helpful comments: “That’s lousy, I’m sorry, let me know if I can help.” Or “Take care of yourself, we’ll be here when you’re ready to come back.” Or “Want some netflix/audiobook recommendations?” Or “I did something similar, if you have questions, I’d be happy to talk.” Or “When something similar happened to me, I found a shower seat/a grab bar/an extra boot liner/knee scooter super helpful!”
Why those are so cool: Having folks express sympathy and send good wishes is fantastic. Being hurt is scary and overwhelming and isolating, and being reminded that folks care is wonderful. I read every single comment people left here and on Instagram and on twitter, and I appreciated every one (yes, even the ones that did some of the stuff I mentioned above, because I know it’s totally coming from a good place). If you said something, I saw it and you’re awesome and thank you!
And hearing about things that other folks found entertaining or useful is also grand. But just to be clear, “hey, doing this thing with a pillow made me much more comfortable” is totally different than “being in a cast is a perpetual torment, you’re going to hate it, having it cut off is going to hurt worse than breaking your leg did, and you’ll never be the same after, you’re doomed” One is helpful and encouraging and gives me something to try and lets me know that other folks got through this and are ok…the other just gives me something to worry about.
Recommendation: If someone is having a rough time, please know that reaching out and leaving a comment or sending a message is totally helpful. I promise. And saying either “I’m around if I you have questions” or “hey, this helped me” is awesome. Absolutely do those things!
Still with me? Well thank you, I know that was a lot to read. And I want to emphasize again that if you said one of the not quite so great things, you are still lovely, and I know it was said with good intentions, and I appreciate the sentiment behind it!
It’s just the tenth time I heard “at least it wasn’t your arm” when I had just been thinking how much easier everything would be if it had been my arm, I got a little frustrated. And full disclosure, I’m also absolutely sure I’ve said something very much like it in the past. Until this happened to me, I never would have thought it might not have the intended effect. But now that I know, I’m going to try to pay a little bit more attention. And because I know you guys are all lovely and would want to pay attention to that sort of thing too, I thought I’d mention it here. Because if I get to learn all sorts of nifty new things, I might as well share!
I am so sorry that you’re stuck in a boot for a while. Along the lines of hopefully helpful comments – both my daughter and I have done time in boots and we both found that it was nice to get a piece of the cotton liner they use under casts to wear as a big sock inside the boot. It keeps your boot from getting extra stinky from sweaty feet (we live in Houston), it can help keep your foot warm, and if you get two, you can wash one while you wear the other. We got a piece long enough to go from the top of the boot to beyond our toes by an inch or so.
We also got to walk with our boots on, and to help prevent the “limp” from the boot being so much thicker on the bottom than regular shoes, we both wore our running shoes/tennis shoes with an extra insole. That helped a bunch.
The hardest thing of all I think is finding a way to let people help you. I stink at that, so I hope that you have good people around you and are good at accepting help!
Oh I’m sorry you had to spend time in one too, they’re no fun! And I hear you on the liner. Right now my foot is too swollen and sore to put on a sock, so I got a package of those straight socks (the kind with no heel) that they give you at the hospital, and have been using them to put over the foot pad on the bottom of the boot. It means my foot is touching something cotton and washable (rather than plastic and less washable). It made a huge difference. I didn’t know about the cast liner stuff, but I’ll totally look into it, I bet it would help with the cold bits where my ankle peeks out.
When I can put weight on this again, I’ll totally keep the height difference in mind, thank you.
And I hear you on accepting help. I’m not good at that at all. Let’s just say I’m getting some practice in figuring out what would help, asking for it, and then letting folks do it. Though if I’m being honest, I’d like to just be better enough I don’t need as much help.
Hope you and your daughter are both feeling better!
Hunter so sorry you’ve gotten these unhelpful comments. I have a broken right ankle, and while I’m somewhat more mobile than you, i been the recipient of a few dumb remarks too. My main issue is, like you, I find it hard to accept help.
Hang in there!
Oh bummer! That’s no fun at all. And I suspect there are a lot of us out there who have to practice asking for and accepting help. I hope you’re feeling better soon.
