Frankenshoulder

It seems that we are accumulating an entire Franken-body here in our household... slowly but surely. Our latest edition comes courtesy of Hubby. Behold... Frankenshoulder!
Hubby had shoulder surgery on Thursday morning. This picture was taken Friday morning when we went back to the doctor for his first follow-up appointment. The surgery went fine. The doctor found nothing in there that he wasn't expecting to find, so that was a good thing. He was in and out in less than 90 minutes. I think Hubby spent more time in recovery than he did on the operating table.

He had a nerve block before surgery, so his entire arm (save his pinky and ring fingers) was completely numb until about 9pm Thursday night. This actually turned out to be an excellent thing as I had to take K-dog to the vet unexpectedly and ended up being gone for two hours over dinner time. Hubby was able to help the boys make dinner and do their homework without pain.

After the kids were in bed, the nerve block started wearing off. Before it wore completely off, he took a pain pill (Percocet) and the accompanying anti-nausea pill. And then I got him set up in the spare bedroom (propped up with many pillows), and he went to sleep.

I decided that I should sleep downstairs in case he needed anything. I would never hear him if I was upstairs in our room. So I made a bed up for myself on the sofa downstairs. Thank. God.

I had JUST fallen asleep (around 11:30) when I heard a loud crash. I jumped out of bed and found John lying awkwardly on the bathroom floor. The shower doors (which I assume he fell back against) were broken off their tracks and he was lying weirdly against them with his legs splayed out in front of him on either side of the toilet bowl. I said, "Oh my God. Are you okay?" He looked at me and asked me why he was on the floor in the bathroom and how he had gotten there.

I was worried that he might've hurt himself somewhere else falling, but he seemed to be okay. I think the Percocet was probably a blessing in disguise in that way. He was so out of it that he didn't know to tense up as he fell, which I think is how people hurt themselves in falls like that.

I managed to get him up, but then he promptly crumpled to the ground again. I had no idea how I was going to get him out of the bathroom without hurting him further if he couldn't stand on his own. After a minute, I got him to stand up long enough so that he could sit on the toilet seat. He was talking to me and telling me that he couldn't focus. He was there in the present, but he knew he was fuzzy and he just didn't know how he'd gotten there. He was a mess. We sat there for a good 20 minutes until he felt good enough to make it back to bed. In that time he decided wasn't taking anymore Percoset. Ever. Add that to the list of drugs he refuses to take: Vicodin, Tylenol 3, and now Persoset.

I got him back to bed, and he told me that when I came in at 1, which is when I was going to go in and give him his next pill, that he only wanted Tylenol. So that's what I did. I dozed in and out until 1, not really sleeping because I was worried that he would forget that he promised he would yell if he needed to get up, and then I took him some Tylenol. I did the same at 5:30. He was much better at 1, and pretty much fine by 5:30 as far as mental focus and stability on his feet. He said the Tylenol took away the throbbing and that he could deal with the achey feeling.

So, that was our experience with Percocet. He's taken nothing but Tylenol since that first pill. We went out to dinner last night, and he coached Jack's hockey game this morning. He's achey, but it's nothing unbearable. He slept in two long chunks last night, waking only because I went to ask him if he needed anything at 3:30 when I got up to use the bathroom.

At this point, the sling is optional... he will likely wear it only when we are out and about, more so people don't jostle him or slap him on the shoulder or try to shake his hand than because he needs it medically. His biggest issue last night and today has been muscle twitches in his bicep, which are extremely uncomfortable. He starts PT sometime this week. And he completed dressed himself this morning. I'd say he's further along and doing better than I expected at two days post-surgery.

As for the Percocet... well, it has been relegated to the back of the linen closet with the other drugs that Hubby can't tolerate. :-)

Successful surgery?

All appears to be well from my surgery this morning. I guess I won't truly know if it's successful in alleviating or eliminating the Menorrhagia for another couple months; however, from the standpoint that the only issues I have at the moment is that I'm tired and I have a headache (from from lying down all day), I'd say it was successful! Oh, I did get sick in recovery, but I think that was more from the ginger ale and graham cracker than from the anesthesia, as I've had that same anesthesia twice before with no issues.

