Snow what?

Welcome to our Second Annual Random Eye Infection Week! This year with added "oh, well it could be related to your shingles" action, and, for the very first time, now including special "It's the 'Snowmageddon' so you must a) come in every single day and b) find an open pharmacy that has this drug that no pharmacist has ever heard of before" complications!

Woo freaking hoo!

I hate having to put yet another sad depressing poor-me post up, but this is where I am right now, so what good is a personal blog if I can't complain about it a little bit? On the upside, I actually got to go out in the snow, which I haven't done in forever, and that means that I - in stark contrast to just about everybody else in the entire Northeast - really enjoyed being out in the snow. I always did: it's got a kind of a hushed, secretive aspect to it that I appreciate. It feels like the rest of the world is as isolated as I often am, and, in a weird way, that makes me feel more connected to everybody. It's difficult for me to get any place, what with the wheels and all, but sitting outside for a little bit this morning while we waited to see if yet another drugstore would have the eye drops I needed (nope) was a nice change of pace for me. The entirety of Massachusetts may be sick to death of the snow - which is too bad because we're supposed to get another foot or so before this storm moves out on Thursday - but I liked it.

Sure, there are some real drawbacks - I miss my days with LilGirl - this is our third day without her in a row, and Thursday ain't looking too good either - but since I can only half see things anyways, maybe that's for the best. SisterS, who lives in New Hampshire, in the middle of nowhere, was complaining about the snow up there today, on her Facebook page. But at least they've got lots of places to put it... around here, the streets have gone from kind of narrow to simply straw-like; there's not a whole lot of maneuverability on the roads. Which works out ok for me, most of the time, because I don't have to go anywhere. Until I have to go somewhere, like this morning's eye doctor's appointment, in which case I feel really bad for everybody who's got to dig me out and drive me down there, even if, on a good day, the office is less than 3 minutes from here. (Today it took us 15.)

I tried to take a picture for you guys of the beautiful snowfall and all of that, but I have one eye that I can't open and one that was still recovering from having bright lights shone in it repeatedly (Off topic a bit here - does that make anybody else want to fall asleep? As soon as she started shining those lights in my eyes, I was so drowsy. Note to self: maybe the cure for your insomnia is bright lights in your eyes), so I didn't wind up with the clearest picture. None the less, it'll give you some idea of how things look around here, I hope.




If you're having some snow, I hope you're enjoying it. Or, at the very least, having a cup of hot chocolate because of it. (mm... marshmallows...)

33 days post op,

and I am starting to finally feel like I might actually be a human-type person again. I'm not springing into cartwheels, or feeling the magical special cure that I had, deep down, obviously, been hoping for, but I no longer feel as if someone decided to whack me in the face with a mallet, while at the same time letting some sort of giant lizard claw its way down my throat. You can imagine that this is a bit of a relief.

I managed to catch, in these 33 days, at least one sinus infection (either inadequately quashed the first time and capable of rebounding, or a party-bug who invited a friend over; impossible to tell) and a case of thrush that made me want to rip my tongue out and use sandpaper on it. Thankfully, the thrush has cleared up, and the infection(s) are on their way out as well. (She says, trying not to jinx herself this time.)

So I'm going to talk a little bit about a couple of things now, and I'm going to warn you that the very first thing I'm going to talk about is exceedingly gross. As in "Are you really about to tell the internet that...?" level gross. But here is where I talk about things that I can't discuss in real life/make my family understand, and so, you lovelies have a bit of forewarning that you might want to skip item #1.

Item #1: Every week since my surgery (and twice the first week immediately following the surgery), I have had to go to the ENT surgeon for a check in. During these check ins, he pokes at my face a little bit, looks up my nose, down my throat and in my ears - in short, all the things you expect the ENT to do. And then things take a dramatic turn for the worse, and I break out in the kind of flop sweat usually only experienced when the dentist turns around with that huge needle in his hand. Luckily, the ENT does not start poking me with needles, but, rather unluckily, he instead decides that now is the time to insert things up my nose.

