You might’ve heard that I had foot surgery and are asking “How are you doing?”
Short answer: I’m doing great! After about 1.5 weeks of bed rest with an elevated leg, I can walk around fairly normally and am getting my stitches out on Monday.
SUPER LONG answer:
MONTHS AGO…
I noticed I had a purplish bump on the right side of my big toe on my left foot. I thought I had just bumped it against something while wearing open toed heels so I thought it was just a bruise on the corner of my toe.
MONTHS LATER…
The bump on my toe got bigger and was now pushing my toenail upward and towards the side so that the left side of my toenail was starting to become ingrown. I began to hurt so much that wearing heels or running of any kind would leave me limping a few steps later. I told my mom about it but I couldn’t see the doctor since I was still at school.
SUMMER
My parents nagged me so much until I finally went to my regular doctor to get it checked. He gave me a referral to a podiatrist. On the first visit to the podiatrist he said that I would need to get x-rays and perhaps even a biopsy of the tissue underneath my toe. Right after my doctor’s appointment I went to get x-rays on my foot. The radiology technician said it was pretty cool and asked me how I did it. I just said ” I don’t know” haha.
On the second visit, this Indian resident brought me into the check up room and looked at the x-rays. He was good looking and dressed well but his kind of awkward movements around the office tipped off that he was just a first year resident. He looked at my x-rays and literally said “COOOOOOOOL” and I said “I know rah?” hahaha. Then he asked if he could touch it. I was all for it and was like SURE!
The doctor finally diagnosed it to be a bone spur growing from my left distal phalanx. He said he would have to surgically remove it by cutting a flap of my skin open and lifting up my toenail. An incision into the bone would be made and he would take a rotary like saw to rub the bone down to it’s normal position. Then he would stitch me up and I would need a few weeks to recover and about two weeks to put on a sneaker and walk fairly normally.
He said it was either because I banged my foot somehow and my body thought I broke a bone so it signals my growth plate to grow new bone or it just started growing for no reason - the first was more probable in my case.
Monday, July 13th, 2009 - Pre-Op Examination at the Hospital
I filled out this form that was four pages long both front and back full of questions about any medical ailments I had. I spent the whole time checking “no” in every box. It’s a reminder that good health shouldn’t be taken for granted.
I was then called back and greeted by an nurse practitioner who was Indian. She was really sweet and explained everything about the surgery to me. The technician entered and started to measure my blood pressure and was going to draw my blood. All the while, the NP was still asking me all thiese crazy questions. The tech asks me if I’m allergic to latex or if I’m afraid of needles and I say “Nope, I like to watch”. To which the NP replied, “You like to watch?” with a smile. “Yup, I think it’s cool” I say in reply and they both look at me at laugh. haha.
When the tech started tying the rubberband to my arm, I told her most ppl have a really hard time finding my veins. After checking both my arms for 5 mins. she was like “Wow you’re really not kidding” Then she asked me how other people find my veins for blood tests and I told her this nurse at the other hospital does it really well somehow but my regular doctor usually just goes through the hand. She manages to find one and out comes the blood. Coool.
The NP finishes my check up and gives me instructions on how to wash myself before the surgery. Now I’m all prepped to go. Whoot whoot.
Thursday, July 16th, 2009 - Day of Surgery
7:45am My mom wakes me up by calling our house phone since she’s commuting to work. She tells me I should be awake and my dad should be awake to prepare to go to the hospital. She tells me to be brave but I’m not the one who’s scared haha.
8:00-8:30am Roll out of bed, take a shower using the antibacterial soap they give me. Weird, it’s red but it smells good so whatever.
8:45am Wash my foot again with the second packet of antibacterial soap they order me to use right before we leave for the hospital in the bathroom sink. This takes more skills than you think.
9:00am Trying to find a parking space at the hospital
9:15am Finally in the waiting room of the building for Ambulatory Surgery
9:30am Get called into the office to get information confirmed about me and to get my cool hospital ID bracelet
9:50am We finally walked into the changing/pre-op waiting room. I get to pee in a cup for urine testing and change into 2 hospital gowns. The nurse repeatedly tells me to take off EVERYTHING before I change and I’m thinking “Yeahh I gotcha” She tells me that there will be a nurse especially responsible for me in the recovery room.
