so i should have posted this weeks ago....

i'm lazy and i totally forgot to write about my surgery and the two weeks following it (while i was in my apartment, and commuting to physical therapy every day). so, i'm cutting and pasting the e-mail: knee update #9, here.

Happy March (and the Year of the Pig)!!!!

I will be punctual with this e-mail since I spent four long days in the hospital after surgery. Nothing was wrong with me, the doctors from Anesthesia wanted to keep me in to monitor my pain once I was off the epidural....pain schmain. Anywho, four days in a hospital is no fun, so I'm going to recap the week's events and share my hospital fun times with all of you. (Bear with me, I think this is going to be a VERY long e-mail)

Wednesday, February 21: pre-surgery doctor's appointment
Visited the doctor one last time before surgery, went through the basic checkups on the knee....I'm healthy, knee is ready to go, and we're all set, right? Not exactly. Doctor tells me that there is a shortage of allografts, and we may have to postpone my surgery. (I called it being on the donor tissue transplant list....I'm on "hold" until Monday morning, and the doctor will call to tell me if there are tendons for the operation....or not).

Monday, February 26: day of surgery?....YES!!!!
6:30 a.m.: I wake up to my alarm, hit snooze, and fall back asleep
7:15 a.m.: I wake up in a small panic, realizing that I need to be at the hospital at 9, but haven't heard from the doctor....So, I jump out of bed and work on the last cleaning tasks in my room while I wait for the doctor to call....and it's snowing. I guessed I missed the weather forecast.
7:40 a.m.: Doctor's office calls....and there are tendon grafts for my surgery! Hooray!
I pack a bag of books, magazines, and music, continue with the trash collection/cleaning
8:30 a.m.: Hooray for friends with cars! I get a ride to the hospital from Danny, since I didn't want to trudge it through the snow.
8:57 or so: I arrive at Boston Medical Center....let the day begin!

First, I report to the doctor's office for pre-surgery x-rays (in case the doctor has to move my patella to align with the right knee). I take the x-rays to surgery registration, register for surgery, and wait for the nurse to come and get me. The nurse arrives, and I am swept into the pre-op room....again. There are three nurses who have seen me at least once before, so I say, "Hi!" and we proceed with the pre-op rituals....When all is said and done and signed, I am rolled into the operating room at 11 a.m. In the operating room, the anesthesiologist places the epidural in my back, and gives me sleepy-time gas to breathe....and I am out for the count.

4:00 p.m. (or at least this is the first time I can remember): I wake up in the recovery room, have really groggy conversations with the two doctors who operated on me, and then am wheeled up to my room (for the week): 8 west, bed 22a (near the door). I quickly text a bunch of people with my whereabouts and then fall asleep.
4:45 p.m. (maybe?): The nurse arrives and introduces herself....and then asks me, "Weren't you here before?"....yes, more people who recognize me! Well, it's not that exciting....until she asks me, "Where's your catheter? You do have an epidural, right? And your CPM machine?" I tell her that I was barely awake in the recovery room when I was then rolled up to the room.

Basically, the doctors forgot to place a catheter in me prior to the end of the operation, and they forgot to get me a CPM machine for my in-house post-op recovery process. Good times. She gets to do both. And I'm awake. I'll just leave it at that. : )

Thank you to the friends who stopped by on Monday evening. It was good to see you, and I'm sorry I didn't have more energy for conversation. It was a long, but successful day.

Tuesday, February 27: day 1 on the road to recovery
I woke up feeling a little better than I did the night before, but was still very tired from Monday's events. I spent the day eating, napping, getting my vitals taken every four hours (because I was on the epidural), bending my knee in the CPM machine, and sleeping. The rest really helped as I was able to eat my first full meal on Tuesday night (stuffed chicken with mashed potatoes and butternut squash)! : )

I don't remember much from that day except that my roommate/neighbor was discharged and went home. She was a nice old woman named Rita, who had brain tumor surgery sometime the week (or two....I didn't ask) before. She was up and about in her own pajamas at night, and definitely made herself at home during her stay at the hospital. Her departure created a vacancy in my room....which made it VERY easy for friends to stop by after visiting hours and not get into too much trouble. : )