UP my NOSE, people. My very tender, and much abused nose. First, he sprays a little numbing stuff, which is about as useful as tap water would be, and then he uses a long thin strip of cotton ball, doused in decongestants, and his looooooong metal pliers, and he stuffs the cotton ball up my nostrils. He leaves it there for a minute and disappears behind me, while the medicinal tasting decongestant drips out of my nose and down the back of my throat.

The first time this happened, I was a little bit shocked: I assumed that when he said he was going to use a decongestant, that he meant a nasal spray. And that was going to be bad enough, because my nose was already swollen and sore, and now he was going to spray stuff up there? Bah. So I was sitting there all shocked and drippy, waiting for him to take this gross stuff out of my nose when, all of the sudden, there's an unexpected noise behind me. A mechanical noise, a little hum that is entirely out of place. And then things go way downhill, way too fast.

Because the mechanical humming noise is coming from some sort of vacuum, not unlike an elongated, metal version of the doohickey that the dentist uses to suck spit out of your mouth during a cleaning, and the ENT is telling me that this damn thing is going up my nose to "clean out what's left."

Are you freaking kidding me??? This was not mentioned during the numerous pre-op discussions we had about surgery and aftercare; This was not mentioned in my aftercare instructions; This was not mentioned anytime during the previous 15 minutes I've been sitting here talking to you: NOW you are telling me, as you approach me with that goddamn thing, that you're going to suck stuff out of my sinuses? I am so not on board with this.

But, what choice did I have, really, since this is part of the after care - I'm going to go through all the pain of the surgery, and then have it be a waste because I didn't do the necessary follow up? I don't think so. How bad can it be, really?

Oh, it can be really, really bad. *I should put a disclaimer here that this was my experience, and the whole sucking out of sinuses might not be a big deal for other people: I can't really say. Except for another guy who was having the same surgery/procedure done on my first post-op visit who yelled really loudly from inside the room while I was waiting for my appointment, so he obviously didn't enjoy it either (if only I had known why he was yelling before I went in...). I can only say, that for me? It was a gigantic deal. Not just because I was already in a lot of pain, although I was, but because, to me, it feels like drowning.

The sensation of not being able to breathe through your noise is bad enough, but you add in the forced pressure of that little vacuum, and the fact that you can feel it not just in your sinuses and nose, but in the back of your throat? And it adds up to a completely overwhelming and painful experience. I cried, the first time, and (Mum told me later) was also, from the waiting room, quite audible in my distress. I cried the second and third times too, and I'm not even the tiniest bit embarrassed by that fact. (It was a little bit less traumatic the last two times, thankfully.)

It hurt, and I am already hurting enough.

But it was the panic that it caused me that was most distressing... the doctor actually told me to "breathe through your mouth" (as if I had any other options) "or you're going to have a panic attack". That is because you are cutting off my air supply, and my body, for some reason thinks this is a bad idea. He also appeared shocked that I would find this so upsetting, only adding to my impression of him as completely out of touch with reality ("7-10 days and you'll be good as new!"; "No patient has ever had a sinus infection so soon, post-op: are you sure that's what it is?"; "You should chew more gum to help stretch those muscles, did I forget to tell you that?").

The only good news is that I now don't have to go back for another month, baring additional issues, and that time, he may not even have to use the vacuum. Fingers crossed! End of totally disgusting and barbaric Item #1.

Item #2 - I have missed out on a lot of things in the course of the 33 days: a cousin's wedding (which apparently included much celebrating), my birthday, a college reunion I wasn't going to go to anyways (but I would've liked to make the my-girls dinner pre-party), Lil Girl's end of school celebration, No Longer Youngest Nephew's school report (which I have never been invited to before :( ), and more than a bit of family drama that I'm still trying to catch up with. Everybody in my family had issues during this period, and I feel like I am a page or two behind on the stories, which is a feeling I truly hate. I also feel like this lag in my understanding of things has caused new drama, which I have to figure out how to fix, but can't till my brain is back at full power, which sucks. This is one of the things I tried to factor into my decision to have the surgery - knowing I would be so far behind/out of the loop, and trying to make it be ok, but I absolutely hate not being there for people when they need me (and we can talk about why I don't expect people to show up for me when I need them some other time, thank you very much). It has been hard, playing catch up, apologizing for the gaps and lapses, the gaffs and digs I've delivered unknowingly. Or trying to, at least.

