it's been an 'interesting' 4 days since surgery.  it certainly held my
attention.<g>  guess these kinds of things tend to make one a bit
self-oriented, no matter how hard one might try to focus on something or
somebody else.

nann, sweetie, i can't thank you enough for suggesting i take pain killers
before i went to my post-op appmt.  i shutter to think what it would have
been like without my taking your advice.  even with two percocets in me,
they made me lie down halfway through the dressing removal process.  was
told i turned visibly gray, sweaty and then my body tried to embarrass
myself by requiring the wastepaper basket.  i thought i was being a wuss,
but the nurse reassured me that a wuss isn't inclined to watch the unveiling
of a surgeon's handiwork without making a sound.  i'm not the type who is
queasy at all about anybody's, least of all my own, injuries or wounds and
frequently watch u of w surgical procedures on tv, because i find the
process fascinating and the result, amazing.  but i guess my body had
reactions of its own that didn't take my mind into consideration.

next came 3L x-ray views of my wrist and 2L views of my elbow.  lucky for
me, they decided that a wheelchair was more reliable to get me to xray than
my legs.  during the course of those xrays, my arm spasmed and my body
decided that wasn't enough physical activity to celebrate that momentous
occassion, so my whole body decided to dance to the pain.  i so love warm
blankets.

back with my surgeon, he tells me my xrays look good, the position of
everthing looks good.  he tells me the elbow break is so small that the
fixator didn't phase it and it will do fine with a splint support.  tells me
there were two very small fragments, too small to pin or wire, almost like
bone flakes that he simply positioned where they belonged, after he wired
and pinned the rest of the fragments.  said it bothered him that part of an
interior bone was pulverized and was essentially missing, but he didin't
want to put me trough a bone graft for that one piece.  said there was
nothing that could be done about the crshed outer edge of my ulnar, but that
he thought,after he scoped it, the tendon will stay put.  he said exactly
what rose said about how i broke my wrist.  he figures i'll be wearing the
fixator for at least 8 weeks, unless i suddenly turn into a bone making
machine.  won't be anymore surgeries, except for removing what looks like
the bent over nail ends on the outside of the skin on my wrist and this
fixator's four pins.  my fingers and thumb are kind of clawlike, cuz i can't
straighten them or make a fist.  he said the tendons were probably rubbing
on pins and stop flexing when it hurts.

then he told me he cut or punctured his thumb on one of the sharp pins or
wires or something that he had just put through my wrist bones.  that there
was no risk to me, but that he was concerned that i might have aids or
hepatitis and didn't tell him.  poor guy.  it must be hell these days to be
a surgeon and nick yourself during surgery.  how scary it must be to be a
surgeon.  i reassured him that i revealed everything i knew about myself,
medically, but if it would help to reassure him he had my permission to call
my pcp and ask her anything.  later, i started thinking---i had all kinds of
pre-op bloodwrk done.  wouldn't those bloodtests have told him i was ok?  i
just now called my pcp to have her call him, cuz i wondred if hippa would be
a problem.   dr. to dr. info is ok, no hippa problem.  but they informed me
i've never been tested for aids or hepititis, no reason to do that.  dang, i
don't suppose my never having been tested will make him feel any better.
sigh . . .

then came the re-dressing process.  at least the bandaging is minimal this
time.  then they told me to go home, take more pain pills and rest.  it was
almost 2 hours before i could leave there.  whew!  can i get away with
calling that post-op appmt. an ordeal?

kelly, 'outlander' and your card arrived.  thank you, sweetie.  i'm going to
savor that book.   sj, your card arrived too.  that was way sweet of you.

i have been thinking about everybody, and keeping you guys in my prayerful
thots.

kate