Thalatta! Thalatta!
Jul. 2nd, 2016 02:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
steepholmFor some reason I'm unable to post to, or indeed read, Livejournal from this hospital, but my link to Dreamwidth is up and running.
As mentioned in my last, I'm very squeamish, so don't expect to find this account full of surgical details. Suffice it to say that the op went well, and I'm recovering according to schedule. Today the dressing came off and I was able to see the surgeon's handiwork for the first time, at least in a mirror. Some bruising apart, I've got to say it looks pretty good - and yes, much more the kind of thing my brain seems to expect. Mostly at the moment I'm just relieved by the lack of outright gore, though.
I'd been really worried about having anaesthetic, not having enjoyed it all on the previous occasions (twice with gas in the dentist's chair as a child, and I still remember the nightmares I had involving the Red Queen from Alice, and twice by injection on the surgeon's slab, which left me nauseous; I recall trying and failing to direct my vomit into the inadequate kidney dish being proffered by a nurse, and overhearing her complaining about it afterwards, but after all I was only ten; being the only child on an adult ward was not fun). Anaesthetic has certainly moved on in the 38 years since the last of these occasions: it was just Out, and then Awake, no mess, no fuss. A bit like the Last Trump, probably, but without the horsemen.
Since then I've been slowly shedding wires. The day before yesterday my glucose drip went, then the canula, and the things that massage your calves to prevent embolisms, and today I waved bye-bye to my catheter - rather regretfully, truth be told, as I'd got used to not having to get up to pee. But that's progress. Meanwhile, I've graduated from Nil by Mouth to a liquid diet of sorbets and consommé, and thence to white bread, rice, and similarly unfibrous things, and today I'm being eased into normal food. Pumpkin and aubergine madras is on the menu for tonight, and I'm peckish.
Anyway, here's the view from my window. The sea is that big blue wet thing in the distance.
As mentioned in my last, I'm very squeamish, so don't expect to find this account full of surgical details. Suffice it to say that the op went well, and I'm recovering according to schedule. Today the dressing came off and I was able to see the surgeon's handiwork for the first time, at least in a mirror. Some bruising apart, I've got to say it looks pretty good - and yes, much more the kind of thing my brain seems to expect. Mostly at the moment I'm just relieved by the lack of outright gore, though.
I'd been really worried about having anaesthetic, not having enjoyed it all on the previous occasions (twice with gas in the dentist's chair as a child, and I still remember the nightmares I had involving the Red Queen from Alice, and twice by injection on the surgeon's slab, which left me nauseous; I recall trying and failing to direct my vomit into the inadequate kidney dish being proffered by a nurse, and overhearing her complaining about it afterwards, but after all I was only ten; being the only child on an adult ward was not fun). Anaesthetic has certainly moved on in the 38 years since the last of these occasions: it was just Out, and then Awake, no mess, no fuss. A bit like the Last Trump, probably, but without the horsemen.
Since then I've been slowly shedding wires. The day before yesterday my glucose drip went, then the canula, and the things that massage your calves to prevent embolisms, and today I waved bye-bye to my catheter - rather regretfully, truth be told, as I'd got used to not having to get up to pee. But that's progress. Meanwhile, I've graduated from Nil by Mouth to a liquid diet of sorbets and consommé, and thence to white bread, rice, and similarly unfibrous things, and today I'm being eased into normal food. Pumpkin and aubergine madras is on the menu for tonight, and I'm peckish.
Anyway, here's the view from my window. The sea is that big blue wet thing in the distance.