But at the same time, I'm trying to be realistic about this - I had the right to do something that, hopefully, is going to lead to a real improvement in my health. It wasn't selfish to do this, even if I don't get the outcome I wanted. Or, if it is selfish, only in a good way. This is one of the things I have decided to work on, about myself - that I don't cut myself enough slack about important things. Yes, it is vital to be someone that my family and friends can depend on, and it stinks when my health issues get in the way of that. But that doesn't mean it's not something that people should try to understand, and that doesn't mean it's something I should feel badly for (at least, not excessively so). So, I'm working on that. It is much harder done than said.

Item #3 I would just like to state, for the record, that I am through thinking about my weight. Because I ate nothing but soup broth and mashed potatoes, slush, bananas, and jello for, let's say 27 days, discounting the first two days (when I could only eat slush), and the last four (when I've been expanding into other, actually needs to be chewed types of food). And I think I gained weight, to be honest with you. So if I can't lose weight on three weeks of vegetarian, non-chewable mush, then I'm just not going to lose weight. So I better figure out how to like the size I am right now.

I think that's about it for now, before this post turns into a novel. I'll be back pretty soon (certainly more frequently now), and we'll talk about something completely different, won't that be nice? Please also know that I am, slowly but surely, catching up with my Google Reader (yay: The Collective is back in my Google Reader!), but it's taking me a while. If you have clicked through a new comment of mine on an older post of yours, welcome! Sorry to be so late to the party! I'm getting there.

Well, so far,

this operation has not been as big a success in the whole "preventing multiple infections" genre as I might have hoped. I'm on my way back from my second infection since the surgeries, all though I will say that (so far, knock wood, cross fingers) the duration of this infection is hopefully of an atypically (for me) short duration. That is the hope anyways.

I've been pissed off because I told Lil Girl's parents to keep her at home last week when she was sick (which I hate to do) and I specifically did not go to my cousin's wedding this weekend because I was trying to take the safe road and keep myself away from germs and rest up and recover. And then, by Monday morning, I was sick as a dog. Again. So it really didn't matter that I didn't do the things I wanted to do; I got sick anyways. Realistically, I know that there wasn't a connection, but still: pissed.

I am recovering, though: my voice was coming back before I coughed it away this week, and my face wasn't as painful as it had been (before it took on it's new infection throbbing). One strangely unanticipated side effect from my septum repair is this odd tingling in my front teeth/roof of my mouth. The doc says this is because the nerve that runs there begins at the base of my nose, and I say it would've been nice if he had mentioned that before the surgery, but since it's supposed to go away, I'll just keep spraying Chloraseptic on it and drooling like I just got "woot canal".

I can't really judge how healed I might be, what with the new issues, but I'm working through a course of antibiotics (and got back from yet another horrid visit with the surgeon), so hopefully, by this time next week I'll be doing better and will be able to say "I'm healing" without all the caveats. Thanks for your support, in the meantime.

I do have a lot of things I want to do this summer, so keep fingers crossed that this is the END of summer infections for me.

It will come as no surprise

to anybody that I am sick.

I was going to say "really, really sick", but I think I could knock it down to just one "really" at this point, because I am fever free(ish), and that is usually a turning point for me.

Just like last year, I went and got myself sick right after Christmas. Actually, this year, it's been a little bit different for a few reasons (like the fact that I am actually writing this while it is still December, rather than the middle of January), but basically, it went like this:

1. I realized I was getting sick as we were going through the frenzy of last week's Christmas preparations, and I started taking my back up antibiotics as soon as that happened.
   
