Category: General

A few things are new in the last couple of days. The big thing is that, for the first time since the last week of August, I wore pants! Real pants! I’ve been wearing pajamas or jogging pants since surgery, except in the hospital where I wore one of those “moon suit” gowns… named more for what you did wearing it rather than where you were going to wear it.

Waistlines were an issue for me since my incision, which was rather tender and still draining, runs up and perpendicular to my waist. In most cases, I’d actually pull up the joggies or jammies quite high, above the incision. Now, I can wear one of my elastic waist pants I found at Mark’s that have many pockets and were quite comfortable. However, there is now an issue. They used to fit perfectly, when I was three waist sizes larger. Forty pounds later, they don’t look as clean fitting as they used to. In fact, my pant legs closely resemble elephant legs, although more for their bagginess than their size. I won’t even describe how my shirts fit. I guess I have to go shopping. Soon.

A few other things came up yesterday. Since my incision isn’t draining, I no longer have to pack the incision and can now change my own dressings. Home care doesn’t have to come every day and I don’t see a nurse again until Tuesday, just to check. I also don’t have to change the dressing every day and every two days is fine. I also got a letter in the mail. The date for my scope is set at November 18th. Surgery is to be one to two weeks afterwards. In short, my summer from Hell is almost over. The summer part is long over, I realize. The Hell part is destined to end up shortly too. I guess the light at the end of the tunnel is not a train, after all…

One milestone down and one coming up. The home care nurse decided that my incision no longer needs packing. Several weeks ago, the surgeon reopened part of it as it was infected and not draining properly. To keep it from healing too quickly (I haven’t figured out why this is a bad thing, personally), she packed the reopening so it would wick the yucky stuff out of the infected pocket and properly drain.

However, the pocket has slowly been healing and there’s been almost no drainage at all. There’s a wee bit on the top, where it mostly drained on the bottom, but that’s not much more than a dribble. No, I’m not posting pictures. The nurses think it’s because I’m becoming more active and say this is good. However, my nurse this morning actually couldn’t get any packing in it at all, even after cutting it in half. Therefore, she said, “That’s it. No packing for you,” albeit without the Seinfeld-ish accent. In short, the infection appears to have run its course and my incision is healing. It has been five weeks since the last surgery and six weeks is the magic cutoff point for worrying about an instant incisional hernia (not a good thing, by the way).

Milestone #2 is coming on Tuesday. I’m going to start back to work for the first time since the beginning of June. I’m looking forward to it. It’ll only be part time, especially at the beginning.

But, to get back to work, I do have to make two huge adaptations. First, I have to start to getting into a sleeping rythym that will allow me to get up in time. My hours are based on chaos theory at the moment so I have to shift myself to a more linear paradigm. That will be a bit difficult, but isn’t the biggest problem. In order to go back to work in October, I have to readapt to wearing socks again. That one, I’m not looking forward to…

Honest admission time… I like my job. I really like the people I work with. I’ll admit that’s probably due to a certain requirement to be a little on the loony side to work there and there is the thing about the convergence of like minds … or lack of them, in this case.

I had to drop some forms off at work yesterday. It was a lot of fun. I got to see lots of people and gabbed, a lot. I didn’t get to see everyone, but did spend more than 2 hours there, which is not bad for a quick trip to drop off a form, let me tell you. However, by the end of that time, I was wasted. I scooted home eventually and it was nap time.

This, by the way, came after a visit to the surgeon. He said that they normally don’t discuss even scheduling the last surgery until six weeks after the last one. The six week wait is for the discussion about scheduling, not the actual surgery itself. They normally do the surgery after a three-month period . However, he figures I’ve come along enough that he booked me for tests in mid November and surgery one to two weeks after. This is, in my books, a good sign.

So, by the end of November, I should have had the last step in ending this roller coaster ride. I’m not sure where this expression comes from. I love roller coasters, but this little trip has been less than entertaining…

It’s been three weeks (and one day) since my (last) operation and a quick progress report is probably necessary for some of my more far-flung relatives.