10:00am Finished changing and I have one gown on frontwards and the other one on like a robe so my butt doesn’t make any surprise showings. Surprise! Sit around and wait some more.
10:05am An anesthesiologist comes and says the anesthesiologist for my operation is still in the OR and he’ll just be putting my IV in for me first. He shoots me with Novacaine in my hand using a very small syringe to numb my hand before putting in the IV catheter. DUDE, that IV catheter was HUGE but I couldn’t feel a thing since they numbed my hand. He popped it in there real good, connected the saline solution and taped it all tight onto my hand.
10:10am My dad comes into wait with me in awkward silence with occasional conversation but we’re too busy listening to the other people getting prepped for their surgeries. There’s this kid who gets the area next to me, he’s only four according to the birthday we have to repeat constantly to every nurse and doctor who talks to us. He gets to have a teddy bear scrub cap and he gets carried into the OR room. Going to the doctor when you’re older is no fun, I don’t get treats. There’s an old lady in the isolation room next to me from a nursing home and they can’t figure out whether her pacemaker has a defibrilator. I hear them in conversation with the nursing home but the nursing home doesn’t know either so they ask the patient and she switches from yes to no everytime they ask her. The nurse looks at us, smiles and shruggs her shoulders after she closes to iso room door knowing that we’ve heard everything. It always makes me sad to see elderly people with no family around to care for them.
10:15am A second year resident comes to fill out more forms in my chart and explain the surgery to me. He’s this tubby Latino guy who seems to have something wrong with his left eye. Interesting…ok, not really but I’m bored of watching the saline drip and he gives me something new to look at.
10:50am The doctor finally comes out to greet me and the anesthesiologist is there too. The podiatrist starts drawing incision points on my foot and then scribbles what I think are his initials. The anesthesiologist then tells me about how they’ll make me sleepy with Propofol and then use local anesthetics. He explains how he’ll turn off the drip a few minutes beforehand when the doctor is finishing up on bandaging me and how I’ll wake up still in the OR but the operation will be completely done by then. Then more watching them filling out forms on my chart.
11:00am I finally get escorted to the OR room by a nurse. It’s a huge room with a ton of people. By my count, there were two nurses, three residents, one anesthesiologist, and one surgeon. One of the residents takes off the gown that covers my butt and tells me to sit so my feet are right at the edge of the table. I hop on and do what I’m told. I can’t see really well since they made me take off my glasses but I know there’s alot going on. I’m lying down on the table and they have you stretch your arms out like on a cross on the arm rests sticking out. After I’ve laid down in the right position. They strap my waist with a black belt, kind of like a seat belt. Then a nurse puts this cold gel pad attached to a blue tube onto my right thigh. She tells me this beforehand and says it won’t hurt but it’ll be cold. (I’m still sort of a kid). At this point the anesthesiologist is putting these sticky pads on me with metal nodes which he connects to the machine that checks my heart rate. One on each side of my shoulder, on my biceps and two on my upper chest and one in the middle of my chest. Another nurse puts a blood pressure cuff on me and the anesthesiologist puts the finger thing on me and begins to inject Propofiol into my IV. He says I’ll have good dreams and people tend to snore during it. I give him a polite chuckle. But wait! I don’t want to go to bed just yet so I try to speed up my breathing to keep me awake longer but to no avail I’m out like a light in a few seconds.
