A Look Inside My Head

Hello, Everybody!

I had an appointment with Dr Movahed yesterday.  It went really well.  He still says that things are well on track and that I'm doing great.  He seemed especially happy with how well the sutures lines on my neck are healing and took photos for documentation.  Here are some of the high points we talked about.

After seeing me and poking around the area of my bionics (what I've started calling my prosthetics), he's pretty darn sure that the infection is not in that (thank goodness!).  He said that if it was in the bionics, there would be swelling, redness, tenderness, etc. and there's none of that.  He's sure it's in that screw hole and that there is nothing to worry about.  So I'm feeling better about that.

Apparently I have a suture in my nose that is keeping my nose from widening as things heal.  This is why is hurts to touch my nose.  I mean hurts.  Even putting lotion on or wiping it.  It's a dissolving suture and some day there will be a ping; no more suture.  That sounds like it'll be weird.

It's been almost a month now since James has been at work on a regular basis and both he and his coworkers are ready for that to change.  But I'm going to so many doctor's appointments and can't drive myself because of the narcotics.  So we're trying tramadol which is a non narcotic pain killer.  I just started it this morning so we'll see how it goes.

He said to stop treating the suture lines on my neck with antibacterial ointment and start with Mederma (scar reducing gel).  He's pretty sure that those are going to heal with little or no scarring.  The belly wound may need a scar revision procedure.  I have a flap of skin that's hanging off part of it and will need to be removed to keep it from being constantly irritated by clothing.  He says they can do it in office in a couple of months post surgery.

Also while I was there, the surgery nurse, Iryna (isn't that a cool spelling?) gave me a CD with some of the images that have been taken post surgery.  Shall we have a look?

My first thought?  Holy crap, that a lot of metal!  I'll be worth something in recycling someday!  And I'm pretty sure my MRI days are over.

And the image quality is pretty spectacular.  I find things that I can see that are inside me to be fascinating so I spend a lot time studying this. Is that narcissistic?

Also noticed that I have no curve in my neck what so ever.  Let's compare.

Normal Neck Curvature

Heather's (lack of) Neck Curvature

This actually is related to a lot the neck and jaw dysfunction and pain that I've had most of my adult life.  We can't say if one caused the other, but they certainly fed off each other.  And it's also why my head thrusts forward.  I need to talk with Shawn (P.T.) and my chiropractor it see if there is anything we can do to improve that.

OK, I think that's all for now.  Hope everybody out there doing well!

Oh Look, A Third Shoe.

Sorry for not posting recently.  Yesterday was not a good day for me and I pretty much didn't do anything.Nothing terrible about yesterday, I just didn't sleep well the night before and I think all this is starting to catch up to me, mentally.  It's starting to be a little overwhelming.  But I'm sure that's all normal for the circumstances.

We did have a third shoe drop on Tuesday.  I went to see Dr Keller and he found a seeping fistula in my mouth on the lower, right jaw.  That means I have an infection in there that's draining.  That completely blind-sided us.  I was having no symptoms at all (no fever, no pain, etc.)  After some xrays, exploration, and talking with Dr Movahed, they think the infection is from a temporary screw that was used during the surgery.  They've put me back on clindamycin (antibiotic).  Neither of them seem too worried about it but I see Dr Movahed today and I'll get more info about it then.  This was getting close to the last straw on surprises, part of what made yesterday so bad.  Things were going so well during/after surgery and now it seems like it's coming undone.  I'm not at all happy about that.  I am grateful for all the good I've had up to now but the current trend seems to be in the wrong direction.  Sorry, not good at positive thinking under normal circumstances and doubly not so at the moment.

We took some new pics after my shower yesterday.

We see me every day so we don't notice much difference.  I did notice my lips look different and my face is slimming out (that may be because I've lost 9lbs since the surgery).  Emoting still isn't happening for the outside world, though Jamie says he's learning to read the new expressions.  Feel free to comment/email anything you notice since the last set of pics.

Speaking of changes, I didn't really realize how much my face had changed until Jamie made this for me.

What a difference a surgery makes!

That's about all for now.  Let me go find something cute/funny...  (dig, dig, dig)  Ah!

Another Doctor, Another Test

I went to the vascular specialists (there was the doctor and a resident) today.  He confirmed the blood clot, though he thinks it is smaller than the ER doctor did.  He said that everything appears to be fine as far as current circulation via my ulnar artery goes and he thinks that the clot will either break up or the artery will route around it in a few weeks.  He is ordering a blood profusion test in my hand bit I'm considering refusing that.  There is absolutely no indication that my profusion isn't just fine.  I'll have to give that some thought.  The pain is diminished at the moment and I'm using my left hand pretty normally.  He thinks that the pain is from the swelling at the clot effecting the surrounding nerves and that should go away as the clot does.  Long term, he says things should return to normal.  Yay!

Really the only negative of the whole thing is that he wants me to stop taking my birth control, at least until after I'm cleared of this clot.  That means unfettered hormones and (probably) a period on blood thinners.  I'm not happy with either those things.  Neither is Jamie (poor guy).  But better safe than sorry.

That's really all to report today.  And now for something cute!

Look who grew into his bowtie!

Give Us a Smile!

Or, maybe not!