As things stand, I have far less pain and often go most of the day without painkillers. I do a bit of walking, although I still can’t go very far. I sleep in the mornings and have a tendency to nap in the afternoons still. And, after visiting the surgeon yesterday morning, I am allowed to drive again. I haven’t yet, but I’m allowed to.

However, after yesterday, the surgeon is rather unhappy with how my incision is draining. Therefore, she decided to reopen part of the incision yesterday to allow for it to drain, She used scissors. No, it was not the high point of my week. Next, she packed the opening with gauze to ensure it doesn’t close over and can drain. This now means that I can’t do dressing changes anymore so home care has to come every day now. Last week, everyone seemed so happy with the incision closing.

It also looks like I might start showing up to work for most mornings, at least, in a few weeks time. We’re waiting until the six week mark for that and I’m not sure how much I’ll accomplish. I can’t sit upright for very long and get tired pretty quickly on my trips out of the house.

I probably need to buy some stylish jogging pants as well as my 12+ inch long incision really doesn’t like tight clothing.  Not that tight clothing is an issue since I’ve lost 37 pounds since June and my entire wardrobe is “fat clothes.” Clara looks at my pajamas and asks, “Don’t you have anything smaller?” 

I won’t say where my incision starts,  but let’s just say that  I won’t be asking very many people if they want to see my scar. Sometimes, the world is better with more mystery…

I haven’t had a chance to talk about this even though I’ve been home for a week. Needless to say, hearing about declining standards of health care before going for major surgery often leaves one wondering what to expect. I was curious about how things would be, but am quite glad to report that, should you be sent off to our hospital, you don’t have to panic about the level of treatment you will receive.

This is particularly true when I apply the benchmark of what I see in other areas of Canada. I went into emergency a bit more than five years ago and saw a brand new doctor in town. He had come from Saint John, NB and was amazed that, at 10 at night, I was seen by him about 10 minutes after arrival. He was used to a longer wait period in Saint John, where he said that the average wait time in emergency was a little over 8 hours.  Apparently, in Montreal, it”s often a 12-18 hour wait in emergency.

The standard of care I received was nothing short of excellent. The nurses should be lauded daily… and I did. They are busy, and sometimes you need to wait for routine things like your daily dressing change, but they were skilled, caring and extremely cheerful throughout my stay over 2 1/2 weeks. They were always friendly and always interested in making sure that any problems you had were dealt with immediately.

Are there problems? What I couldn’t help noticing was that much of the equipment is old and some needs a great deal of help. When it takes the third blood pressure machine to finally get your blood pressure, after the first two simply no longer function, it does indicate that some things need repair or replacement. My IV pump, which Kristal, the nurse, named Fred, had a battery that wasn’t beneficial to walking. I was supposed to go for a minimum of three walks a day, and Fred’s battery would often last about 10 feet out the room door and then start beeping annoyingly (low battery were two words I began to despise).

So, let’s not panic about the level of health care here. However, let’s also keep a good eye on our elected officials to ensure that these standards are maintained. Let’s be honest. I’m a typical Canadian who sees universal medical care as a sacred cow and quite cheerfully capable of suggesting the cutting seats in the legislature as a cost-cutting method to ensure its existence. After all, one nurse is worth far more than 18 territorial representatives and costs far less…

I’ll admit it. I’m bored.

I’ve been home since Friday and recovery will be slow. I still can’t move very far, although I can go up and down stairs. This is important because it differs between sleeping downstairs on the sofa bed or upstairs on our real bed. Sofa bed mattresses are designed for two specific engineering functions. First is the ability to fold up and go back to being a sofa. This makes it need to be thin and uncomfortable. The second function is to make sure that your company isn’t encouraged to stay too long and ours certainly meets this important criterion. The alternative, upstairs, is a 14″ chiropractic mattress on a queen sized bed, so the ability to get upstairs is a big bonus.

