Suzy Q Homemaker

I see a trend.

I also don’t know what to write about other than the pain.  It has taken up most of my life these past couple of months.  Yesterday my physical therapist pushed me pretty hard.  There was one exercise I simply couldn’t  do because it hurt so bad.  I’m making steady progress but it is going so slowly that I’m getting frustrated.  The good part about PT is that the floor is slick enough I can work on pivots.  So long as my foot is right on the pivot point on the bottom of my shoe, my ankle doesn’t catch.  Just the slightest lip of traction sends a jolt of pain right through my foot.

The visible scars are healing well.  I have three.  The longest one is the scariest because you can see the holes where all the sutures were.  There are two small ones on either side of my foot.  I’m not sure but I think one is from the arthroscopic tenosynovectomy.  Doesn’t really matter.  Internally, I feel things starting to loosen up as my tendons are slowly learning how to do things again.  I suppose it helps to have a virtual obstacle course in my own house.  I’m also walking on uneven surfaces whenever I go down the driveway to the bus stop.  My foot gets a workout all day long.

I haven’t publicly admitted to being slightly depressed.  So I guess that’s what I’m doing now.  I hate that I don’t have the energy to do much more that sit with my foot propped up after getting the kids off to school.  Timothy has been watching more television than any toddler should be allowed to watch.  He gets food all over the place no matter how many times I make him take his snacks back into the kitchen.  The second I got up to go to the bathroom yesterday he took his spagettios into the living room and spilled most of them all over the carpet.  He also refuses to wear clothes for most of the day.  But that’s more amusing than anything.  And practical considering he is trying to make progress using the potty.

Wow I’m a Debbie Downer today.  I’m broken and I want to be fixed.  I miss that Zumba high I would get after class and the sweaty hugs from all my friends.  I know I’ll be back soon.  It just can’t seem to come soon enough.

Tell you what, though: I’m definitely looking forward to my first non-fat Pumpkin Spice Latte of the season. How did the weather know it was PSL time?  I might dig around in my cabinet and see if I have any cans of pumpkin left from last year.  I managed to make some really good imitation PSL in my crock pot last year.  So good.  On a similar note, the Samuel Adams Harvest collection is out and the pumpkin beer is really good.

Alright. I’m gonna see if I can muster up the energy to make myself some breakfast.

Happy Thursday, y’all.

{this is mostly for my dad who somehow missed my email and because I failed to call him back.  talking on the phone is really inconvenient lately.  also, i don’t like the phone anyway.}

Procedure #1: Athroscopic Synovectomy

The MRI done on my ankle showed excess fluid surrounding the joint (more than normal).  This is the major cause of my ankle impingement, decreased range of motion, and the pain/swelling that still occurs at the end of the day.  The synovectomy will remove the excess fluids around my tendons to free up the space and hopefully give me back the flexibility I originally had before my sprain.

Procedure #2: Modified Brostrom

I have ankle instability.  The joint itself is loose because of the number I did on my ankle during the sprain.  My tendons are all out of whack so if I don’t get this procedure done, I’ll most likely sprain it again and again.

A Broström repair is specifically for the tendons of the lateral ankle, that is, the tendons of the outer ankle near the foot. If you reach down and touch the protruding bone on the outside of the ankle, the tendons just between this bone and the foot stabilize the ankle. These lateral tendons-the anterior talofibular ligament (ATFL) and the calcaneofibular ligament (CFL)-are what keep the foot from rolling inward and the leg from rolling outward. These tendons are also the focus of the Broström procedure.

In the original Broström surgery, the anterior talofibular ligament (ATFL) was shortened and repaired and, in some patients, the calcaneofibular ligament (CFL) was also repaired. This shortening of the tendon holds the bones of the ankle joint in place similar to tightening down the straps on cargo hauled on a truck. The original series of patients in which this report was based was very successful-eighty percent of patients enjoyed success with the Broström repair.

In the 1980s, a surgeon by the name of Gould made alterations to the Broström surgery. This increased the success rate and expanded the number of patients that could be treated with this surgical approach. In the Gould-Broström surgery or the Modified Broström surgery, a tough, fibrous tissue called the extensor retinaculum is folded over the lateral ankle joint in order to further stabilize it. This approach and subsequent modifications like the Chrisman-Snook modification have been particularly successful in ballet dancers who suffer repeated stresses to the ankle joint and often require surgical ankle stabilization.

These are both outpatient surgical procedures so I won’t be in a hospital.  I will be put under general anesthesia and sent home once I’m stable.  I’ll hobble around on crutches until my follow up appointment where the doctor will make sure the incisions are healing.  Then I’ll be put in a walking cast and begin physical therapy a couple weeks later.  Blessedly, Jamie is home for the summer (hooray for teachers!) so he will be taking care of me.  I’ll miss my Zumba pals severely, but will stalk everyone online.