12:00pm I wake up to the sound of them pulling up the sheets and the anesthesiologist supporting my head when they do a three count and lift me over to the stretcher from the operating table. I’m still pretty sleepy but I know what’s going on. They roll me out into the recovery room. A nurse puts her hand on my upper arm and gives me a gentle squeeze. She says I’m freezing and she’ll get blankets to get my temperature up. I don’t feel cold at all but I’m too sleepy to decline such an offer. As they roll me into my spot in the recovery area, she tells me the surgery went well and if I’m doing ok. I tell her it was a good catnap. As promised, she puts at least 5 heavy warmed blankets over my body and 1 warmed blanket over my head. I’m pretty sure I look ridiculous right now but who cares, I’m sleepy. She’s about to give me an oxygen mask but the anesthesiologist says I’m in good health and I don’t need extra oxygen so she doesn’t give it to me. One of the nurses asks me if I can move my toes on the foot I had surgery on. I comply happily. The same nurse attaches me to the heart monitoring machines in the recovery room and puts a new blood pressure cuff on me. She tells me the cuff will inflate every 15 minutes and not to worry. I see the anesthesiologist is filling forms on the left hand side of my bedside while he’s talking to the nurse who is by my arm on my right hand side. It’s his birthday and she’s commenting on how young he looks. She looks at me and says he looks young for his age right? I’m still drowsy but I say, No need for Botox shots yet! hahaha. He laughs and thanks me for my generous compliment. The nurse then says I can go to sleep but I want to know what’s going on so I stay awake with my eyes closed. I hear the nurses talking about my chart and ask me if I got a prescription for painkillers, I answer yes the doctor gave it to me during the last office vist, Percocet! I say. She says good and apologizes for waking me. I say it’s ok. I close my eyes because my eyes are so dry and my lips are kind of dry but I have to pee. I hear the nurses’ conversation and my recovery room nurse was taking a lunch break so another nurse takes over for her. I fall asleep again.
12:15pm The cuff inflates again so I know it’s 12:15 but I’m not ready to wake up.
12:30pm Still napping but really just listening to conversations around me and the two new people who are rolled into the spaces next to me. The woman to my right seems to have had some surgery involving her belly button and a surgical camera. She keeps comparing it to her C-section. She recites her birthday, she’s in her mid-40’s. The curtain is drawn on that side so I don’t know what she looks like but from the sounds of it she’s a standard Italian SI mom, she’s super talkative with the nurses and doesn’t even go back to sleep. The woman on my left has definitely had more serious surgery and when the nurse asks how she feels she says she feels like she’s going to throw up. I’m thinking, oh boy she’s definitely going to throw up but they give her meds to relieve the feeling of nausea. The doctors surround her and talk about something on her eye that they covered that was a previously sustained injury. The nurse asks her who is coming to pick her up and she says her boyfriend is suppose to pick her up. I take a peek and see she’s a heavyset Latino lady with tatoos on her arms who is probably in her mid to late twenties.
12:45pm I’m really bored now but I keep my eyes closed because the nurse isn’t there and I feel awkward just keeping my eyes open. Now I’m focused in on the heart rate monitor that beeps. This lady’s heart monitor beeps faster than mine and it’s annoying b/c it’s her beep then mine RIGHT after it. So what else to do but try and trick the heart monitors while I’m bored. I tap my thumb quickly to try and psyche out the monitor connected to it. Then I try to breathe much much faster to change the sticky pads on my chest. No change.
1:00pm The nurse finally comes and asks me how I’m doing. I say I’m doing good and she puts my bed up into a sitting position. I still can’t see since I don’t have my glasses so I just look at whatever. I’m trying to scratch my eye since it itches but there are so many blankets on me that I can’t manage to get my arm out of the blankets to do so. She asks if I want cranberry juice, apple juice or water to drink and I asked for apple. She gives me those small plastic cups on apple juice covered over in foil with a bendy straw stuck in it. Kind of like the water you get in an airplane meal. The apple juice was really good b/c I was thirsty as heck. But I still really have to pee.
1:05pm My dad arrives in the recovery room and I’m just busy sipping on my apple juice. I ask for my glasses and I finally can see things. The nurse, Diane, gives my dad some post-op instructions and tells him to sign the bottom
1:15pm The nurse fits me with a surgical boot and goes to get my clothes. When she returns with my clothes she says my dad can go down and get the car. My dad leaves to get the car while I change. She removes all the extra blankets on me, removes the blood pressure cuff, the finger thing, and the stickies on my chest, lowers the bed and removes the handrail on one side. She pushes the chair closer to me so I can hold something while I’m changing. Then she pulls the curtain to let me change. I finish changing and at this point I’m just looking at all the medical equipment behind me cool looking stuff. Alot of life resucitation equipment from what I can tell. I get a chance to look at how they bandaged my foot since I couldn’t see when I was on the bed. Even though my surgery was mostly in the big toe area, the doctor wrapped my entire foot until about 3 inches above my ankle. It was composed of a heavy gauze wrapped over by a self sticking ACE bandage. I didn’t feel any pain since the anesthesia was still working.