So I was at the surgical center at 6:05am, and I was home by 9:30am. I changed into my awesome new PJs (a pajamagram sent by my co-workers) and took some naps. I had some cramping this morning, but none now. Hopefully that will continue. Right now J-Mav and I are snuggled up watching the Caps game on TV. :-)

Oh and tonight I got a beautiful, ORANGE flower arrangement from my BFF. :-)

So all is good here. I'll lay low tomorrow. Not supposed to drive for 24 hours or so to make sure all anesthesia is out of my system. Imagine I'll be back to normal activity on Sunday... might even get back on the treadmill. And back to work on Monday.

Frankenuterus is definitely lower maintenance than Frankenfoot... but sorry, no photos this time.

Frankenfoot

First off, this is what my foot looked like from about Noon on Friday until late this morning. The bandage was ginormous and wrapped all the way up around my ankle. It left a lot to the imagination about what was actually going on under there... but I wasn't allowed to peek until I went back to the doctor this morning. Like Christmas... do not open until...

So this morning I went to see my surgeon, Dr. G. I found that I was more nervous about this appointment than I had been about the surgery. OK. Maybe not MORE... but at least as much. What if the scar was huge? What if the bandage stuck to the incision and it hurt when he took it off? What if, what if, what if? Luckily I didn't have to wait to long to see the doctor once I got there, so I didn't have time to work myself up too much. :-)

He unwrapped what seemed like miles of ace bandage, tape, and gauze and revealed... FRANKENFOOT!

The incision, as you can see, IS quite large. Lots of stitches inside and outside. Turns out he found more than he bargained for when he got in there. First off, the cyst was growing toward my toes instead of toward my ankle, as he had thought. Second, it was under a tendon and pushing up on a muscle, making the muscle bulge. And lastly, as an added extra bonus, he found a bone spur under all of it, which is what likely caused the cyst in the first place. Ding, ding... we have a winner! Lucky me!

So it's a little swollen, a little bruised, a little stained with the stuff they clean the area with before surgery. In short, a little gross.

And what of all the "ink" you might be asking. Well, in pre-op, I was told to write "yes" on the ankle of the foot I was having operated on. When the doctor came in to talk to me before surgery, he initialed the top of my foot to confirm my choice of feet. I guess this is a CYA measure to ensure the doctor doesn't slice into the wrong foot. That would be bad. The smiley face... well, that was Dr. G making fun of me. He laughed at me when I took my Blackberry out to take a picture of my foot before he re-bandaged it. So he added the smiley face and told me to go ahead and take the picture.

Then he re-bandaged. Smaller and pink! Practical AND stylish. He gave me a choice of pink or green... both were the bright colors of the 80s. Perhaps I should've chosen BOTH and made my foot look like a watermelon? Anyway, this bandage stays on until next Thursday, when I got back to have at least some of the stitches removed. Still can't get it wet, which means at least another 10 days of shower aerobics and bagging and taping. And the oh-so-stylish shoe, which you can see in the picture above, is a new fixture in my life... at least for the next month or so.

And now Frankenfoot and I are back on the sofa. The sofa nest will be dismantled after today. Life resumes to mostly normal tomorrow. Back to work on Thursday. It was fun while it lasted...

Survival

This morning I accomplished great things... I double-bagged and taped my foot/leg, got into the shower without killing myself, got showered, SHAVED MY LEGS (at least the parts that weren't covered in plastic and tape), AND got back out of the shower without killing myself. Quite an accomplishment, no?

That was that

I am home and snuggly ensconsed (sp?) in my "sofa nest" (and have been since about Noon). The surgery went fine. The only snafu was that since I was somewhat dehydrated (yes, I KNOW I don't drink enough water), the nurse couldn't get the IV in the back of my hand. The vein kept rolling/ receding/ something. (I'm sure I'll have a lovely bruise from that.) She was very nice, she just couldn't get the needle in my vein. She finally called someone else in, who had no trouble getting a vein on the side of my wrist (and I should think not considering how tight she had the piece of rubber tied just above my elbow). I was visited in the prep area by two anesthesioligists, an anesthesiology nurse, my doctor, and three other nurses. They wrote "yes" on my left foot and the doctor initialed it. Liability CYA, I guess. I've heard of too many people who had the wrong limb amputated! Anyway, I confirmed my name, birthday, and what I was there for about 17 times, and then I was walked back to my OR and Hubby went out to the waiting area to ... well, wait.