As always, food and visitors will be welcome while I recover. (Hint: http://mealtrain.com/)

One more week!  I’m losing sleep over this surgery.  The anxiety I feel is tangible.  But I can only hope that this will solve my ankle problems forever and I’ll have a long Zumba career once I’m fully recovered.

I’ve been avoiding this place.  And it’s my place!  I suppose I’ve been in some form of denial these past couple weeks.  Deep in the back of my mind I knew that if I wrote about it I would have to fully accept it.

I’m having surgery on my ankle on July 21.  And I’m not happy about it.

Spraining my ankle a couple months ago has turned out to be one of the worst things that ever happened to me both physically and financially.  We’ve racked up medical bills for x-rays, splints, physical therapy, and the latest is an MRI that we have to pay out of pocket because we haven’t met our deductible.  Fortunately, we can set up a payment plan which I can only guess is what we’ll have to do with the surgeon and anesthesiologist when it comes time for my procedures.

Finances aside, I am trying to maintain a positive outlook on my recovery.  I need to remember that it will be a time for healing, not a time for mourning.  I’m going to miss my friends. The majority of my friends are Zumba pals who I only see in class.  I consider them colleagues as well as friends even though we’ve never done anything aside from Zumba together.  Well, they have.  But they’ve known one another longer and live closer.  I’m way out in the country which leaves “dropping by” to the family that live next door.

I can say the same for church friends.  I envy the people who can drive two minutes to their friends houses and can get together at the drop of a hat.  That envy has been a hard pill to swallow for many years.  I have only had one friend since moving out here that would come by on a regular basis and whenever she didn’t have much to do.  I lost that friend, though.  She moved away and I was so hurt that I destroyed the friendship before she left.  Burnt bridge.  Not that I haven’t tried to find her. She was living in Louisiana before the hurricane so I don’t know where she went after that.  The last time I talked to her I think I was newly pregnant with Simon.  It was an awkward phone call.  My cell phone number hasn’t changed in eight years.  I hope she wrote it down.  I know how “losing” numbers is easily done whenever a new phone is acquired.

Oh, but I didn’t mean to make this a post about her.

This is about me!

My sister and life coach started a list of things to do while I’m a gimp and I’m going to take her up on it.

1. knit some shit!
2. like one of these: http://www.internet-d.com/2009/02/13/willie-warmer/
3. write a short story
4. draw a comic book about a man who goes to the moon only to discover that the dark side of the moon is a series of underground caves inhabited by people the government “deported”
5. write your own madlibs and then have your kids fill them out
6. crossword puzzles
7. play scrabble with me on your iphone
8. braid your hair into hundreds of tiny braids
9. http://theoatmeal.com/comics/bobcats_monday

See more Mommy Confessions and add your own at Life Starring the Kids and Me.

I haven’t done a Mommy Confession in a while, but this week made me realize I need to get something off my chest:

I feel guilty for being sick.

There. I said it.  Why do I, as a mother, feel so guilty when I can’t do what I’m here for?  Sure, I like the peace and quiet that comes with healing.  And it’s great not having to wipe anyone’s butt, clean cheese out of the carpet, or solve major crises between children.  There’s just this part of me that misses being able to snuggle, bounce, and pace the floor with Timothy.  I want to bend down to kiss boo-boos and buckle belts.  Mostly, I don’t want to see my husband overwhelmed like I usually am.

For these guilty feelings, I’m going to blame modern medicine.  If this had been a few decades ago, I for sure would still be in the hospital with nurses tending to my every need.  I’d have flowers by my bed and visitors bringing candies for me to nibble.  But Timothy would not be with me, so I also have to thank modern medicine for allowing me to come home so soon.  I just hate that I can only provide him with my milk and occasional cuddles right now.

Leave it to a mommy to feel guilty about getting her appendix out.  Hopefully, I can heal quickly and get back to doing what I do best…whatever that is.

What!  I know!

I had to get my appendix taken out.  How fucked up is that?  I’ve never had surgery before in my life so it was so surreal.  What to hear how it all got started?  Of course you do!

Yesterday, we all drove out to the Chancey Family Reunion (Jamie’s Gramma’s side of the family).  I actually really like this side of the family because they’re all gun-totin’, huntin’ motherfuckers and generally fun to be around.  It was this side of the family that really pulled through when Jamie’s dad passed three years ago.  They had tons of crazy stories about Jamie’s dad when they were all growing up, like the one about when they painted Granddad’s mule as a practical joke.  At the house where we partied yesterday, there were several animal heads on the walls and I was so scared they were going to start singing at us like they do at that restaurant we went to in Atlanta.