1:45pm I’m done changing by now but I don’t know whether I should peek my head out of the curtain so I just sit there waiting for the nurse to come back. She asks if I’m done changing on the other side of the curtain, I say yes and she pulls open the curtains and brings this huge wheelchair over. I sit in it and she rolls me near the front of the room to wait for one of the other people to bring me down to my van. I crack jokes with the lady rolling me down about weighing ourselves. We go down in the elevator and she helps me into the car.
2:00pm My little brother stares at me like I’m some alien and then laughs at me. Then he complains that he sat in the waiting room for hours doing nothing but skimming through his summer reading. To his credit, he did wait in the waiting room from 9am until 2pm. We drive to Wendy’s because we’re all starving and I order for us. Then I run to the bathroom b/c I need to pee like a mad woman. I come out and eat lunch with my brother and my dad. It was good stuff and we got a Frosty, something I haven’t had since my high school days.
2:30pm My dad says we should go put my prescription in so I can get my pain killers before my anesthesia wears off. We drive to CVS and my dad makes us stay in the car while he runs in to get the prescription filled. I wondered why I needed to pee so bad since I didn’t have anything to drink the entire day except for that tiny cup of apple juice. Then I remembered that I was already halfway through the bag of saline when I finally walked into the OR and they changed my bag of saline when I was in the recovery room which means I had at LEAST three or four bags of the stuff. He comes back and says they’re out of my prescription so we drive to the Rite Aid next door. He comes back again empty handed b/c he says I need my other insurance card. I mistakenly tell him that’s the only one I have and he goes back to tell the pharmicist at Rite Aid. The pharmicist says he’ll try but it might not go through.
2:45pm We arrive at home and I get myself set up in the smaller room with my laptop. I see my mom called my cell phone four times and the house phone 3 times. The phone rings again and I pick up. I tell her everything went well but I’m looking for my other insurance card. I dig through a ton of stuff while she’s on the phone to finally find it. I leave it on the table for my dad, take off my boot and hop into bed. I keep my leg elevated above my heart per doctor’s orders and take a lie down.
4:30pm My dad goes to get the prescription from Rite Aid
5:30pm He comes back with my painkillers and I take one even though the anesthesia hasn’t worn off yet.
7:30pm Surprisingly, the anesthesia hasn’t worn off yet so I manage to walk down a long hallway and a flight of stairs to my kitchen to eat dinner with my family.
8:30pm My mom comes in and asks me how I’m doing. I say I’m ok and she checks out the new bandage I’m sporting.
9:00pm I take two pain pills b/c the pain is starting to kick in and it’s pretty not fun.
9:15pm I get extremely dizzy sitting up and I have to lie down to make the world stop spinning so quickly. I fall asleep right afterward.
My mom decides that she should sleep next to me for the next few nights since I can’t get up and get things for myself. (Moms are awesome)
*I realize that I should’ve asked for crutches at the hospital even though the doctor said I didn’t need them unless I wanted them because going to the bathroom was like climbing Mt. Everest.
Friday, July 17th, 2009 - Post-Op DAY 1
Surprisingly, I was able to sleep throughout the whole night without taking any additional painkillers. I woke up around 8am to some pain so I took so pain pills at 9am but I was supposed to start work remotely at 10am from home. No such luck. I was so drowsy that I worked for 15 min before I fell asleep with my laptop still on my good leg and I only woke up to my dad taking my computer away. I couldn’t stay awake long enough to tell him that I needed to work. The sad thing was that I get half days on Friday so I only needed to work from 10am-12:30pm but I woke up at 1pm only to take another round of painkillers and fell asleep halfway through an episode of the Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien.
My meals were brought to me bedside because I couldn’t bear to do so much walking. Nicee.
Saturday, July 18th, 2009 - Post-Op DAY 2
I took painkillers when I woke up and my day was just a blur of sleeping and waking up only to eat, take more painkillers or go to the bathroom. All I recall is that my brother and Dad installed the AC’s. I asked my parents for JELLO and I got JELLOOO!
