Ankle surgery

Ankle surgery was yesterday. The surgeon said it went well. My anesthesiologist was gorgeous (couldn't have been a day over thirty if that). I wanted to introduce him to my dear friend's 21-year-old daughter immediately. I told her I'd wait until I got the bill, then we can Google him and find out if he's single. For a brief moment, I turned into one of those women who says, "I would love for you to meet my granddaughter/daughter/niece/friend!" It was a strange feeling.

I checked into the hospital at 7:15, my procedure was at 9:30, and they discharged me about 1 pm. They had given me a block behind my knee in shot form--the shot hurt like hell because Dr. Gorgeous or Dr. Gorgeous' Assistant hit the nerve just right, causing the pain to run up and down the entire back of my leg. They gave me my general anesthetic shortly thereafter, and the next thing I knew, I was coming to in the recovery room.

When we got home, we were disappointed to discover that the suitcase ramp we bought on Craigslist for such a great price was too steep for me to use getting into the house. I ended up scooting backwards into the house on my butt. Maybe when I get more used to operating the knee scooter and am less loopy on Demerol, I can still master the ramp.

The block behind my knee kept my leg numb for the first 24 hours, but began wearing off today. When it did, I started taking the Demerol. It quiets the pain, but it still hurts. The cast is big and bulky and my leg is yellow from some weird iodine soap they used on it in surgery.

I'm getting used to the scooter, but wow. Mobility is something most people take for granted; when you lose it--even partially and temporarily, as this situation is--you realize what a blessing it is to be able to move normally.

They weighed me before surgery--233, so two pounds less than the day before (which is odd, but I'll take it!). That made me happy. It occurred to me this evening that I won't be ABLE to weigh myself until I can use this foot again. So, no obsessing about the number on the scale. It will almost feel like a vacation!

This week

My life has been crazy lately. My ankle surgery is tomorrow. I'm almost looking forward to it just because I will be able to rest and be left alone! I'm trying to imagine how it's all going to work, not being able to put weight on it at all for almost a month. The knee scooter is actually kind of fun. Showers are going to be tricky, but a friend lent me a shower chair and I don't plan on attempting to use it unless Mr. Salted is home. I bought one of those plastic covers to protect the cast or boot at the pharmacy. I'm wondering how much the ankle will hurt and for how long--I had to track down the liquid Demerol again, which is no mean feat, and the bottle isn't that big to begin with.

I've been working as much as I could because they have needed extra help, and I just had a copywriting job to do this morning as well. My grandmother was sent home to live independently today, much to my disgust. I made a decision to back far away from THAT situation (a) because I have done everything I could and (b) for my own sanity, but I have still been in daily phone and/or email contact with family members as well as checking in on her via the phone.

I saw the nutritionist yesterday--a different nutritionist who is filling in for the one I've seen this whole time. She was nice enough, but her affect bugged me--I felt like she was doing the swooping in, "tell me about your mother", Dr.Freud kind of thing. I just don't feel that I have much to say now--I take my supplements, I eat what I'm supposed to, and my weight loss is more than satisfactory. In fact, I had lost 12 pounds in the last month and was actually two pounds lighter than that weight this morning. I just don't care about food anymore. The less it factors into my life, the better. I make sure I get my protein and I eat my healthy snacks that I can have, and it keeps me alive. Sometimes I have a couple of bites of what Mr. Salted makes, but the majority of what I eat now is protein bullets, shakes, and bars. It is weird that so much of it isn't "natural" food, but I'm getting the vitamins and minerals I need, I feel great, and my hair isn't falling out!

I will be glad when my ankle is fixed so that I can work out, but I really don't want to see the exercise physiologist. It's a big part of the wellness center's follow-up thing, so I don't know if I can really avoid it, but I think it's a waste of time and money and I hate it. I don't need to work out in front of this guy while he says "good job" like I'm a dog he's training. I know a lot of my resistance is due to my past experiences with being forced to exercise, ridiculed, etc., but I just want to make my own decision to go to the pool or go for a walk my damn self. I don't want a coach or a trainer, and I find dealing with him really annoying--it just isn't working for me.

After I weighed myself this morning, I was 235, which is less than I have weighed in ten years. Needless to say, that felt great. I heard Old Navy was having a big sale, and it was payday, so I stopped by on my way home from work. I found some great lounge pants with skulls and hearts on them that fit now, some yoga pants that will fit soon, and some absolutely darling summer dresses (that will fit by summer) for $15 and $20. It's so strange to buy clothes that are too small on purpose. It's also disconcerting to feel good about your weight all day, then try on clothes that make you look like the Michelin tire man. I had to remind myself how much weight I've already lost and have faith in the progress I will continue to make.

Major appliance failure

A few months ago our fridge gave up the ghost, and now the dryer died. The washer was perilously close to death as well and had a mysterious periodic leak, so we bit the bullet, applied for credit, and ordered a matching set of the second-cheapest from Home Depot: Maytag, commercial grade, allegedly good for 25 years. Front loaders are cool, and it would have been fun to get them in some jazzy color, but it was hardly necessary and we're paying off surgery bills. I'm waiting for our new set to be delivered now, and I wish they'd shake a leg. I have so few things that fit me that laundry needs frequent doing these days.

I am not losing weight as quickly as I was initially, but I was relieved to get on the scale this morning and see a couple more pounds gone. I can tell by the way clothes fit, too. I was 237 this morning; that is the least I've weighed in about ten years. I'm doing better with keeping drinking and eating separate, and physically I am feeling great. I'm still tired, but that has to do with work and life stuff. I finally got my fancy-schmancy scale today. It's mostly made of glass, and it doesn't work properly on a carpeted floor. It kept cycling between weights in the 140s and I thought, "If only." Then it said "Error" and I discovered it has to be used on bare floors. It can figure body fat ratio as well, but I didn't have the strength to see what that was today. When I think of my body fat being measured, images of calipers and public humiliation spring forth, and I'm not really in the mood.

