Warning the following post includes a details of an injury that may make you pull this face….
So, the last post was a rather lengthy preamble leading up to the Jabbermonkey starting his growth hormones in April. The following explains the events that have occurred since April, which has been no less of a roller coaster. Well done if you’ve got this far and hold on it’s gonna be a bumpy ride.
It had been a challenging year at work, but Madmummy was feeling very capable, as the year 6 Teaching Assistant. After two years she had finally got to grips with her role and was looking forward to the following year. Indeed, she has even gone on a year 5 trip to London to get to know the next cohort.
The year 6 SATS were two weeks away and all the preparation that could have been done had been done. Despite this, it was a tense time. They were still waiting to find out where each member of staff would be placed the following year. Madmummy would have been pleased as punch to stay where she was, safe in the knowledge that she had done well supporting the class teacher for the previous 20 months.
So, upon returning after Easter, she was rather surprised to be informed that her contract was not being extended after the Summer holidays. Despite her disappointment, she tried to take this blow on the chin and remain calm. Yes, she was happy where she was, but perhaps she needed a kick up the bum to push herself in a new direction.
For example, she had occasionally considered getting into teaching. That is until she has come to her senses! She concluded that she had way to much of a busy home life to commit to arguably the most demanding and stressful job on the planet! She had seen for herself how many hours were put into planning and marking by the teacher she supported.
On the other hand, she was also aware of a number of teachers who were very successful in balancing the demands of teaching, while raising a family- these women are goddesses in her eyes.
But Madmummy was pretty sure she wasn’t one of them. She still found PPA covering a challenge at time.
She did, however, have confidence that she would be able to secure a new Teaching Assistant job before the end of the summer term. When she informed her hubbykins of the bad news that evening, he was equally surprised and philosophical. He immediately began looking and found another job at a local school, working in a nursery class. As Madmummy was due to go away on the weekend she decided to go ahead and apply, if only to feel proactive.
She had spent the past 2 Years working with 10 year olds and was now looking at working with 3-4 year olds. Bit mad, but then she didn’t expect to get an interview. After all, her only other relevant experience with “early years” was BEING A MUM. So it was with great surprise and delight that, the day after handing in her application, she received a request to attend an interview. Get IN!!
The following Friday the interview took place (part of which involved potato painting a hungry caterpillar). After the interview Madmummy returned to work (where SATS week was in full swing) and to her surprise she received a phone call regarding her interview. Although she hadn’t been successful in securing the post she had interviewed for, they wanted to offer her a different job in the Reception class. Thrilled at having been offered a new job within 2 weeks, she graciously accepted.
During the next few weeks Madmummy continued to work diligently: covering classes when needed, learning how to score cricket and helping with the end of year play. She was also asked to help in Reception – which would be a useful experience for her new job. Many people that she spoke to about her next venture seemed slightly perturbed that she was going down from year 6 to reception. “I couldn’t work in early years”, “oh, it’s non stop down there”, “good luck to you” and other warning cries and knowing looks.
But Madmummy would not let that frighten her (well not too much). After all, it had always been her intention to work with younger children, which was why she had previously volunteered at a children’s centre. Back in 2017 (before the Moving Madness) she had been unable to find a job in early years without any previous experience or qualifications. So, she had applied for a Teaching Assistant post within the year 2 class – at the school Jabbermonkey was due to attend! (Remember…the one literally behind her house!)
But wishing to prevent any awkwardness, they had offered her a job in a year 6 class at the “sister” school. Two years on and she had once again been offered a different job to the one she had originally applied. She was hopeful that, like the year 6 job, she would end up getting on fine. She just needed to have faith. Yes, it would be different, but she had spent the past 3 years trying to manage the behaviour and development of the Hulk. She had a very real working knowledge of phonics and speech therapy and she wanted to help other children. But she couldn’t deny that she was slightly worried…would she be up to the job of moulding the minds of 4 year olds! The very newest and youngest of compulsory pupils.
During her last few months in year 6 she intended to make the most of working with older children. So, she was happy to accept the challenge of sorting out the year 6’s Enterprise project. The theme this year was the issue of plastic pollution and it was decided that Madmummy would arrange the production of a reusable water bottle, to reduce the need for single-use plastic bottles in school. She had just 3 weeks before these needed to be ordered and delivered, so that year 6 could sell them at the Enterprise fair. So she got to work. In two days she had sourced a company, sent the artwork and completed the order.
