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SPINAL NETWORK NEWS 31<br />
Lizard<br />
Hamish used to write for the Spinal Network News about<br />
10 years ago and we are delighted to welcome him back<br />
—Hamish Ramsden<br />
My lack of control over my<br />
temperature drives me nuts.<br />
boiling in the winter and the summer. I get regular<br />
visitors during the winter as they know I will always have<br />
a warm house. My lack of control over my temperature<br />
drives me nuts and I watch the weather on the news at<br />
night or the predictor on my phone more assiduously<br />
than when I was a farmer. I won’t al<strong>low</strong> myself to get<br />
caught short in regulating my body temperature as it<br />
can seriously affect what I’m trying to do, or not do, at<br />
that time and it comes second in my way of thinking to<br />
my paralysis.<br />
Hamish enjoys the warmth of the sun.<br />
Being a cold-blooded reptile, lizards need to<br />
regulate their body temperature by exposing<br />
themselves to external influences. By this I<br />
mean they need to bake themselves in the<br />
sun to warm up and find shade and/or water<br />
to go into to cool down. So, by account of this<br />
reasoning, and my experience of paralysis, I<br />
am now including most tetraplegics in a new<br />
animal species designed specifically for this<br />
column, called Tetraplegis Lizardarius.<br />
It is inte<strong>res</strong>ting in today’s environment that mankind is<br />
very worried, and it warrants being so, about climate<br />
change and the extinction of many species of animals,<br />
insects, fish et cetera. So, it is indeed ironic to suggest that<br />
Tetraplegis Lizardarius is going completely against this<br />
trend and line of thinking. Not only are we keenly<br />
awaiting the day that we are extinct, with no more<br />
members of our species due to medical advancements,<br />
but indeed we are more than able to cope, and dare I say<br />
enjoy, the subsequent effects of climate change which is<br />
increasing our environments average temperature by 1 to<br />
2° over the next few decades. Selfish I know and very<br />
self-serving but we have trained ourselves to look for<br />
positives out of anything.<br />
I am a lizard, and I love the feeling of baking in the sun<br />
and feeling the hot radiant rays on those parts of my body<br />
that I can feel, my face and shoulders, it is one of the joys<br />
of summer and the scourges of winter. This is not<br />
intended as a moan but just an observation. So, if you ever<br />
come round to visit me, apart from pouring me a nice<br />
glass of the good oil of life, just remember to stay out of<br />
my sun!<br />
Depending on your level of injury, roughly around the<br />
cervical fifth or sixth vertebrae, if your injury is at or<br />
above this level then your temperature control regulator<br />
is be<strong>low</strong> your level of injury. And so, you cannot<br />
automatically control your body temperature other than<br />
the two methods mentioned above, parking up in front of<br />
the fire or sprinkler or putting on or taking off clothes.<br />
I am a member of this new species (a C5/6 tetraplegic) and<br />
as people and friends will attest my home is one shade off<br />
Hamish has recently published a memoir called Dog’s<br />
Getting Fat with proceeds going to the NZ Spinal Trust<br />
and the Catwalk Trust.<br />
You can read it in our Library at the NZ Spinal Trust, buy<br />
your own e-copy from Amazon, or contact Hamish<br />
directly for a copy at hamishramsden@xtra.co.nz
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