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surgery january 23 2001 |
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I had surgery to repair my poor busted wrist. I was in hospital on
morphine drip for two days. Because I had to wait four weeks (xmas, new
years, ces, & namm shows got in the way) before surgery the pieces
had started to get reclaimed and were turning to mush. Like "wet
cracker jacks" said my doc. He had a hard time being able to screw
things together. He used cadaver bone and fake made-from-coral-reef
synthetic bone to create a framework for my bone to grow back
over.
The xrays didn't show all the pieces. The CT scans sure did. The head of my radius was shattered into at least 15 pieces in the joint. Nasty. The ulna styloid process was also busted off. Anyway, I have a whole home depot hardware isle screwed into my bones and stuff sticking out my skin. Robocop meets the Tube Queen. I have to keep that arm elevated above my heart to reduce swelling. my fave painkillers are vicodines. I need 20-25 mg to kill the pain. Luckily I stay pretty straight on the stuff. Mentally this much vicodine hits me like one or two beers. Not bad. Some folks get wigged on the stuff though... The morphine drip in the hospital was awful. Given the choice I should have just been sent home on vics. Morphine made me itch and repressed my respiratory system so I'd go to sleep for no more than ten minutes at a time and the wake up with apnea GASP! Don't forget to breathe! Then I'd look at the clock and damn I'd only been asleep for ten minutes but it felt like hours. Sheeze. That and the knee surgery lady yelping and the old snoring lady and the nurses coming in every half hour to take vital stats... I should have just gone home on vicodines... |
Mom flies to Chino to play nurse for a few weeks. |
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CT scans reveal lotsa pieces. |
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Dec. 19, 2000 post-reduction in emergency room. |
Jan. 30, 2001 post-surgery. Notice correct repositioning of hand. See lateral view here. |
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Wow. Look at all that blood! Plaster cast coming off one week after surgery. Blood soaked into the plaster.
Nurse Berta and Dr. Husain removing the bloody cast.
Those little plastic blue things cover the ends of the pins
sticking out my skin. Ouch!
Yeah doc took one out that was poking all the way through to my thumb tendon. I'll have some cool scars from all this mess.
The CLAW: Nurse Berta taking out the stitches 2/6/2001. Pins came out 2/13.
Here's my best fist 2/13/2001
I now model for you a sporty red shorty cast. I have weeks more of casts while the bones heal.... then months of physical therapy to regain what strength I'll be able to regain. Then I'll get hit with arthritis in the wrist. What a fuckup. A silly fall off a 4' wall.... There's a major split in the cartilage of the radius which is of some concern. I ain't never gonna have *full* function of the left wrist again, but at least my fingers all work well, and my recovery goal is to be able to pull the clutch on my H-D again... it's a goal.
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SURGERY |
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