Rats

Well, I just saw my surgeon yesterday. He is pleased by the gains I continue to make overall but he is not so pleased by the amount of pain I still have in my wrist. He determined this by grabbing my hand, twisting hard, and poking his finger firmly into pain central on the back of my wrist. Gee, that was fun! It's a good thing he is the fellow who put this Humpty-dumpty patient back together again AND that I like him because if those two criteria were not met I'd have had my one good hand around his throat. It's just sort of this instinctive thing with me to want you in pain if you willingly inflict physical pain on me. Call me crazy. I'm just glad I was able to censor my comments before they came flying out willy-nilly since my son was sitting next to me. Not that he hasn't learned every cuss word in the book from me already, but I do try. Honest. And I actually do like and trust my surgeon. Honest.

Anyway, what does this mean? It means he is threatening to dig around inside my arm again and fish out the nice big piece of metal he stuck in there in the first place to hold it together. He thinks the metal is grinding in the wrist joint and the cause of pain which impedes further progress. He said we don't have to hurry to make the decision. He's giving it until next month. I'm glad he's not in a hurry. I'm not real keen on pain but I'm less keen on surgery. Much less keen. Ok, I grasp the logic. We take a couple of steps backwards so we can take even more forwards...eventually. I'm still not keen on it. Did I mention that?

I REALLY don't like surgery mainly because I have a certain phobia about anesthesia. I don't have good experiences with it. I either have crazy reactions to small amounts or they max me out and I am still feeling things or I wake up puking my guts out.

• Excisional biopsy when I was 22 (benign, thankfully) I woke up puking and knowing I couldn't move. There I am laying on the gurney or bed or whatever thinking, 'Hhhmm, so this is how it ends? I'm gonna choke to death on my own vomit like Jimi Hendrix. Not what I expected.' I was quite profoundly grateful for the cold set of hands that turned my face in time to spare me that fate.
• First c-sec I just shook uncontrollably for I don't know how long after the surgery.
• Second c-sec I felt. Yes, from first incision to last suture I felt the whole friggin surgery. Of course, they warned me I would and I argued my way out of general anesthesia when the epidural only took partial effect (probably a benefit of being an American in Trinidad at the time too, a certain 'indulgence' granted that otherwise would have been denied). I can be such a pain in the ass, I know. I'd do it again too if it was the only way to remain lucid when my child enters the world. That scene at the end of Braveheart.....yeah, something like that.
• Last c-sec I had some crazy reaction to the drug and started choking, then I spent the next 24 hours tearing my face off because the itching damn near drove me out of my mind. Anesthesiologist leans over me during surgery and says, 'Gee you're very sensitive to this drug.' Ya think??? (Does anyone else see great irony in a person who hates surgery and anesthesia having all her kids that way?? Believe me, it was not my choice! I'd have preferred squatting in a field. They were healthy, all that matters in the end.)
• This thing with my arm? I fortunately didn't wake up puking. Mr. Lime warned them and they loaded me up on all sorts of things to prevent that. Thankyouthankyouthankyou! I also didn't have any weird reaction that I know of. I do feel like I was lobotomized through my arm though. Afterwards it took me a long time to be able to feel like coherent thoughts were not a struggle even when I was not taking painkillers. And short term memory? Just call me Dorrie. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming...
• I've just spent 3 months working like crazy to regain some strength and use of Janita and now they want to send me backwards. The doc tells me I won't have to be splinted or anything so that's good. I'm still not jumping for joy here.

I'm just not digging this threat of a second surgery. Ok, I have moaned and whined enough. There are a lot of people suffering in ways I cannot even fathom or imagine. And in the 4 months since the accident I have spent fewer hours boohooing than Janita has fingers. I just Don't want to spend time in that spot. It doesn't get me better and there are actually too many things for me to be thankful about. I'm not going to spend a month worrying about the possibility of surgery. Maybe I won't need it after all. I just needed to get that rant out of my system. We now return you to your regularly scheduled Lime.

Just in case I get too whiny or self-pitying or negative, you all have permission to tell me to go out to the rock, sit upon it, and consider some of the nastier alternatives I could be facing were I not as fortunate as I already have been. See it? That rock down there. That's the one I landed right next to....very thankfully, not on. I need to remember it could be a helluva lot worse.