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Post-Surgery: The First Few Days

I knew I needed someone to be with me for the first week, but now I am wondering how I am going to get along once the week ends.  There are so many simple, everyday tasks that have become difficult, if not impossible.  At first people were surprised that I was posting on Facebook, answering emails, and writing a blog.  For the first 24 hours I was pain free!  The nerve block that was administered before the surgery was still fulfilling its objective.


This picture, taken the afternoon of the surgery, shows how well the nerve block works!

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I came home with two additional nerve blocks that are administered automatically through a catheter in my leg.  These two are also doing their job.  Except for a certain position when I extend my leg, I still feel almost no pain.  Day one through three were all about being comfortable and not moving.  Day four is starting to be about pain.  The nerve block balls are just about empty -- one is finished and the other will be done within hours.  The pain is starting to worsen, but I think the anesthesiologists were playing the same game tour directors play.  Tell people to expect the worse, and when things are not as bad, they are happy.  We tell people we can wait three or four hours for customs at the Rainbow Bridge between Canada and the US, and then when we wait an hour everyone thinks we did great!  Two anesthesiologists told me to expect severe pain after the nerve block finishes, so the pain seems much more like significant discomfort.  

I started the blog talking about my concern about having someone with me; this really is not due to the pain but to the difficulty getting around.  I have graduated from the bedside commode to the bathroom.  I have the commode above the toilet, and that makes it easier to get up and down.  In the guest bathroom I need to hold on to the bathtub and the countertop.  Getting up and down off the recliner is a four-step process.  First, we need to remove the four pillows under my calf.  (The ankle cannot rest on the pillow; it needs to be up in the air.) The leg rest goes down and the back goes up, and I need to balance myself on a scooter whose brakes don't work very well.  So, this works much better if someone is holding the scooter and helping me up.  Then the calf rest on the scooter in a position that does not require me to extend my leg and keeps the calf up in the air.

This gives me good mobility around the house but not up and down.  I can get anything that is at the same height as the scooter, but nothing on the floor or low down.  For example, this morning Zora got the remote for my fan and, since she knew she wasn't supposed to have it, she was hiding under the coffee table away from any possibility of my getting it away from her.  It took my daughter to release it from her bite.  I cannot put her food down on the floor.  I cannot yet walk out to the porch to put her  outside, although I have neighbors and friends who have volunteered to walk her starting on Sunday, when my son goes home.  He has volunteered to stay as long as I need him, but I was hoping to allow him to get back to his own life by Sunday night.  



It's Day Four.  My 24-hour companionship ends Day Seven.  I have a few days to get more mobile and to see if I can get back some of my independence. 

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