Wednesday, July 24, 2019

I’m happy to report that I had a good day today. My back barely hurt when I got into the car to drive to work and I only had to use ONE old lady throw pillow as support!!! Plus, as far as healing goes, my finger is looking good and the scar should be barely noticeable in the end, PLUS my surgery incisions are healing really well and I’m hopeful the scar tape I’m using will do it’s job and the scars will be flat and blend into my skin. In addition to all that, I had a really good day at work and even though there was a bad accident on the FWY on my way home, I only had a few minutes added on to my normal commute time! Now it’s time to relax!

A good day by any measure! Even the unbearable heat can’t dampen my mood!

I bought some grenadine this past weekend (I don’t know what happened to mine), so I think I may make a Shirley Temple or a Roy Rogers to drink before dinner. It’s too hot for cocktails (drinking a measly drop of alcohol will result in a hangover when it’s this warm... it’s currently 100F here). Plus I don’t usually drink alcohol Monday through Thursday, so I’m looking forward to something other than boring flavored water, iced tea or diet coke. Yay!

Saturday, July 20, 2019

I've come to the realization that I am an old, broken down mess.

Healing after surgery is a lot slower than I expected. I had the weird experience of having about 7 internal stitches decide that they wanted to work their way up through my skin. Luckily, I had my 3-week post op appointment this week and my surgeon took care of them. Other than that, I made good strides this past week, but hit a hurdle two weeks ago with something else.

I was getting ready to change clothes and run errands a couple Saturdays ago and stopped to yawn and stretch. Apparently, my recent lack of mobility fucked with my muscles because I pulled my "Rhomboid Major" muscle group. The pain was so bad I hit the floor! Breathing, walking, laying down....everything was the worst pain I have felt in decades, including my recent surgery. I couldn't even go to work. Luckily, I'm normally super healthy so I have WEEKS of sick time accrued. Driving was impossible that first week, so on the days I tried to go into the office, a gal from work picked me up and brought me home. It's taking so long to heal! I can do short bursts of things, but then my back starts to burn and I have to lay down.

Which leads me to the dumb thing I did earlier today.

One of the platforms on my cats HUGE cat condo was wobbly, so I thought I'd try and fix it. Easy, right? I can do that sitting down! I was able to unscrew the post and take the small unit to the couch. Separating the platform from the post was more difficult (this was the part that wobbled). It took a while, but I did it. Thing is, I'm not sure they were supposed to be taken apart. It kinda looked like I broke it.

In order to get a better look, I grabbed some reading glasses and got some tools. Bad idea. I'm not quite sure how I managed it, but the hand holding a pair of pliers slipped and I sliced the top of my middle finger, right below the knuckle On a sharp jagged metal edge of the post. Deep. I've never seen the inside of my finger before this morning. It was so gross and gushing blood. I'd also gotten a small cut on my index finger, not a bad one, but it contributed to the blood flow mess. I rushed to the bathroom and ran cold water over my fingers and tried to get toilet paper to apply pressure without bleeding all over the place (I failed). I had to sit on the floor to try and get bandages on it, but they kept getting soaked through and making a mess. I actually got scared (very rare for me) and figured I needed to get into clothes meant for leaving the house (if I had to go to the E/R), so I had to try and get dressed and put on/tie shoes while trying to hold my hand in the air above my head (except when doing a poor job tying the shoes, using all but the gashed fingers), blood streaming down my arm. I finally called a guy I work with whose wife is in medicine to see what I should do. They were out of town, but walked me through some steps. It took a while, but the bleeding finally stopped. They said I should be okay without going to urgent care, which made me feel less scared.

My hand really hurts, my back really hurts and my incisions from my surgery hurt.

Again, I'm an old, broken down mess.

Tomorrow will be different though, I'm gonna feel great and get shit done!!

Tuesday, July 2, 2019

This is a short one. Made it through surgery. Was more complicated than they expected, so it was about 5 1/2 hours instead of 3 1/2 and I had a really hard time in recovery and with pain at home later (I decided not to take the pain meds). Very grateful to my mom for coming down to help me. I had my 1-week post op appt yesterday and I believe everything is okay. Another appt in 2 weeks.

Home office visit in FL beforehand was neat. Will discuss later.

Today was my first day back at work, luckily my boss let me go home a bit early. I’m exhausted. In fact, I was exhausted after getting dressed this morning.

Off to rest...