On This Day Last Year

On this day last year, a friend (she is a saint) drove from her house in Stillwater in her new Prius to my house. She picked Offspring #2 and I up and drove us across the 35W bridge to Abbot Northwestern hospital. They have valet service there. They need valet service because it's about 2 city blocks from the parking ramp to the same day surgery check in. We were lost but a kindly nurse showed us the way. I got checked in and they had me change into a gown. This was a gown like I had never seen before. This gown had a vacuum cleaner attachment. I had a remote control and after I was hooked up, air blew inside the gown keeping me as warm or as cold as I preferred. I cranked it up as high as it went and was very comfortable. After waiting around for a couple hours I was taken in for my spinal stimulator implantation surgery. I have never had to lie face down on an operating table before. As I put my face into the face holder, I could see myself in a mirror. I guessed the anesthesiologist used the mirror to check my breathing during the operation but it is a little strange to see yourself in a very tense situation like going into surgery. They told me I would be somewhat awake during the surgery but not enough to feel any pain. I trusted them. Soon I was awakened by someone calling my name. I don't remember going out until they woke me up. The voice wanted to know if I could feel any tingling. "Yes," I said in a laughing voice, "I can feel it in my waist and it tickles!" They kept asking questions and adjusting the tingling until I could feel it in my lower back and right and left legs. Then they quit asking questions and went back to work. I said, "Hello! I can feel that." I could feel a pain where they were cutting in my back but I wasn't feeling the hurt of the pain. The surgeon, nice lady from Iran, asked me to relax and take a few deep breaths and shut my eyes. She went back to work. "Hello! I can still feel that." I know I was saying this in a snarky teenager voice but that is how it came out. Again she said, "Please close your eyes and relax." Next thing I knew I was lying on my back in the recovery room. I woke and was aware instantly and immediately started talking. "Man, my mouth tastes like Doritos. Nacho Cheese Doritos! I haven't had nacho cheese Doritos for years but I can sure taste them now." Normally I am a reserved person, even leaning toward quiet. But give me the right drugs and I become a blabbermouth. A nurse was helping another man who was vomiting. She asked me to close my eyes for a minute (translation - quit talking). But I couldn't. I kept talking. Eventually she got me a glass of water and a can of diet sprite. She mentioned closing my eyes several times but it didn't work, I kept talking. She moved me into another room so she could shut the door on me and my babbling. The constant urge to keep talking felt very foreign to me. I remember resolving to be more tolerant of the talkative. After a while they let me get dressed and go home. My friend, the saint, drove us home before going back to Stillwater. She must have put on a hundred miles that day. Recovery went well. It was strange to have two incisions - one for the battery in the hip and the other for the wire leads. I had to wait a week before they turned the machine on. Am I glad I had it done? Yes. Without this I doubt I'd be able to work. Does it help as much as I had hoped? No. I still limp. I limp like the Real McCoy. If you are younger than I am, I will have to explain that TV reference. The Real McCoys was a television show about a farming family in a small community in which, after season 2, the grandfather in the show had a distinctive limp. He walked normally at first. Grandpa lived with his son, his son's wife, and his grandchildren. They were always getting into situations. The Real McCoys was a great show. I can't exercise or hike like I used to. But the pain is manageable as long as I am careful to listen to my body and rest when the body says rest. My scars have healed. I can see the shape of the battery showing through my skin but it doesn't show through my clothes. The battery is rechargeable through the skin. About every 3 weeks I wear this big metal plate on a belt around my hips and recharge myself. The process takes about 6 to 8 hours. I have a remote control where I can turn the device off, up, down, etc. I never turn it off. I turn it down to a barely perceptible level so I can sleep but I turn it up to get around the house and I turn it up even higher to work or garden or walk. On a pain scale of 1 to 10, the stimulator brings me from an 8 to a 5, and sometimes a 4. I have a very few days where it's back up to a 6 or a 7. Those are the days where it hurts to bend to sit down and I struggle to get my right leg in and out of the car. Those are the days I rest. The stimulator changes the pain from a sharp shooting pain to a duller ache. I feel very fortunate to have it. I've learned how to live with it and the remaining pain. I used to walk 15 miles a week. Now I walk minimally. I do tai chich, I bike, and sometimes I swim. More importantly, I focus on being grateful for what I can do. I've had a good year.