I laid down on the operating table, which was only about as wide as was and hoped I didn't do a big twitch while I was out or I might have ended up on the floor! They strapped my arms out to my sides and put something in my IV to relax me. Didn't feel any difference. Then she said she was going to put the actual sleepy stuff in there momentarily. Missed that part. :)

I was under "twilight" anesthesia, so there's always the chance that you'll wake up during the procedure. I did wake up toward the end and had a conversation with whomever with in the room. I really remember what we talked about, other than the fact that I made a comment that I could feel I had a sock on my foot so the bandage must not be too big. Some replied that, um, no... there was no sock and my foot was still numb. Oh well. In my defense all of this conversing was going on with my eyes closed.

Anyway, I was chatting away and the next thing I knew, I was in the recovery area. Guess I went sleepy again for a few minutes. The nurse asked if I had to use the restroom, and I did. Not shocking since they pumped a few liters of fluid in me during the 90-minute procedure. They put a lovely orthopedic shoe on my foot and I hobbled to the bathroom, where I almost fell into the toilet as I was still a little dizzy from the anesthesia. But all was well. When I went back, I got to sit in the rolling Barka Lounger. And I got pretzels and Diet Coke! I had joked with the doctor prior to surgery that I hoped my growling stomach didn't distract him from the task at hand! I was HUNGRY!

In the less than five minutes it took me to scarf down my bag of pretzels, the dizzyness went away and Hubby joined me. I got dressed, the nurse when over some stuff, and I sat in a wheelchair to be discharged.

So the verdict was that I did, indeed have a ganglion cyst in my foot. I didn't ask how big it ended up being. I need to ask him that next week when I go back for my follow-up. But he also found a bone spur, which he said is likely what caused it in the first place. So he shaved that down and removed the cyst. That's why it took longer than anticipated, I guess. But's all's good. I go back to see him on Tuesday for a follow-up. I have to keep the ginourmous bandage on until then. Fun, fun.

I have been sitting/lying on the sofa nest since about Noon. I ate, took a Tylenol III, read a few chapters of my book, read my email, read the latest People Magazine, took a codeine-induced nap, and now I'm watching Keeper Boy play Backyard Baseball on the Wii. J-Mav is playing at a friend's house.

We are going to order a movie on TV and some pizza and just hang in the sofa nest tonight. So far, I feel good. I've had my foot elevated all day, which I'm sure helps. I will likely take another Tylenol III soon. I decided there's no point in being a hero. I wasn't when I had children, and there's no need to be now, either. Not that this pain could be anything near THAT pain, but why deal with pain at all?

Still undecided about this weekend's activities... I think I'll remain on the sofa nest at least through tomorrow, which means I'll miss J-Mav's soccer game and end-of-season party, as well as Keeper Boy's hockey game against his team from last year. We'll see what Sunday brings. I may feel the need to fly the coop by then.

This is it

Well, today is potentially the last day I'll have full feeling in my foot. I hope not, but there's a pretty good chance I'll end up with some nerve issues from this surgery tomorrow morning... like maybe not being able to feel my pinky toe. Today is DEFINITELY the last day I'll wear anything but sneakers or my flat, black shoes for the next month. I should say, shoe, because I'm going to have a lovely "prescription shoe" on my left foot for a month.

I'm glad I'm finally getting this taken care of. While the cyst does not leave me in constant, excrutiating pain, it is annoying, dull achiness. Not constant. It comes and goes. However, it has come more than it has gone in the past three months. And any type of exercise with even just the slightest impact has become extremely uncomfortable (to include running, zumba, and even walking on the treadmill).

Needless to say -- with pretty much zippo exercise going on -- I'm not exactly rocking Weight Watchers right now (which is why you all haven't seen any updates recently). I won't be able to really do anything for at least a month, so I'm going to have to be really vigilant about what goes in my mouth. Sigh.

Anyway, no food or drink after midnight tonight. (I can have half a can of Diet Coke in the morning, but it has to be at least two hours prior to my arrival at the surgical center... i.e., by 6am.) Surgery is scheduled for 9:10am tomorrow and should last about 45 minutes. Right now I'm not nervous.

Heard...

So my Godson had an unexpected appendectomy last Thursday. (Is an appendectomy EVER expected?) Anyway, Keeper Boy returned from Camp Grandma late Saturday night, and gave the Godson a call on Sunday to see how he was doing since he was released from the hospital on Saturday. I only heard the first part of the conversation, and only on Keeper's Boy's side, but it went something like this...

"Hey [Godson]... How ya doin'?... I heard you had surgery... So what's that all about?..."

Yeah. I had to walk away then because I was laughing too hard.