This is a really helpful post. Thank you!
Oh good! I debated whether to post it or not, because I absolutely know no one said anything with any ill intent at all (and I totally don’t want to make anyone feel bad). But I suspect we will all find ourselves needing to say something to someone who is injured or ill, and sometimes having read something like this can make it easier to know what to say.
Very well said! I have been guilty of exactly the things you pointed out and been called out for it, so I try to be a bit more aware of people’s feelings before i say anything. Now, I usually just start with a easy question and let them tell me as much about things from their perspective as they want and reply to those issues. Healing thoughts for you!
Me too! I’ve absolutely said things that I now realized later were maybe either intrusive or insensitive. But reading stuff like this when other people have written similar things has helped me avoid doing it again, which is a big part of why I posted this. I know just about everyone has good intentions…just some things maybe aren’t readily apparent…and so reading about it can help.
Thanks for this post!
I was on crutches for more than a year, suffering from a broken bone that wouldn’t heal and debilitating nerve pains. Nobody knew whether I’d ever get better, so I became somewhat of an expert on “thanks but you’re not helping” myself.
Everyone kept asking “how are you doing?”, and saying “crappy” out loud 10x a day made me feel even crappier.
At some point I asked a few people to wait for me to talk about my health but not to bring it up otherwise, and cut off everyone else saying I’d reach out once I was better but that I’d need all my strength to get better.
The close ones found ways of making it better by calling “hey I found a ground-level place to go for lunch/coffee/dinner, I’ll come pick you up and we can hang out”. They made sure to stay fiends with me and not my sickness, and I am eternally grateful to each and everyone. I’d walk through fire for them in return!
Now I’m all better, and most of the people I shut out we’re actually super understanding, saying that they were glad I told them exactly what was going on.
Get well soon and make sure to put yourself first!
(What really helped for me was seeing an Osteopath btw)
Oh no, that’s really lousy. I’m glad you’re better now, and I’m glad you found a way to speak up and let folks know what you needed. That’s really hard to do, and I wish there were easier ways for us to learn how to do it!
This is such a helpful post! I blew out my knee and did the whole wheelchair/crutches/everything is a production thing in my twenties and learned so much about how accessibility does and does not work. Something else I learned is that if you genuinely want to help, being specific about what you want to do or what your availability looks like is the best, because there are plenty of people who say “let me know if I can help” and they just mean them as sympathetic mouth-noises, so if you say that to me I assume you don’t actually mean it. (People make similar mouth-noises after you’ve had a baby, or surgery, and yet it’s still hard to find someone who can actually help with things!)
Impaired mobility sucks, being in pain sucks, and I’m sorry you’re going through it.
Thank you! It’s really reassuring to hear that folks don’t think I’m just being a big jerk face for writing this (seriously…I sat on the draft for days because I was worried people would be upset). And I’m amazed by how many people have navigated something like this and seem to really get it. It’s great to not feel like I’m imagining it all!
And yes, offering specific things (want me to bring dinner over? need me to swing by the grocery store for anything?) is fabulous. It makes it feel like it’s ok to actually say ‘hey could you grab the mail out of my mailbox and drop it on the front porch so I can get it’ or whatever the thing you actually need is.
Excellent public service announcement! Thank you for sharing.
While I have not broken any bones, our house was struck by lightning on the 4th of July one year and burned to the ground. Fortunately, we got the kids and pets out with no loss of life, but we lost everything. After cleaning off the slab, we build our house for a second time. We had an open house to celebrate and thank our friends and neighbors for supporting us along the way.
One of those friends and neighbors was so impressed with the rebuild, she had the insensitivity to say: “Aren’t you so glad this happened, your house is so much nicer now?”
Ummm. No. I would rather not have been homeless, traumatized my 5 and 13 year old kids, and lost everything we owned…
Forgive the rant, it’s been 11 years, and this still upsets me.
I do hope you heal quickly and things become far easier for you as recover.
