08.19.09
Right After Surgery
We got back to the hotel around 6:30 pm. After I made my way VERY slowly into the room, Ken got me set up in bed, propped up and surrounded with pillows. I was still pretty groggy from the anesthetic so I was sort of in and out of sleep for a little while.
I woke up a little while later and found Ken sitting in bed watching TV with a pizza box in his lap. The smell made me ravenous. So he made me some soup.
As part of my after care instructions I was told that I should walk as much as I could. While he was puttering around in the kitchenette, I got up SLOWLY and walked a couple laps around the coffee table.I was more capable of moving after this surgery than the reconstruction.
The HiQ had given Ken a couple of prescriptions for after the surgery. The pharmacy was closed by the time we got back to the room and Ken didn’t want to leave me alone the first evening so the nurse sent along enough pain pills for me to get through until my one day check up.
After Ken made soup I actually sat at the kitchenette table and ate some of it. Even though I thought I was ravenous, my body didn’t seem to want that much food. So I ate what i wanted and then went to the bathroom.
I was really curious about what I looked like so I gingerly took off the pajama top. My chest and torso were wrapped in a compression bandage over other bandages so all I could see was that I had bigger boobs. I wouldn’t be able to actually see them until my one day check up the following afternoon. Although I did try to peek, it would have been too complicated and painful for me to completely unwrap myself.
I remember falling asleep pretty early after taking a slow walk down the hall. I think I slept through the night. I was still pretty dopey from the anesthetic after all.
I’m going to apologize in advance because this is difficult and painful for me to remember so I won’t be very consistent on my posting. I can only deal with remembering for a little while before I have to stop and take a break.
On top of that, Ken and I are leaving the country for a few days on the 24th and won’t be back until the 28th. I’ll talk about this in another post.
05.30.09
I Am Disinclined
Up until a few days ago I was sleeping either completely upright or at a 45 degree angle. Sleeping at an incline kept me from being in pain while I slept. For the most part anyway. Where I once had a dozen pillows I am now down to three: two regular pillows and one hospital pillow. I have even been able to turn on my side. Though I confess that initially there is a searing pain in my chest. That subsides in a few moments though and I am able to sleep. It has taken six weeks but I am finally getting back to most of my old sleep habits.
There IS one problem though. I used to be able to fold my hands up under my chin and sleep like that. The Twins are so big though, I just can’t get my hands to fit where they used to. So now one hand rests under a pillow and the other rests along my side. My fingers against my thigh is really distracting though. I’m not used to feeling anything, even myself, touching my leg while I’m trying to sleep. But hands folded up under my chin simply compress the Twins too much. So I’m just going to have to make that adjustment.
For now, I continue to make progress with my healing. I am, after all, disinclined.
05.26.09
Positions
A couple days ago I finally tried turning on my side to sleep. Initially there was a moderate searing pain in my chest and then it settled down once my body adjusted to the new sleep position. The problem wasn’t so much my chest or back. My back has become very nearly a non-issue now that the drain sites are healing so well and the muscles and skin have relaxed.
The problem turned out to be my shoulder and right arm. It went painfully numb so that I was struck with nearly immobilizing pain from both there and my chest trying to get off of it. So the moral of THAT story is…what? Try not to sleep so deeply?? I’m not taking anything beyond acetaminophen so it’s not meds making me sleep that soundly. My body is still healing and needs its rest.
I’m still sleeping on a pile of hospital pillows. Maybe if I change to just the wedge shape foam pillow under my regular pillows I can remedy that situation to some extent. I’ve already rearanged the hospital pillow pile so that I’m sleeping at a 45 degree angle rather than upright like I had been. It’s more comfortable that way.
This morning was actually the first morning I woke up without needing to immediately take something for pain. Oddly enough my back is aching more than my chest. Since Ken had his car at the mechanic I decided that I was going to do some work in the office this morning.
We had 20 messages in voicemail to be dealt with, so I proceeded to make notes about which of our customers needed to be called back, who wanted catalogs and deleted the hang ups. By the time I was done, I was amazed to discover that I was absolutely exhausted. It seems totally bizarre to me that making notes about phone messages could be so hideously draining. I guess it’s a good thing that the mechanic couldn’t work on the car today after all (they need to order a part first).
After a long rest, I grabbed up my keys and drove around the neighborhood. I think I’m able to drive short distances, but anything beyond a few miles would be taxing for me. My underarms are still tight. Overhand turns are easier than they were before but my chest was still tender. All in all, not bad for just shy of six weeks.
10.13.08
Scared and guilty
It was a good day today. I managed to distract myself for most of the day. Unfortunately these nagging feelings keep bleeding through. I can’t seem to shake them and I wonder if maybe I should see a therapist.
There was an afternoon in early January of this year while I was still on the V.A.C. machine when I became SO depressed that I looked for a way to kill myself. If there had been prescription narcotics in the house I would have overdosed. So instead I called Suicide Hotline. The woman on the other end saved my life. She reminded me that I could help people and that, even though I couldn’t see it right now, there was an end to all of this. She reminded me that one day in the not-so-distant future everything would be made right.
The clattering of the V.A.C. machine every 5 minutes was, for me, a constant reminder that I had brought this horiffic situation on myself. Because I HAD to have pretty breasts, I now had two holes in my chest and the healing wasn’t going the way the nurses at KCI said it would. I just wanted it all to be over with and the only way, in my extremely depressed state, that I could see that happening was to kill myself.
So there’s part of the guilt there. I still blame myself for what has happened.
And the fear? I live in terror that the same thing will happen again after the reconstruction surgery. I have found the best reconstruction surgeon in the southeast. This doctor studied under the surgeon who invented the TRAM flap breast reconstruction proceedure, which was the most safe and ingenious way to reconstruct a cancer survivor’s breast at that time. He’s world renowned and teaches world wide.
Nonetheless I am totally terrified.
On the other hand, I cannot continue to live like this. I’m not mentally ready yet, but I know that, for my own mental wellbeing, I cannot stay like this. When I look in the mirror I see a mutilated, maimed thing. Not a human chest. I can’t live like that forever.
And so I do what I can to keep myself busy. I work. I do schoolwork. I go out to various places and I do my best to keep my mind on other things.
But at night, when I’m lying in bed before I fall asleep, some nights it’s difficult.
On October 24th I have an official consultation with the reconstructive surgeon. Maybe I’ll be able to start putting the fear behind me then.
