Day two of surgery.

It's day two, and I woke up to the realization that things will only get worse before they improve.



Yesterday I had the help from some of the local painkillers from the surgery in my system... Through the night those wore off and I woke up in pain despite waking up throughout the night to take the meds and try to reduce the pain in the morning. I woke up with a really swollen knee, PAINFULLY swollen, i touch the swollen parts and they do not feel like leg... more like large painful growth attatched to my body. My ice machine had stopped working last night, the ice had melted and the part that attatched to my knee was not only warm, but leaking. This is NOT GOOD because I cant take off the wrappings for 12 days, till the post surgery checkup. and it seems fairly obvious to say that water + wound + soggy wrappings is bad.


Good news is that i am allowed to double up on painkillers so that should help something, but make me dumb for the next day or so. I forgot to mention in my post yesterday about the fire in the hotel. HA.

so after the operation we go through the process of getting me upstairs in the hotel and back to the room. It was a really shitty process, of helen holding my knee out straight, paul grabbing my sides and lowering me into a really ghetto wheelchair the hotel provided, with nothing to elevate my leg. So thats helen;s job. Paul tried to put together some sort of bootleg knee elevation thing with pillows and his briefcase but I was doubtful that this would stay in place, if it didn't i would be royally screwed. anyway, with the help from a few employees and some sarcastic humor to lighten the awkward situation... i was rolled into the hotel and up to the room, lifted onto a bed and positioned with 300 pillows, my ice machine and painkillers.

Then there is a loud screaming beeping noise coming from the hallway, paul opens the door, looks out, and says... fire alarm?
You cant use elevators in fires. we call the front desk and they say i need to be evacuated... they say,,, no she just got back from surgery half an hour ago, that is not possible. We cant carry her down with her knee straight. SO we get an employee to come up and stand in our room with a walkie talkie and communicate with the people looking for the fire. all the while the blaring beeping noise is NOT helping with my pain.


so basically... if this had been a real fire, i would have died. no way to be carried down the stairs in that bootleg wheelchair with my knee straight? Can you imagine the pain if they dropped it.. god god god... well after about 40 minutes of her standing there listening to the walkie talkie ( the fire dept didnt come.. they were lost or late or some shit ) They figured out it was a prank. and There was no fire. BUT REALLY? REALLY? WHAT ARE THE FUCKING ODDS. talk about stress. I was close to saying fuck it, let me burn.

anyways. good start to the first day of crippledom.

oh and i also learned that being a cripple makes you lose all respect for yourself, going to the bathroom involves the entire family, a wheelchair and my mother holding my leg and getting a direct view to my crotch as I piss. talk about a good time? fuck yea.