It’s finished. Finally. My first attempt at sewing, with CRPS, didn’t go quite as well as I’d hoped. Don’t get me wrong, the skirt came out really well – and I love the end result! And I’m very proud of how well the zipper turned out – it was the first one I’ve sewn! But getting this project done was much more difficult than I’d hoped.
First off, I realized right away that I can’t use scissors – with my CRPS- affected right hand – to cut fabric. Trying to use that hand, inside the handles of the scissors, was far too painful. Added to that, my fingers don’t move well enough to grip the scissors properly, let alone to move them in a cutting motion while applying any pressure to the handles with my fingers.
When I tried to use the scissors with my left hand, well, let’s just say that I completely mangled the piece of fabric that I was trying to cut. Luckily I’d picked up the cloth on sale, so had bought some extra material ,-)
The fabric is a thin cotton, and I know of a trick to cut cotton when I need a straight edge. Normally I’d cut a half-inch long nick into the edge of the fabric, where I wanted to cut it in a straight line. Then I’d hold the material with both hands; with the nicked or cut edge between them. With a solid pull on each side of the fabric, each side of the cut, I’d simply rip the fabric into two pieces.
There’s no way I could grip the fabric tightly with my right hand, because it’s mostly out of commission due to Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS), so I used my left hand – and my teeth! – to split the fabric in two. Very carefully, because the last thing I wanted to do was break a tooth! It ended up a more or less straight line, good enough for what I needed.
But you need more than straight lines to make a fitted skirt. This meant that I had to figure out another way to cut the cotton, for the curved pieces that I’d need. A long time ago I did a quilting project, so had purchased a rotary cutter – again on sale. It’s kind of like a round-bladed pizza cutter, but for sewing and crafting projects.
There’s a special cutting mat, which you place under the fabric, to hold it in place as well as to protect the surface on which you’re cutting. Then, using one hand, you roll the circular blade over the fabric while applying enough pressure for it to cut the material.
It took a while, but I found that old rotary tool; in a box at the bottom of a closet. The cutting mat was too large to hide in a box, so I knew exactly where that piece of my puzzle was; stored along the inside wall of another closet.
After many repeated, and somewhat frustrating, attempts with some scrap fabric that I’d kept from other sewing projects, I finally found a way to use that round blade with my CRPS (right) hand. I wasn’t able to hold a curve or a straight line using my left hand.
What was the trick to this? I had to use my right hand to guide the tool; by balancing the grip of the rotary tool in the palm of my right hand, with my fingers hanging straight down the right side of the blade – instead of wrapped around the grip as would normally be done.
Then I put my left hand over the back of the right, applying just enough pressure to cut the fabric while my right hand guided the tool along the fabric. It was very slow going, and I couldn’t cut for long before my right hand would become too painful.
Everything I had to do, each step of the sewing process, went wrong in some way – just like that. I couldn’t place pins into the fabric with my right hand, and kept jabbing myself when I tried to pin the fabric with my left hand. It felt as though I was hitting roadblock after roadblock with this project.
Putting the zipper foot on the sewing machine, changing the thread, tying a knot, ironing down a fold for a hem. All of these things, that I could’ve done almost blindfolded before CRPS. Actions that I’d be able to complete so quickly in the past.
Now I had to rethink each one of them, to try to adapt it in some way that I could accomplish the task without – or barely using – my right hand.
What would’ve taken an afternoon instead took… Almost 3 weeks. But it felt fantastic to create something again; to make something myself. So now I’m going to try to find an ‘overlock’ or ‘serger’ sewing machine; one that cuts as it sews. That might make it easier for me, for my next sewing project.
I’ve decided that there will be a next project, despite how frustrating the process turned out to be. This is going to be one of my CRPS challenges for this year. As always, wish me luck – as I do you!
Thanks so much for reading, and feel free to reach out via Twitter or Instagram. I’ve finally shut down the comments feature as I’ve gotten tired of being bombarded with obscene images from overseas sources ;-(