I walk around the house a lot so I’m getting some exercise.  I went for a walk down the road a bit the other day but it’s been windy and I haven’t had much of a chance since then to do it again. Walking involves a bit of planning. I need to bring Clara with me in case I can only get so far and you have to really remember to plan for the walk out and back again.

We’re getting really good at changing dressings. I got a bit of a reprieve from that yesterday when Home Care showed up. I had a shower on Saturday which gave me the opportunity to actually look at the incision in the mirror. It’s about a foot long and is held together with about 30 staples. I go to the surgeon’s office tomorrow to see if they come out, or some come out, or we leave them in longer. Since I had two operations, the incision will take much longer to heal than if it had been used only once.

My big concern is that it’s very easy to come up with an incisional hernia after this. Therefore, the heaviest thing I can pick up is a coffee cup.

I’ll be off work for quite a bit longer. I may try to pop in for a bit in about a month’s time but am not expecting too much for the first while. I’m concentrating on getting everything ready for courses in January, which I have to be ready for early. I probably go back for the last little surgical bit, and I am quite glad it’s “little,” in early December. Then, I’m off until the new term starts. It’s kind of scary how much work I’ve missed with this and knee surgery in early June.

Well, that’s about how things are. I’m keeping low-key since I’ve picked up a bit of a bug and am less energetic than normal, which, sadly, isn’t saying much…

That took a wee bit longer than originally planned.

I went to the hospital on August 24th for abdominal surgery to repair a fistula, a connection between the colon and the bladder. This explains why I’ve basically been miserable since February and probably the February before. The end result is that I’ve basically had bladder and kidney infections for the past year and feel just miserable. I’ve been tired and had trouble working a full day since the winter.

I finally got it diagnosed when I came down with the bladder infection from Hell and had to go into emergency on a weekend. The on call surgeon figured it out based on a new symptom and since it’s very rare, was able to schedule a few more tests and confirm it.

I had surgery, which basically called for cutting a piece out of the colon where it was infected, patching the bladder and putting some fat in between the two to prevent it from recurring. I did not get to pick where the fat came from, although I tried. This was the original plan; however, as in 5% of these surgeries, I sprung a leak where the two pieces of the colon were reattached and had to have another operation to repair this and clean out the abdominal cavity. This represented another week of setback and means my recovery will be longer. Also, as a part of the repair, I will also have to have more surgery as well as several tests before hand sometime in early December to finish the repair.

Now, two and a half weeks later, I came home. It is kind of scary to give up my 24 hour nursing care. I guess I have to leave the nest eventually. I still have a lot of pain, tire very easily and am quite weak. I also have to be very careful to avoid causing an incisional hernia by overdoing it. I’m allowed to pick up a cup of tea and that’s about it.

Thanks, all, for the many wishes. I am extremely grateful to each and every one. Now, I promise a more consistent posting schedule…

So, tomorrow is surgery day and there’s no internet at the hospital. Therefore, I’m going to be offline for a bit, so this will be my last post for a while. The estimate is that I’ll be in hospital for about a week, so I assume my next post may be longer.

Other than that, take care all and I’ll catch you next week.

All the best, Doug.

Well, I got a phone call from the OR scheduling people this morning. I go for surgery Wednesday morning. Now, I get to run around like a chicken with its head cut off for a few days to get everything ready before hand.

I have a few things to do. I have to check the forecast to see if I’ll be able to get the boat out for a last run tomorrow… sometime between seeing the dramaturg about my play at 8:30 and pre-op clinic at 4. If not, I have to put my motor and boat away for the year since boating season will probably be over by the time I’m back in business. A few lawn things have to be taken care off before hand too. I have a few things to wash (my new jammies are washed already though) and have to get packed as well as other minor things.

Oh, well. They could have called and said I had surgery tomorrow…