I Am The Borg

Goodness, this dicky hip is turning me into a bit of a technology monster. I am regularly using the Novasonic machine and that is really helpful, however, it's not the sort of kit one can take into a classroom, throw oneself on the floor, flip up the skirt and apply to hip! So, as I have lots of London gigs coming up, Kim treated me to a TENS machine.

Now, the only thing I knew about TENS machines is that they tried one on me when I went into labour, a little over 20 years ago and it was about as useful as a chocolate teapot. Not only did it do nothing to help the pain, but I got all sweaty, as one does in labour, and the dratted pads kept falling off - so I ended up covered in sticky tape and it still did nothing. You can imagine how confident and optimistic I felt when Kim presented me with a neat little package and offered to wire me up.

To say that our bedroom looked like Dr Frankenstein's hardware bench is no exaggeration. There were electrodes, there are wires and then there's a thing you plug it all into. Having just returned from a trip out, I was aching like hell and thought this would be a good time to test the TENS. So on went the machine and I could feel electrical blips passing through my skin... and gradually, things stopped hurting. It's not a miracle cure and nothing is going to prevent the pain caused by bone grating against bone (sadly, there's no gap at all in my right hip joint and not much on the other side), but it helped. The TENS seems to blast the nerve receptors so that the brains just decides to ignore the pain signals; there's a danger to this, as it's easy to do more than one should. Pain is there for a reason - it is our body telling us not to do things, however, sensible use does help make life bearable.

Half an hour after being wired, I wasn't exactly leaping about like a spring lamb, but hobbling to the loo was a lot less painful, I can tell you! Best of all, he got me a mini TENS that's portable and fits into a small box that's only about 5" x 2" x 1/2" so can go in the handbag and it's perfectly possible to pop it on my hip under a skirt. It works nearly as well as the big TENS machine, and will be perfect for a little analgesia in coffee and lunch breaks. I think I might be able to cope with the coming week, after all. Oh, a credit for the company Nature's Gate who supplied the TENS machine, as they got it to us next day after ordering and seem to have super reviews, and we'd certainly add to them.

So now I can wander around with bits of electronics attached to me - not quite as glamorous as Seven Of Nine, but a lot more grateful!