We've had a lot of questions about my morning routine, so here it is!
Alexa, stop.
Unlike a lot of people with a spinal cord injury, I don't get up to wee in
the night, so the first thing I do when I wake up is good for a wee.
I have to use an intermittent catheter to empty my bladder, we have a video all
about this if you want to find out more.
In the morning I'm quite dehydrated because
I avoid drinking anything for a few hours before I go to bed,
so that I don't need to get up and go for a wee. So after I've been for a wee
I try to drink this whole bottle of water. At the same time I take the
opportunity to take my medication. I take two tablets in the morning Solifenacin
and Mirabegron, both of which are bladder relaxants and help me go for
longer between catheters without wetting myself. I actually have two different
morning routines since I only do my bowel routine every other day and days where
I don't need to be my bowel routine, it doesn't take me much longer than an
able-bodied person to get ready but on a bowel day in now takes around two to
three hours to get ready depending on how fast things are moving that morning.
It takes Craig much longer to do a catheter than it takes an able-bodied person
to wee, so while he is doing that I normally come downstairs and make breakfast
In this house, our bedroom and the bathroom are both upstairs and the kitchen is
downstairs and we have a stair lift which Craig uses to get up and down the
stairs. Now this stair lift is much easier for Craig to use than going up
stairs on his bum. But, even still, it is a bit slow and a bit of effort for him. So
we just tend to find it easier if I just bring breakfast upstairs to him on a day
where he has to do his bowels it just saves a bit of time and effort and
helps our routine go a little bit quicker
I always eat my breakfast at least half an hour before I do my bowel routine as
it helps to wake up my digestive system. So I use the my Alexa to help set a
timer for when I'm ready to go. Alexa, set a timer for 30 minutes.
30 minutes, starting now.
Since I've gotta wait half an hour to go to the bathroom, I sometimes take the
opportunity to do some stretches. I'm just going to do a few now, but if you
want to see my full stretching routine, you can check out our video all about
that. This video is part three of our spinal cord injury: the awkward stuff
series where we tried to be open about the things which everyone struggles with,
but not many people talk about. As always we're very happy to discuss any
aspect of spinal cord injury, so if you have any questions feel free to leave
them down below. Remember to subscribe and click on the bell button so you
don't miss any other videos like this.
Alexa, stop. So that's the 30-minute timer, it's now time to go do my bowel routine.
I normally keep my shower chair here because it's out the way, but today
I need it for my bowel routine, so I'm taking it into the bathroom with me. I
need to lift up the toilet seat, push the shower chair over and lock it into
place. So I use this thing here called Peristeen
to do my bowels. If you want to find out more about what it
is and how it works, then check out our bowel routine video. We just keep it
hung up here to dry out between uses.
So it just needs filling up with warm water, so let the tap warm up.
And then, hook up the pump.
I use a shower chair to do my bowel routine. If you want to see a step-by-step transfer, we've
made a video all about this.
So I tend to keep the wheelchair here so I can use it
to store my supplies on that I'll need for my bowel routine. I keep all my supplies
in this bag, I've got my gloves, my lube, my Peristeen catheters so, we're ready
to go now. So the first thing I need to do is basically check to make sure I
haven't got any poo ready to come out, because if there is poo there right
in the end, I won't be able to put the Peristeen catheter in.
So, grab a glove, grab some lube
and stick it in.
So we're all clear, so now we can do the next stage.
And now here's the fun part, stick this end up, inflate it and then
pump pretty much the whole back of water in. So I do have to hold on to the
Peristeen catheter while I'm pumping, because sometimes, even though the
balloon is fully inflated, the pressure from the water is enough to push it out.
So this bits a little bit uncomfortable but it has to be done. So now the magic
happens, deflate the bag...
And now we wait for it to do what it's going to do. This usually takes somewhere
around 30 to 40 minutes, but I do find basically, if I just relax and give it as
much time as it needs, I tend to have better results, so just don't worry about
the time, just let it happen. Since I'm here for quite a while, I take the
opportunity to use my phone and just let things happen naturally
You might have noticed that I've now put some swimming shorts on, obviously I
wouldn't normally do this, but for the sake of the video it lets me show you
everything without the risk of flashing. So I've now finished my bowel routine I
just need to clean up and then get into the bath. I run the bath while I clean up.
The only downside of the Peristeen is that it can make quite a bit of mess.
I also prepare my wheelchair by putting a towel over it and a second one to dry
myself off afterwards. Then I transfer into the bath. We've got videos where I
demonstrate this step by step for different types of baths.
I tend to shave in the bath as well since it's quicker and less messy.
When I'm done I transfer out to the bath onto my wheelchair. I sit on one of the
towels so I don't soak my wheelchair and dry myself off with the other one.
So I can't clean the commode as well as I'd like, because I can't very easily get
to all the different areas of it, so Claire normally deals with that for me
and then she'll put it back in the hallway afterwards.
The last things I need to do are moisturize and get dressed.
I find the skin of my legs and feet gets quite dry so I moisturize them most mornings.
I find it easiest to get dressed on the bed. We've made a few other videos about
getting dressed on the wheelchair and in the bed.
Now I transfer into the stair lift and go downstairs, where I can finally get
into my normal wheelchair and start my day. If you want to find out more about
any of the parts of my morning routine in more detail, check out this playlist where
we've got videos about each step