Wednesday, February 28: day 2!
Felt much better when I woke up on Wednesday morning. I ate a day's worth of meals (yes, breakfast, lunch and dinner!), slept, stared at the walls in my hospital room, and almost fainted while standing before I took another short nap into the early evening when friends stopped by to hang out and watch the Maryland/Duke basketball game. It was very important that I did not have a roommate because the game was on late (9 p.m., ESPN), and I wasn't sure that they would be able to stay for the entire game....but they did! The nurses didn't say a word when they checked on me, and after the game ended (Maryland beat Duke) at 11:15, they left without a word. It was REALLY awesome.

I received not-so-awesome news on Wednesday: I wasn't going home until Thursday/Friday. My doctor wanted to keep me in the hospital for one more day, and the anesthesia doctors wanted to keep me in for TWO more days. Ridiculous. Pain tolerance ridiculousness. Obviously, I don't know anything about my pain tolerance after having an epidural in me. Grr. I was really sad/upset because I was tired of being in the hospital, and just wanted to be home. I guess that in exchange for my extra nights, I was given two nights with a hospital room to myself. Not too shabby. : )

Thursday, March 1: day 3! (and the first day of the best month of the entire year!!!!)
I felt spectacular when I woke up on Thursday morning. So much so that I read, Book the Tenth from Lemony Snicket's "A Series of Unfortunate Events" called, The Slippery Slope. If you ever want to read a clever and funny children's series, you should read this one. I have books 7-12 here in Boston, and am trying to figure out how to get books 1-6 from home-home. Fun times. : )

More friends stopped by during the afternoon and evening, and it was nice to pass the time talking, playing Uno (thanks Erin!), or reading through celebrity gossip magazines. I also had a neighbor join me in the room for the night, which quieted things down a bit (not that we were being rowdy, but just aware that there was another patient in the room). But it was okay....just a few more hours until I was home!!!!

Friday, March 2: day 4 and freedom day!
I didn't sleep well on Thursday in anticipation of going home. Oh well. And when I did finally wake up, it was raining. Yuck. At least I was going home!

Chrissy came by at 10:30 a.m. to get me and my stuff, and I got into a wheelchair and left 8 west, room 22 for the last time....hooray! The wheelchair attendant wheeled me downstairs, and Chrissy and I drove off into the....rain. The prescriptions were dropped off at the pharmacy, and Chrissy and Jasper helped me settle in at the apartment.

SUCCESS! I was finally home.

The stuff you really want to know (surgery):
The doctors performed a patellar tendon graft repair and removed scar tissue that had grown around my knee since September/November. When the scar tissue was removed, my joint and the surrounding cartilage remained intact and healthy. The doctors say that I will have scar tissue in my knee, but if I get on it early enough, I'll be able to "mold" the scar tissue into a position that will stabilize my knee.

Physical therapy starts on Monday. I will go to physical therapy everyday and do very simple range-of-motion exercises and isometric quad exercises (simple quad-strengthening exercises). I have enough pain meds to last me a VERY long time, but so far, there hasn't been much pain as I increase the degrees of flexion on the CPM machine.

However, when I'm not at PT or not commuting to and from PT, I will be at my lovely apartment reading, sleeping, eating, or relaxing. If you want to stop by at any point during the day, give me a call!

Thank you to all the friends who visited me during the week: Erin, Chrissy, Shmi, Jac, Karen, Roy, Keely, Danny, Kathy, Allison, Mackenzie, Nancy, Blake, Erika, Emily Walton, Greg (Scoops), and Steve. And thanks to all of you who called, sent e-mails and text messages.

It's a new beginning and I'm really excited for it. Thank you for all the support; you have been such wonderful friends. I'll continue to keep you posted on my progress. And please do keep in touch.

.....and that's the e-mail. yes, i had lots of time to write, so it was only fair that i wrote a novel. : )

i'll post more on my current status very soon. if i don't resort to laziness. : )

a new beginning is very exciting.

-me : )