Sunday, July 19th, 2009 - Post-Op DAY 3
I woke up in the middle of the night in pain but I didn’t have any water left to swallow my painkillers. I looked over to my mom who was snoring in LALA land. I didn’t want to wake her up because she doesn’t get enough sleep in the first place so I bit the bullet and tried to fall asleep in pain.
Morning came: I hobbled to my way to my brother’s room for a change of pace. Both my mom and my brother wanted to “watch me” so they couldn’t go to church. My dad made my brother stay with me and took my mom to church. My brother went straight into playing computer games as usual. I was feeling alot better and decided that if I had any pain I would try and stick it out before reverting to the painkillers. Frankly, I was sick of sleeping. I hadn’t taken a shower since the surgery so I decided it was time for a shower. Since I couldn’t get my bandages wet, I tried to wash my hair by sitting on a stool and leaning my head over the tub. My brother helped me by turning on the shower head and taking it off the holder so I could wash my hair. My hair got so heavy when it was wet that it became a strain on my neck. I hollered for my brother to hold the shower head nozzle away from me so I could shampoo my hair. Then he helped me rinse, my hair wasn’t completely clean but at least I got all the shampoo out. I went on my merry way to wash my body using a washcloth. I was clean…very refreshing.
Monday, July 20th, 2009 - Post-Op DAY 4
I decided to sleep in my brother’s bed overnight which was a BAD IDEA because I woke up at four in the morning writhing in pain because my brother kicked my injured foot in his sleep. I wanted to give that boy a serious purple nurple but I only had enough energy to grab my painkillers and swallow another round.
I was able to get some work done before I left to get rebandaged by the doctor.
When we arrived at the doctor’s, the waiting room was almost completely full. There was only one seat left for me so my dad went outside and waited in the car. He was probably relieved that he could wait in the car haha. I got called in by Amir, another resident doctor. He carefully peeled off my bandages to reveal this really gross purple and toe with stitches and a bruised foot overall.
I did some waiting in the check up room and the doctor came to look at how my wound was healing. He started to rebandage my toe when a middle age lady starts causing a ruckus about how her 90 something year old parents have been waiting in the other check-up room for 35 minutes and that they’re too to wait for so long. She said how people should be seen according to what time they arrive and that we were seen before her parents even though we came later. One of the nurses tried to tell her that the doctor sees cases according to emergency status but she wouldn’t relent and said none of us were emergencies. The doctor stop my bandaging midway to tell her maybe she should go somewhere else. This stifled her complaints and he quickly returned to my bandaging process. He gave me a “ouch” look and then a smile about the whole awkward moment that just occurred. I just chuckled and said “all in the day of a doctor”.
The best part was that I could finally scratch my ankle! HALLEUJAH!
When my mom got home from work that night I told her I made a poopy! I hadn’t pooped since the morning of the surgery which is really odd b/c I poop every morning like clockwork. (The painkillers give me major constipation)
FAST FORWARD
Friday, July 24th, 2009 - Post-Op DAY 8
I haven’t taken any painkillers since Monday and walking is alot less painful. It’s starting to feel less like my sutures are keep the flesh on my foot together and more like my regular foot. I’ve got another check up on Monday to remove my sutures. FUN!
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- Propofol works like a charm
- I don’t get euphoria when taking narcotic drugs, just sleepy.
- After being in the waiting rooms of hospitals and doctor’s at least once every week and filling out crazy forms, you begin to appreciate your good health. It is a blessing to be able to run about without any major pain. We don’t get to see many serious physical ailments in our day to day life and when we do, it is often too late for you to change. Take care of your life and enjoy it.
- Showering is a blessing. When your body is physically clean, your mind is more focused and perky. I haven’t showered since Sunday and I’m feeling pretty gross.
- It is a true blessing to have family and friends to sacrificially take care of me. There were always constant reminders from the old lady in the isolation chamber before my surgery to the Latino woman next to me in the recovery room who had no one to pick her up that having people who love you and care for you is a huge blessing that we often don’t notice. It is an awful existence to be utterly alone.
- God is always faithful.