Anyway, as is always the case at these family reunions, there was much eating to be done, mostly on BBQ and fixin’s.  I didn’t eat anything that was strange, but about two hours after we got home, I was convinced that I had a really bad case of food poisoning.  I didn’t barf at that point or get the Hershey squirts, my stomach just hurt really bad like I had to fart the loudest of all the farts known to woman kind.  But I couldn’t fart!

I researched home remedies for stomach ache, subjected myself to a concoction of baking soda and warm water (GROSS BY THE WAY), and even tried lying down with a heating pad on my belly to try to ease the pain.  It kept getting worse, though, and I got to thinking that it might be a ruptured ovarian cyst again.  Remember when that happened right after I got pregnant with Timothy?  A lot of things went through my mind at that point:

-Oh shit, there’s no way I’m pregnant
-If I am pregnant, what the hell am I gonna do?
-Maybe this isn’t a cyst but I have appendicitis?
-If it’s a cyst then I will get better

For the next eight hours, I convinced myself that I had a cyst and that it had exploded all its disgusting scary fluids all over my vital organs–but that I was going to feel better soon just like I did last year.  This would have explained all the searing pain that I felt in my gut, right?  On top of that pain, I couldn’t lie down on my right side because of a serious ache in my right lower abdomen.  Surely, I thought this was the offending ovary and tried to ward it off with vicodin and percocet.  Please don’t get all up in arms.  We do co-sleep, and I do breastfeed.  I did not take unhealthy amounts of these medicines.  Jamie took over baby duty and made it his mission to get Timothy to sleep in the cradle most of the night.

The heavy pain killers did nothing to ease the pain, though.  Sure, once they kicked in, I was no longer able to writhe around in agony for an hour.  After a quick sleep of maybe fifteen minutes, though, the burning started again and I was moaning and groaning again for the next three hours until I could take another something.  Not even Percocet could touch this pain.  Thing is, I am the last person who wants to inconvenience anyone, so I was afraid to wake Jamie, let alone call someone at 3:00 in the morning because I had a belly ache.  The way I figured it, if I called anyone and it turned out to be some bad pork, I would be so embarrassed.

The good news was that I did not eat bad pork.  I had plenty of family to ask in order to rule out this theory: my own family, Jamie’s mom, uncle, gramma, brother, nephew.  None of them were sick, so I was like shit.  BAD NEWS.  I was convinced that it was, indeed, an ovarian cyst.

At 6:00 a.m., after hurling a few times from the pain and no longer being able to describe my agony without weeping tears of grief, Jamie packed all the kids in the van and drove me to the ER.  The first pain killers and nausea medicine worked for an hour max, after which I puked green bile into a tiny plastic tub.  Great visual, I know.  So they gave me something different which finally knocked me out.  Note that I had not slept at all for more than 15 minutes at a time before this.  Sleep was such a relief!  In between bouts of blessed drug-induced dreamland, nurses came in, CAT scans were done, doctors poked around at me, and it was finally determined that I had a “suspicious” appendix.

We didn’t have to wait for long for surgery, which was surprising and scary because I thought for sure I’d have a few hours to digest the fact that I was going to be put to sleep with tubes down my throat and scopes in my abdomen.  In all the excitement, I did make sure that I talked to the anesthesiologist directly and tell him to be extra careful of my vocal chords.  I didn’t want to end up all Julie Andrews.  My throat is irritated, but I was told that it would be just from the tube being there and would feel better soon.

While I’m grateful that there was something seriously wrong with me, I’m sad that I can’t be with my family right now.  Yes, I enjoy the peace and quiet, but my heart goes out to Timothy.  In these short four months, I never built up a freezer stash, or even considered it.  No, I’ve only pumped out of necessity for choir rehearsals and the occasional night out with Jamie.  Jamie had to pick up some of the F-word and Timothy decided he’d rather suck his thumb than hav any of that shit.  The hospital won’t give me a breast pump unless I have doctor’s orders, so I have to just wait myself.  I’ll express into a cup or something so my supply won’t go down too much.  One of the anesthesia medicines has a 10-hour window for  excretion into my milk, so if I can tough it out until then, we’ll be golden.

My mom has Timothy tonight.  She told Jamie that Timothy will either be pissed off at home or at her house, but he’s got three other people to worry about.  What a saint.

So here I sit, sipping on clear fluids and eating jello while looking all sexy in my fancy anti-blood clot sox.  At least that pesky little appendix won’t bother me anymore, right?