The Fog has lifted

I had to re-read my last two posts because I knew that I wrote them but I couldn't think of what I wrote. After the bandages were removed on Monday morning, I had to continue taking Benadryl for the next 4 days so there was a lot of foggy feeling and dizziness. But I am finally off of it! My hives are pretty much gone. My severe headache that was with me for most of the week is currently under control. Between the hives and the headache, I couldn't focus, had trouble sleeping, and had problems interacting with people around me. Getting these things under control has made my life much, much better. My doctors response to my hives was "You just don't have much of a tolerance for narcotics." I guess this is a good thing. The drains did not come out this week though. I hate the drains! I can't wait for them to be gone. I understand their importance but I know that after they are gone, I will get better faster. I am finally stopping the nasty sweating of the excretion of all of the drugs they gave me during surgery. I am also losing the weird water weight and bloating that made me feel puffy for the first week after surgery. Now that I am only on my normal asthma and allergy meds I am getting back to "normal". I'm still struggling with finding a comfortable position while sleeping so my sleep is not great on a regular basis. I am also still struggling with food since I am unable to cook and we aren't eating what we normally ate before. I was not cleared to start the range of motion exercises yet but hope that I will be on Monday. I am doing a lot with my left arm although I am not nearly 50% range of motion yet and, due to the placement of the port and some referred pain from it, my right arm is at about 30% range of motion. I can't wait to have something to work toward in doing the range of motion exercises.

I have been walking a lot. I started walking around the block immediately after surgery and then on Thursday I felt great and went for a 4 mile walk! I think walking is helping me heal. There are stats that say that the body heals eight times faster with exercise. I am realizing that walking gets me nowhere near the exercise "high" that running and biking give me but it is helping me immeasurably none-the-less. I am so excited to run again. I think that getting back to my running will ultimately allow me to feel "normal" again. I was lucky that I spent the week with my father who was more than willing to go out and walk as far as I wanted to at any time I wanted to go.

I did have a moment of mental weakness this week. On Monday, after I got my first look at my new body, was wearing a pair of black running pants, the cotton vest that holds my drains, and a sweatshirt of my husbands, and my hair looked like I was Ralph Macchio from the Karate Kid, I looked at myself in the mirror and just cried. At that moment, I realized that if I dressed like I was a sick person, I was feeling like a sick person and I hated that. I didn't like that I looked like a young boy - there is nothing healing, healthy, or uplifting about being a 33 yr old woman and feeling helpless and feeling like I lost something. I vowed to figure out what I could wear to look like a woman and look healthy again. Since then, I have found shirts in my wardrobe that have larger neck holes and have warn them so I feel better. I also started wearing my wedding rings again as my hands are no longer swollen so they fit again! I am committed to looking great when I am capable to enhance my self-esteem.

This surgery was much harder than I thought it would be. I know I had reactions that were atypical but I thought I would have more mental capabilities in the week after than I did. I feel like life is moving at a sloths pace but, as my cousin pointed out, you don't go from working and training for an Ironman to sitting around trying to recover from surgery without it feeling like life has slowed down. I didn't realize how much Joe and I worked and trained until he went back to work, training, and coaching on Tuesday and was gone for 12 hrs. This was my life until March 15th too. I understand that I have to step back and take my life at a slower pace. I believe I will get used to this soon and get into a rhythm that I didn't have before but which will be best for me. Of course this week was not typical for Joe either. Although he worked 4 of the 5 days at school, he came home early without working out or coaching 2 days because of me on Monday and on Wednesday because he got a stomach bug (yuck). He goes back to "normal" starting next week. I am hoping that next week, I won't have to be supervised all of the time which will help me find my rhythm as well. I have at least 3 weeks to just heal now before chemo starts. That is what I shall concentrate on now.

4 days post surgery

Thursday was surgery, Friday I was basically pushed out of the hospital even though I was still puking and having a pretty severe headache. Friday, Joe and I learned to deal with my current situation with drains. Saturday, I was nauseous, extremely nauseous. My thoughts went to what if chemo is like this, I will not survive the year - that is how bad it was. Very quickly we learned that the hydrocodone was making me sick to my stomach and quite possibly giving me hives. We had a decent afternoon though with little thought of throwing up since I was not consumed with hives and itching. Benadryl became my best friend at this point. In the middle of the night Joe decided that washing the hive area again may help and we figured out that where the betadine was put on my body I was having a reaction and close to the tape that is around my surgical wounds was very irritated. Once we washed it again, gave me benadryl and put some anti-itch cream on the hives and I finally got to sleep.

Today. I woke up at around 8 am with itching and tingling around my chest and my back. I stayed awake until 1 eating two meals then took an hour nap and now I am writing. My head is still a bit fuzzy due to all of the medications I have been taking but I am feeling slightly more human. Today I did realize that I am completely dependent on my husband which makes me sad. I am one of the most independent people I know and now I can't even wash my own face. Washing my face and hair feels like it should be done every hour because I feel like I am excreting the anesthesia through my skin which is creating this oily feeling on my skin. I am still walking around the block - we measured it 0.66 miles in 13 min 13 sec today - but depending on my head depends on how much I enjoy being outside. I am dieing to go for a run and it's only been 4 days since surgery - how am I going to last 3 more weeks. This unusually warm weather allows me to sit in the recliner and think "You should go outside" and I am just too fuzzy sometimes to make my move to go out. I am so grateful that friends and family have brought over food for us as I don't know how Joe would take care of me, take care of himself, and do everything else. I didn't expect to be this helpless but the anesthesia really did my body no good. Tomorrow the bandages come off and maybe I can start the range of motion activities. Maybe one drain will come out too which would speed up healing. It can only get better the further from surgery I get!