On Monday, a doctor is supposed to make the final determination as to whether my grandmother can return to living independently or not. Everything hinges on that when it comes to her situation.

My ankle surgery is Thursday, the 1st. They have told me if I am not in too much pain and can maneuver my knee scooter, I don't have to be off work the entire month that I am non-weight-bearing. We'll see. I haven't picked the scooter up yet. Mr. Salted will be off for the first ten days with me, so hopefully any granny duties that may arise will do so during that time so that he can drive me. I may carpool to work with one of my friends from there. I am SO glad to have this job; I don't know how we would have managed if these folks hadn't asked me to come back. They have been really flexible, too, which has been a huge help.

Puree Day 1

I consulted my nutritionist instructions, and it turns out today is the day I can start puree. I had some baby cereal (it was Beech Nut whole wheat with raisin) and it was pretty good (I put some Splenda in it). That was fine.

A couple of hours later, I tried to eat some lunch meat--thin-sliced--and immediately got sick after about four bites. I think it was a mild dumping episode, and it was miserable! Nausea, sweat, dizzy, praying to the porcelain God (and I don't have the knees I used to when my lifestyle necessitated frequent prayers to the P.G.). That will teach me not to look at the label--I bet it had sugar in it. Bleargh.

Overall, I feel somewhat sore and still very tired. The worst of the bruising is beginning to heal and turn interesting colors in the interim, but I can't take any of the bandages off the incisions until I see the surgeons on the 13th. I'm just not up to doing ANYTHING, so most of the time I stay horizontal. Books, TV, and the laptop are keeping me from losing my mind. I feel like I should be doing more, but Mr. Salted says, "You just had major surgery. Just rest." It's hard, though. I hate for him to have to work all day and then come home and do all the chores too.

My ankle surgery has been tentatively scheduled for October 1.

Guess who needs reconstructive ankle surgery?

So here's the deal: I had this horrible left ankle fracture when I was 16. The bone was snapped in half and had to be screwed back together. (They removed the screws later.) It's always hurt when it rained and that kind of thing, which I figured was par for the course. Lately, as I've documented here, it has been giving out more and more frequently. I can just be walking along, minding my own business, and it goes over to the side without a warning. Working out on it or a moderate amount of walking causes pain and swelling. Everything hurts it, even just walking around the grocery store. It is one of the reasons I've pursued bariatric surgery with the degree of purpose I have in the past few months.

Back in 1985, when this bone was broken, the orthopedic surgeon just repaired the bones involved--that's what they did back then. They didn't have the technology then to see ligaments or even consider them a problem. I was really young and they probably thought I'd heal up just fine. My ligaments--the ones that provide necessary stability--have long since been shredded. The doctor could tell just by moving my ankle around with his hands that the ligaments there were basically gone and done for; the right ankle, on the other hand, felt just as it should. The difference was obvious in the movement and feeling, especially once it was pointed out and demonstrated to me this way. He said when the bad ankle just gives out now, it's just tearing at existing scar tissue, and the reason I can (thus far) still limp away on my own afterward is because of that scar tissue, but it will still need to be stabilized in a more permanent fashion. Future stabilization = not optional.

Reviewing x-rays taken today, the doctor said, "See now, your bones look gorgeous." (Not a sentence I ever expected to hear...)He could see on the film where the break had been with his practiced eye--right in the ball on the outside.

He said I will have to get this ankle repaired. Not necessarily today, but as soon as I can. It isn't going to get any better on its own, no matter what kind of strength training or exercises I do, and I'm "young" (ha!) and have a long way to go. "You had to know this was coming," he said. Well, yeah, I was afraid it was, but am still "young" (ha HA!) and stupid enough to think that maybe it would fix itself with my eventual weight loss, et. al. Pfffft. What they do is take part of my tendon and reconstruct the stability-providing ligament. I can't walk on it for at least three weeks, but I am allowed to drive an automatic. It's in and out of hospital the same day, no stay. After about a year's time, there is usually a lot of progress that has been made.

So--he said this, and I freaking knew it--walking is no good for me. The ankle can go over at any time--gravel road, crack in the sidewalk, step in a puddle, on a rock, off a curb. The elliptical is no good because you push off from your heel and that can also exacerbate things. Same with the Stairmaster. Since you are usually watching TV or listening to music to provide distraction from the exercise, you're all that much more likely to forget exactly how to compensate for the instability and go boom. I knew this too. Despite the crappy news that I do need surgery, it certainly felt fantastic to be validated. A doctor who listens! We talked about my pending bariatric surgery; he knows my surgeon. He encouraged me to "take care of me first", get stabilized from the GBP, and come in, maybe this fall, and get this taken care of, giving him about a month's leeway. He will write the necessary letters for me and fax his findings from today to my exercise physiologist and bariatric surgeon.

He also said these magic words: "Your weight has nothing to do with this. It is neither here nor there." I wanted to give him a big old hug, kind of like I want to hug the occasional (myopic) cashier who cards me when I buy Mr. Salted's beer at the grocery store. Oh hell, I wanted to kiss him on the mouth, just like a big old grateful hound. Why, thank you, universe! You have dealt me a doctor with a clue!

The bad news is: this puts me out of commission for longer, and I don't know how we will afford it. We'll manage somehow, I'm sure. I don't see what good waiting any longer to fix the ankle would do--it would just mean I had to take time off from a new job (should I be able to find one), and in the meantime, the ankle can still go out whenever it wants to. And it means no school, at least not this year, but I had pretty much given up on that, at least for this year. Maybe the economy will rebound a little by fall 2010.