By the end of the following week she has convinced a team of year 6s that it was THEM that would be ordering the bottles. They created a script and made the phone call to “the production company”. In actual fact they called Hubbykins (aka Mr Madmummy/ daddybeen instructed/ coerced to pretending to be Mr Fogg, an employee of the bottle company. He too had a script and confirmed all the details of the ordering process. Then, another child sent an email to the company (which was actually an email address set up by Madmummy) and the rest of the team worked out what they would sell their bottles for.
Once she has weaved her web of lies, Madmummy helped them create leaflets, pre-order forms and power points to promote the bottles in every class. However, a week before the enterprise week she was bequeathed another project. Tying it with the theme of preventing plastics polluting the ocean, she was tasked with creating a sculpture from plastic bottles. Great, she thought, it would link in nicely with the “Bottle for life” enterprise project. They could collect and use all the single-use-plastic bottles, which would no longer be needed once everyone has purchased a reusable bottle!
She was then informed that said sculpture needed to be complete ready for an exhibition at Walsall College in 3 weeks.
So, within a week, worrying amounts of plastic bottles were being piled on Madmummy’s desk – contributions from both students and staff. Once again she arranged a team of students to help sort and paint. It was around this time that she got the inevitable wisdom tooth infection and had to take 2 days off while the antibiotics kicked in.
Once she had returned to work, she busilly got to work on constructing a 2 meter long turtle from plastic bottles. Armed with a Stanley knife, Pva and a huge roll of gorilla tape she worked tirelessly between end of year rehearsals, spelling interventions and cricket practice.
During the enterprise week itself her feet barely touched the ground as she tried desperately to get the bottle turtle compete. For, while she had a week to go before it’s instillation, she was to spend three days of that week on a residential trip in Whitemore Lakes. Yes, she has been selected to accompany 20 year 6 children and supervise various activities and challenges. These included archery and fencing and more death defying activities like climbing, absailing and raft building.
Here are some photos of her during her brave escapades.
Ah…so that’s how Madmummy ended up with her leg in a cast! No doubt she fell when doing abseiling or some other such activity- I hear you cry.
WRONG!!
She arrived back from Whitemore Lakes on the Wednesday and was thrilled to be told that the entire year 6 and their staff would be allowed a lie in to recuperate; they would not need to attend school until 11am the next day. As exhausted as she was, Madmummy did NOT seize the opportunity to get a lie in! Why? Well it was the Hulk and Jabbermonkey’s first sports day and so her motherly duties beckoned (after all she had been away for three days).
After the quintessential egg and spoon races were over, and her hand were raw from clapping, she drove to work. The later start meant that she had to work fast to get the finishing touches to her bottle turtle. She cannot recall what the class did in the afternoon, but the events that took place after the children had been dismissed will forever be etched into her memory.
The bottle Turtle needed to be installed at the college before she went home, ready for the WASUP exhibition launch the following afternoon. So, her top priority was getting her bottle turtle into the car (she actually had to borrow Hubbykin’s car, as it had bigger boot) And so, she began ferrying the pieces of the turtle from the classroom to the car. The shell, the head and legs each took a separate shift. Across the playground and through the playground gates she carried her precious creation until finally Terry the Turtle was fully loaded.
Madmummy then returned to collect her display boards, and was walking back to the car when DISASTER STRUCK
**Warning: the following includes a description of a nasty injury which may make you do this face…**
She’s not sure exactly how it happened ….but somehow, in the process of walking back to her car, the gate swung back and her ankle got caught under the metal railing. Ouch..that smarts!
For two seconds she thought it wasn’t that bad and was determined to shake it off, walk to the car, go to the college, install the turtle and get a plaster on it later. ‘‘Tis but a scratch!” she thought.
But when she glanced down at her ankle she knew immediately that, even if she could drive to the college, she could not have carried the turtle to her place in exhibition hall without leaving a messy trail of blood. It would probably be frowned upon. She also thought…
….£$#%^ck!!
Determining that she needed first aid, she hopped/scampered across the playground and entered the year 4 classroom. The perplexed year 4 teacher and TA looked surprised to see her back. “Um! I’ve had an accident and think It might be bad”- she had panted before collapsing on the reading corner chair. The TA came over calmly and looked at her ankle. Her eyes grew big and she ran out of the room yelling “WE NEED A FIRST AIDER!!”.
Soon she was having her heel and ankle held by two TAs, as the maths teacher passed bandages, the RE teacher mopped her clammy brow and the head teacher rang her husband. During this she deliriously continued muttering “the turtle, the turtle needs to be at Walsall college for 5pm”. If only to calm Madmummy down, they uninstalled the Turtle from her car and reassured her that the headteacher would deliver it himself, as soon as she was safely on her way to AandE.