Oh ugh…I’m not sure I’d have been able to remain tactful if someone had said that to my face. I’m sure the new house is lovely, but that’s NOT the way you want to get there. I’d totally be still mad too!
Any injury sucks! I hope you are feeling better soon. I had rotator cuff surgery a year ago this month, and I can testify that upper body injuries have their own set of issues. Getting dressed is difficult with one hand, finding a comfortable sleeping position is almost impossible, typing is tough, and even meals were hard. Getting a hot dish out of the microwave is iffy with one hand… Plus, you can’t knit! (although I did a little bit holding it up really close to my body.) I hope you have a good support system. Do what your doctor says, and if they recommend physical therapy, do it. It makes a difference on getting everything working properly again.
Oh, I’m absolutely sure that having an arm out of commission is lousy too! It’s totally not that I want to rate various injuries against each other…it’s just that I’ve gotten a first hand demonstration of how many folks will tell you ‘at least it’s not xyz’ and that it can get a bit tiring after a while. Any injury is crummy, and I think most of us probably want a bit of space to vent about what’s happening with us, even if there’s something else that could be worse.
And yes, I’ll totally do all the right PT. I want this better as soon as possible and am excited to start when I can!
I would like to add my most annoying comments. When a stranger walks up to you at the grocery store or whatever and asks what happened. They don’t know you and it is none of their business. If all they can see is a boot or a pair of crutches, then they don’t care about you.
Oh yuck. I haven’t had that happen yet (so far I’ve only managed to make it to dr appointments and out to one restaurant — that was a mistake), but I would be super annoyed by it. That’s awfully nosy.
I’m so sorry this happened to you, Hunter.
And the post was gentle and thoughtful and helpful. Like you.
And beautifully written – as usual.
Oh you’re very kind, thank you! I always worry I’ll accidentally sound like a jerk, when what I really am is sort of a cross between surprised I didn’t know this stuff before and hopeful that I can maybe keep someone else from experiencing the same frustration. Good to know I didn’t come across too ranty!
Super well-written post. Sorry about your leg, it sounds like it really sucks. I wore one of those boots for a few weeks but mine was “only” a fracture in my foot and I was allowed to walk on it. Here’s my hopefully helpful hint for when you graduate to being able to put weight on your foot in the boot. There’s a huge height difference between an air cast and a normal shoe so I dug around my closet looking for a high soled but stable shoe for the other foot and was surprised to find that my safety boots (which are men’s because I have huge feet) had the highest heel and thickest sole.I wore an air cast on one foot and a safety boot on the other for a few weeks.
I am totally looking forward to real shoes again some day (and socks…my foot is too swollen/sore right now for socks, and I miss them)! And yes, I will totally do what I can to match the height difference once it’s time. Thanks!
As someone who has been injured (albeit differently than you are), I heartily support everything you said here. If I were closer, and actually knew you, I would be there with appropriate edibles so that you would not have to worry about that. I am not at all clear where you live now, but if there is some kind of food delivery service, one could also order food from afar to be delivered! The wonders of modern times. Sending healing thoughts … I do enjoy your posts, your knitting, and the glimpses we get of your life.
Uh huh, we’re big fans of those dinner delivery services (blue apron/plated/etc) that mean you don’t have to go to the grocery store nearly as often! I’m pretty sure I couldn’t live here (very tiny town in Maine) without the wonders of the internet and amazon prime shipping!
Welcome to the world that the chronically ill/disabled live in. I get those sorts of unhelpful comments *all* the time!
I hope you heal quickly and well. The only thing I remember about my broken ankle 30ish years ago was that I broke it. So, my helpful hint is: eventually it won’t even be a memory! 😀
Yeah, I hesitated to write something because it felt somehow…presumptuous? unearned? to gripe about something I’m dealing with for a few weeks when there are loads of folks who deal with things all the time. Like maybe it’s not my place to talk about it because there’s someone else more qualified to do it.
But I decided that this experience has made me more aware of a bunch of stuff (there’s a letter in the works to the restaurant that assured me they were accessible but had no grab bars in the bathroom), so maybe I can share that awareness with a few other folks along the way. Just hopefully without sounding like I think I’m some sort of expert and without taking room from people who are much more qualified to talk about it than I am.
