Plastered

I have had a unique relationship with plasters, you may call it an enduring affair, as in the last five decades I have religiously landed in one of them once in each of them, not a mean but quite an unenviable achievement. As a kid who had just about started to take his first few tentative steps, I was diagnosed with Primary Complex, a form of Bone TB in my foot and ended up  earning my first plaster. As they say, morning shows the day or in Hindi "Poot ke paanv palne mein", there were many more to follow! The story goes that my father had to put the paediatrician in his place since he was insisting, it was just a sprain and took me to an orthopaedic, who diagnosed it correctly. No wonder my love affair with orthopaedics has lingered on. It took almost about six months with umpteen number of injections to get me back on my feet again. 

I managed to steer clear of the casts for next couple of years, till I landed up in the NDA and lo and behold in the very first term I managed to break my wrist bone while trying to indulge in a game of supposed Soccer in a slushy football field. It was a seventh string match, obviously what was being enacted did not remotely resemble football, as the ball was nice and secure in its place, stationary, but all our limbs were in action so one piddly wrist giving way was not unusual. Just that I ended up in a cast for six weeks after the Command Hospital staff kept me hungry and thirsty for more than six hours for something called “reduction", was more of an ordeal. If they had kept me a little longer on this I would have probably been reduced forever. Imagine an NDA cadet, after such a gruelling game forced to undergo this torture, naturally this is most vivid part of the memory of this accident. Thereafter I was extra careful and did not venture into uncharted territory, played Hockey for the squadron, but being a winger stayed there itself rather than get into the rough and tumble. I took up racquet games, Tennis and Squash relatively safe, so I presumed.

Fresh from the Young Officers course, a spirited youngster bubbling with josh on the basket ball court I was probably inflicting too much of damage on the opponents side and one of their guys  was tasked to tackle the issue, which he dutifully did by tripping me along with a massive jerk on the knee sending me sprawling on the court with a swollen knee. But youth does not care for such blemishes and I returned to the field ready to carry on where I left off with a knee cap thus aggravating the injury further. By the end of the game I had to be carried on the shoulders to the hospital for a tear in the medial collateral ligament, and the plaster cast followed for another six weeks, this time right from my groin to the ankle.  This one really rankled as even after recovering I was medical category for almost two years, putting paid to my professional and sporting aspirations. A minor scooter accident followed where apart from a head injury and shoulder concussion, I also broke my nose, so the nose was put in a cast. That was the best of them all, as I could remove it at will as the cast had to be fixed with scotched tapes and move around except when the doctors were on rounds.

Having learnt my lessons, I was careful to avoid any injuries till the next millennium almost about 12 years, till BasketBall again turned out to be my nemesis. Here I was officiating in the Divisional HQ ready to proceed on a much sought after computer course, but my Senior JCO had other plans. Being his Company Commander, he insisted that I should participate in the Inter Company Basket Ball match as this one was crucial for the Banner. Obviously I could not say No and landed up on the court successfully steering the company with a safe margin of victory but as though devil had got hold of me, I got back on the court for the grand finale and in my exuberance taking a layup too close to the board ended up crashing onto the pillar. My right ankle was in a mess and ended up in a plaster for four weeks putting paid to my wishes to hone my computer skills.

By now I was already five plasters down if you count the nose job also and thought I had had enough of these tribulations with Orthopaedics in my life, but man proposes and He disposes so here I am once again in cast, my Achilles tendon being the culprit this time round. Despite all these encounters I had managed to keep my bones fighting fit. Squash court was the arena where I ended up at this stage well into my fifties, having retired in SHAPE1 (medically fit category, all my faculties, appendages in tact), quite an achievement in these days when almost everyone is afflicted with at least lifestyle diseases if nothing else. The tendon in question has turned out by Achilles Heel literally.  I am wondering whether I should send in a claim of some sort of record which if not Guinness at least Limca Book of Records may accept.