When hubbykins arrived it was agreed that the year 6 teacher, who Madmummy had supported for the last 2 years, would “hold the foot”. while he drove her to hospital. Having survived her drive to AandE she delicately climbed into a hospital wheel chair, where she sat bravely in the waiting room – her hubbykins kneeling down at her feet in-front of her. Just where she likes him. He could have been mistaken for a hopeless romantic proposing to his love…accept he was holding on to her bloody foot!
The pain was bearable (compared to having had two children). What was excruciating was the jovial quips that hubbykins kept spouting (typical of him in a crisis) “The first cut is the deepest, hunny” or “no more rugby union for you! Haha”
About 15 minutes into their wait hubbkykins began to complain of feeling uncomfortable on the floor, and so he swivelled her around so that he could sit on a chair.
And they waited…
As if seeing that they looked bored, a nurse arrived and asked if she could borrow her wheelchair for another patient. They looked at each other in surprise and confusion, as if to confirm that they had both heard the same thing.
They muttered a quiet objection and indicated Madmummy’s foot. But the nurse insisted that she would return it as quickly as possible and so they obediently agreed. Madmummy clumsily hopped into the chair next to hubbykins, dripping blood on the floor in the process. Seeing this, the nurse paused for a moment in realisation (perhaps she had previously thought it was only a sprained ankle). Regardless, she continued to make off with the wheelchair.
Madmummy was left to lie precariously over a waiting room chair, her ankle still clutched in her husbands lap. 30 minutes later her wheelchair was returned. After another hour she began to think that perhaps they should have called an ambulance.
Then she was called through.
Having been assessed by the AandE nurse and consultant they confirmed that she had indeed “partially ruptured” the tendons in her ankle and would require surgery to clean and repair the area. The nurse had initially dismissed Madmummy’s insistence that she might need a tetanus, (it was a rusty gate that had sliced her ankle.) After Madmummy had confirmed that she had been given a tetanus at school, the nurse had insisted that she wouldn’t need another “they last 10 years, you’ll be okay…your only 24”
“Ummm…I’m 34” Madmummy replied, both flattered and alarmed.
She was soon wheeled up to ward 9 on a gurney, grateful that she wasn’t asked to hop anywhere. She was given intravenous antibiotics and told she would be “nil by mouth” from 3am until her operation the next day. So she signed the required paperwork, had a sandwich, took some drugs and went to sleep. It was not a restful night, however, as it was a busy and noisy ward and she had forgotten her ear plugs.
The next day she has her Tetanus and her bed bath and waited patiently. A jolly orderly wheeled her down to an even jollier x-Ray technician and she took delight in telling those, who asked, what happened and watching their expressions.
The morning and the afternoon went by and still no operation. She was informed that there had been a serious car accident, and that the single surgical team had been swamped by emergency cases. Fair enough.
She was very understanding, after all her injury was nothing compared to the sort of things they would have to deal with following a car wreck. It was now 8pm (only emergency operations were performed after 8pm) , so she had her antibiotics and her sip of Morphine, and a chicken sandwich – for she had missed dinner.
The next day, the anaesthetic had spoken to her and assured her that she would be the next case that morning. So she had washed herself with the smelly pink soap and smiled through all the offers of food and drink that she declined. At 2pm in the afternoon, however, she began to crack. There was no word on the operation time, or why it was delayed. She was hungry, sore, tired and bored. Furthermore, she was starting to get fed up with answering the innumerable messages she received from friends and family, asking “how did the operation go?”
“I’ll let you know when I’ve flipping had it!!!”
Seeing that she was growing both “Hangry” and impatient, a nurse agreed to find out what was going on. She returned with a doctor, who assured her that her case had been upgraded to “emergency”, (although he still didn’t know when her operation would be). It was now past 5pm and the dinner trolly was doing the rounds. Alas, she could not partake. Madmummy was resolved to the fact that she would probably end up staying for a third night, and was a tad irritated to be denied her dinner. It seem liked a cruel torture that she had been asked to fill in her meal order form for the past two days and then been unable to partake. After obediently declining a tea at 7pm she was beginning to wonder when the nurse would be bringing her the quintessential left-over-sandwich and the same bad news.
But she did not return with a sandwich but a different anaesthetic. At first Madmummy had assumed she was just preparing her for an operation the next day. But, before she knew it, she was been wheeled down to the surgery room. Thrilled, relieved and suddenly Terrified!
After all she had not had a general aesthetic since he was six and had grommets put in her ears.