Thank you for the insight. I KNOW I have said the “well at least it wasn’t…” comment to a few people in the past. My word for 2018 is “mindful” so I’m going to try to be aware of what I’m saying and to whom. Hopefully BEFORE it leaves my mouth.
I’m sure I have too, and I never would have thought anything of it (which is why I tried super hard to emphasize that no one who said it to me needs to feel bad…I absolutely know it wasn’t meant to be frustrating). But I’ve heard it enough that I found myself trying to put into words *why* it was frustrating, and that’s usually about the time I feel a blog post coming on. I hope it ends up being helpful to someone!
I also wanted to write about the good things. My friends and family have been wonderful helping me in all sorts of ways. No two alike. My sweetie drove me everywhere I needed to go, did errands, and helped me cleaned the house. When I was up to it, my sister picked me up and drove me around to food shop and whatever. She also drove me to the ocean to watch the waves while we knitted. A seriously ill friend sent me two cards: one from her and one from her dog. They are still on my desk and I smile knowing they are there. Another friend took me out to lunch. Another brought me some delicious food that lasted in various ways for about five days. Some friends offered to help, but without concrete plans nothing happened. Still I felt appreciation and their love.
Hunter. Since you probably don’t have lots of friends in Maine yet, you will have to rely on us virtual friends. We are hear to listen to you talk about your grumps, gains, or pains. We want to see if you have been knitting and what progress you are making. And if it is no progress, well that is what some days are like. We are here to laugh, sympathize, and help you heal in whatever time it takes to get back to a new norm.
Absolutely! It’s amazing how much those things mean! And I’m getting better…it just takes its own sweet time and I apparently can’t rush it, no matter how much I glower at it with a menacing tilt to my eyebrow…
I agree 100% with what you said. I have never subscribed to the “it could be worse” school of sympathy and never understood it.
Feel better soon and heal quickly. I believe in the power of rest to help heal so I wish you rest and relaxation during this painful and frustrating time.
Thank you! I’ve been amazed just how much I’ve been sleeping (but it feels better the more I sleep, so at least for now, I’m going with it). And I’m finally starting to feel enough better to get back to work, at least a little, so I’m hopeful that things are on the mend.
Very well written post. I’ll surely be thinking more carefully about how to sympathize with people. Feel better soon=).
They’re totally the sort of things I would have said and never thought anything of. But as I’ve talked with other folks who have had similar issues, it totally became clear I wasn’t the only one who got those comments a lot and who found them…eventually frustrating. So now I’ll know to pay a little more attention going forward. But breaking your leg to find that out seemed a little dramatic, so I thought writing about it instead would be more efficient for everyone else!
An interesting blog today. You made several excellent points as well as examples of offering true support to someone experiencing a difficult time. On the other hand, I was also a bit puzzled by parts which is why I decided to add a comment contrary to the general response. It is most likely that I am the person who commented “at least you can knit.” If I didn’t then I can most certainly hear myself saying it especially to someone with whom I share a love of knitting. As you said, it was not meant to be unkind but to offer a small bit of humor. And, speaking of character building, in case you were not aware, the message “it could always be worse” comes from an old Yiddish folktale meant to illustrate the philosophy that things are not always as bad as we might think. Perhaps that perspective is worth considering.
Oh, it wasn’t any one person’s comment that inspired this! It was lots of different folks, both in person and especially over on the IG post (where part of my frustration was that I said that I hadn’t found a comfortable way to knit, and folks were still saying ‘at least you can knit’ which seemed…odd).
And I totally get that the ‘it could be worse’ style of comment is intended to be helpful or maybe encouraging. I firmly believe everything folks said was intended that way…no one is trying to make anyone feel bad. I’m just suggesting that it absolutely didn’t have the intended result for me. And, when I was talking about this with other folks I know who have been injured in similar ways, they said it absolutely didn’t have that result for them either. So if it’s often not received the way it’s intended, it’s something I’m going to try and avoid in the future.