The funny thing is, the harder I try to smile, the farther the corners of my mouth go down.  I can't do Grumpy Cat this well when I have full control of my facial expressions.

Random Thoughts

My Current Bodily Composition

50% Carmex
25% Narcotics
10% Other Meds
5% Stuff a Human Body is *Supposed* to Be Made Of

The Other Shoe

Things have been going so incredibly well with this surgery that I was sure there was a price to pay for all that.  I think the bill came due last night.

I woke up Saturday morning with the pain in my left wrist from the arterial line back.  I had noticed it on and off but it wasn't horrible and Dr Movahed (surgeon) said that some pain wasn't unusual.  During the day Saturday it kept getting worse and I noticed the pain spreading up my arm toward my elbow.  Fast forward to 2am Sunday.  I woke from a couple hours of sleep to excruciating pain in that arm.

After trying to figure out what to do, we decided to call the nurse line from our insurance company.  She recommended getting a hold of my surgeon or, failing that, going to the ER.  Thus we entered the After-Hours Zone.  We called the office number to get the exchange number to talk with the doctor on-call.  The recording gave us a number; that number gave us a person who gave us another number; that number gave a recording that gave us a number that sent us back to the person; that person said they would page the on-call  doctor who never called.  We gave up and called Dr Movahed's cell (sorry, we tried not to) and he said to go to the ER.

Of course, they were very busy.  We spent 1.25 hours waiting to get back (I've heard of worse) and then they took us back to a hall bed.  I've never had to do that before and is indicative of how busy they were.  After another 45 minutes, the ER doctor came in to see me.  After some questions and a little poking, he said I would have to come back in a few hours for an ultrasound; that whole thing took about 5 minutes.  He left, came back in 10 minutes to tell me to be at the ER at 10am.  A few more minutes then a nurse came in to have me sign discharge papers and told me I could go.

I. Was. Pissed. I just spent 3 hours in the emergency room to see the doctor for 5 minutes for him to tell me to come back in 4 hours. In hindsight, it was better to be home than sitting in the emergency room for that 4 hours. But hindsight is 20/20 and I didn't see that at the time.

So we came back at 10 a.m. to the ER. At the front desk they told me to drive to the heart hospital (same campus). Jamie, being the good husband that he is, had dropped me off at the ER and gone to park the car. So now I had to wait for him to get there so he could go back and get the car to drive us to the heart hospital.

The ultrasound tech was a very nice lady and watching the ultrasound from my neck to my wrist was actually pretty cool. I could see the vein she was tracking and blood flow through it. And even I could tell when we found the issue. I had a blood clot in my artery, or more particularly, a radial artery occlusion. She called down to the ER, and the doctor on duty said to have me come back down. Nice ultrasound lady walked us through the hospital to the ER in far less time than it took to drive over and park from the ER. Thank you ER front desk girl!

After a brief stay in the waiting room of the ER, I was asked if would be willing to take a hall bed again in order to expedite seeing the doctor. I agreed and in less than 10 minutes I was back to listening to ER nurses banter around the nurse's station. Fifteen minutes later the ER doctor appeared, along with two nurses. While one nurse hooked me up to the blood pressure/pulse/ox monitor, the other nurse started setting up to insert an IV. I noticed Jamie looking at her wide-eyed and looked over to see what was going on. When I saw that they were trying to poke me yet again, my well reasoned and mature response was, "Oh hells no!" Doctor looked at me sternly and said "Well, we may need to to save your arm." "Look, I already have 5 holes in me, only one of which was in use by the time I left this hospital after the surgery. I really don't want stuck in anymore" Fortunately, the doctor decided that they would talk to the vascular specialist and if I needed an IV, they would insert it then and not now. Thank you very much, mister doctor!

Half an hour and one hospital gown bathroom trip later, the doctor came back which OK news, and good news. The OK news was that I did indeed have an inch and a half blood clot in my radial artery. The good news was it was treatable with oral medication and I could go home. Yay! So after time for discharge papers we came home.

So I've started a blood thinner (right now for the next 2 weeks) and I need to go visit the vascular specialist ASAP. I still have good circulation in the Ulnar artery, so at this time my hand is not in danger. But, much to my surprise, this little mofo hurts worse than anything so far in this surgery. I have pain every time I move my arm or hand, and I can't hold anything with my left hand (of course it was my left hand!). I am now, officially, an invalid. I can't make my own food, change my own clothes, wash dishes, prepare medication, etc. While I'm pissed about this, I guess the "other shoe" could have been much worse. I will update on this as well as the jaw stuff in the future.

Thanks for reading this update/rant. Hope everything is well out there.

Truer Words...

I spoke with Dr Movahed last night via cell phone. I wouldn't usually have called but we didn't manage to connect on Thursday and it was looking like not on Friday.

Anyway, I wanted to talk to him because I was frustrated by the fact that I was more painful and less functional than when I left the hospital and was it something I was doing? His response (in much more professional words) was, "Look, kid. You have no idea just how effed up your face is at the moment. You're doing amazingly well and things are going as they should. Sit back and go with the flow." All of which is completely accurate and I know it. Doesn't mean I have to like it. *pout*

Anyway, after I hung up the phone, Jamie said, "Poor guy. He probably thought the surgery was the hard part of taking care of you."

:-D