She had just signed a long document detailing the various (if unlikely) complication that might occur – which included loss of limb, infection and death!
She remembers laughing casually with the surgeons, who were surprisingly young and handsome (Ahem…though, not as handsome as her hubbykins) . Then, as the injection was given, and an oxygen mask was held on her face, and she began to feel her heart race. As if sensing her silent panic, the man assured her that all she needed to do was think of something nice to dream about.
Within the following 5-10 seconds she thought about her family. She tried not to think about death. She thought about her happy place in the autumn woods, She heard her heartbeat and worried that she would not be able to sleep. She blinked.
Then she work up.
She had previously thought she would wake up like this…
But she in fact it was more like this
It was a far more casual re-entry into the land of the living than she has thought. There was a nurse watching calmly over her and some heart rate monitor stickers on her chest, but it just felt like she had woken abruptly from one of her many impromptu naps (she is practically narcoleptic when watching Tv after 10pm).
She breathed deeply, expecting to feel the wave of violent nausea, which she had been warned about. But it didn’t come. Within minutes she was wide awake, being wheeled back to ward 9.
She was relieved and full of joy! She was alive and there was a double chocolate chip cookie and a cup of tea with her name on it waiting in her room. She drank the tea, ate half the biscuit, took some painkillers and slept like a baby that night. (A phrase Madmummy finds painfully misleading having had two babies who’s sleep was not particularly deep or long)
The next day she was transferred to another ward (slightly newer and less busy). There she would await her physio appointment and eat the hospital food like a starved beast.
The next day she was given crutches and a brief instruction in how to use them. She even got taken to a stairwell to practice the noble and elegant art of bottom shuffling up and down the stairs. Once she had proved that she could crutch her way to the toilet, she graduated from the 50 minute crutch school and was discharged with a sac of painkillers, antibiotics and blood thinning injections.
The later she has been receiving daily since her accident but a nurse had administered them. But after removing her cannula, the nurse casually explained that it would be Madmummy’s own responsibility to inject herself for the next 50 days! After a brief instruction the nurse insisted that Madmummy should try this at once. So she duly grabbed a roll of flab, jabbed the 1 inch needle into her subcutaneous tissue and plunged. The nurse then told her she would feel a stinging sensation and may experience some bruising. (no shit!!)
and then finally she was discharged
On her return home Hubbikins was as excited as a puppy to have her back and he presented her with new dressed (as she could no longer wear her beloved leggings). Her mum has cleaned the house and got her a new foot stool and she was forbidden to move from her leg raised position unless she needed the loo.
Well that’s one way to make Madmummy slow down. Indeed, despite feeling the occasional pang of despair at her uselessness and loss of freedom and independence, she tried to take advantage of this excuse to truly relax for the first time in 7 years. A wheelchair was acquired and she was pushed around the towns and shops for the subsequent weeks by either hubbykins or her mother (whom she stayed with for a week). During this time she even got a chance to ride a mobility cart at Tesco’s – which was thrilling.
Sadly, as well as being unable to work the last few weeks of term, she was unable to play the female lead in the play hubbykins had both written and directed. Luckily another member of their drama group was able to learn her lines in 2 weeks and the show was able to go on.
Madmummy was sad not to be part of the supporting cast (bad pun intended) but delighted to get a new leg cast, in which she could pick the colour of. So she chose her favourite colour -red- and eagerly accepted the offer of glitter. Only as she was drinking her tea in the hospital cafe afterwards, did she realise her choice was weirdly festive for the month of July.
On the upside she was given permission to say farewell to her rather ugly and uncomfortable flight stocking.
Two weeks later and her cast was due to be changed again, this time she selected a more summery blue.
The position of her foot was also adjusted and she was given a rather fetching cast slipper and permission to bare weight for the first time in five weeks. Once her ankle had been fully set in the flexed position and the straps of her slipper tightly fastened, the nurse asked Madmummy to try walking, so she could see how she did. Well she thought it would be like this
But it was more like this
The nurse reassured her that it was normal to struggle at first, but once her confidence was back and muscle atrophy subsided she would be able to walk again. The cast would now remain on for 4 final weeks before finally being removed…just in time for the end of the summer and the start of her new job….almost.
In fact she had to start her New job with her cast still on. Looking both ways and limping carefully across classrooms when no children were running. As she is writing this she is sat in the staff room with 7 hours to go until her cast is removed!!! She can’t wait but is a bit apprehensive about seeing the hairy, shrunken horror of a leg that lays underneath.
madmummyblog 