2. Unfortunately, I still had a million and a half cookies to bake, and a sick Lil Girl to entertain, and Mum who was sick (and had left all her Xmas shopping til the last minute as usual), and therefore I had to do things like manage to get my own food and essentials like that, and so I couldn't really just rest and try to head things off as much as I might like to have.
3. On Christmas, I wore myself out even more. Mostly having fun, although there was some managing of things that I really should've just let go mixed in there too. But still, mostly having fun.
   
4. By dessert time on Christmas day, my throat was scratchy, my head was stuffy, and I knew I was getting a fever. I started coughing, but everybody was coughing, so no big deal, right?
5. Wrong. Big deal. By three in the morning, after everyone has finally given up on the Beatles Band Hero, and either gone home or gone to bed, I knew I was in serious trouble. I was having trouble breathing, my throat was so swollen; I could barely move because of the damn fever; and Imight be wrong, but I think someone must have transformed my room into a sauna as a surprise Christmas present for me.
   
6. Saturday and Sunday disappeared into a fevered fog. I have vague recollections of chills so violent I required four blankets (which all hurt: thanks FM!) & two heating pads, and the fact that there seemed to be an endless cycle of having to drink, having to get up to pee, and crying because it hurt so bad. I gave up on watching movies, and spent a lot of time staring into the window lights for no damn reason except that I couldn't think enough to realize that I knew how to shut them off.
   
7. Monday morning, the fever broke and has been mostly gone since then, which means I was able to rewatch (and actually understand this time) Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince (awesome), and the antibiotics finally start to kick in so that I was finally able to swallow something other than soup.
8. "Eating" nothing but soup for three days does not agree with my stomach. My stomach decided to make its disagreement well known.
   
9. Yesterday, I finally got in the shower, and Mum changed my disgusting sheets, and after that I felt vaguely human again. Brain power started slowly coming back, and I remembered things I am supposed to stay connected to like my sister's mother-in-law's surgery and my cousin's ultrasound results.
   
10. We finally get to today, where I feel halfway decent (for me), and have gone from sounding like a cigar-smoking Darth Vadar to just a cigar-smoking frog. The hacking cough is lighter and less croup-y, and my tonsils are back on their own sides of my throat.
    

While this is hopeful, and I'm glad the antibiotics are really working this time, I would really just like to not catch every damn thing. Next year, I'm making the cookie dough in August, and freezing it all. And I'm going to start shopping now, because I can not let myself get so run down. And it pisses me off that 15 years into this damn disease, I still haven't managed to set - and keep - the limits that I need to in order to help myself stay healthy. Which isn't to say that I wouldn't have caught it anyways - Lil Girl, Mum, (not) Youngest Nephew, & his dad are all/have all been sick either this week or last week, so it's not just me of the ruined immune system, but I know that there are ways to protect myself more, and I hate that I let my guard down in that area when things get stressed. Because these damn infections are starting to get more and more serious, and I am not going back to the hospital if I can help it at all.

So, now onto step 11: rest, rest, Guitar Hero, rest, eat real food, watch crappy TV, more rest. Join me, why don't you?

So you know how I was going to be all "The summer of Grandmother = Yay!"

Yeah, well that was until the sinus infection I've been fighting off for weeks decided to migrate to my EAR (not exactly, but close enough), and I can't talk (or eat. Or swallow.) without wanting to carve out the inside of my ear. So, I'm miserable, and I'm miserable company...Grandmother - "You seem depressed." Answer I want to give - "That's because someone is sticking something hot and sharp into my ear!" Answer that is acceptable to give: "No, ma'am, just sore." Grandmother - "You just need Lil Girl to cheer you up" Answer I want to give - "Thank all the gods and goddesses that those kids are on vacation, because right about now I'd be trying to sell them on Craigslist." Answer that is acceptable to give - "No, I'd be pretty miserable and then so would the kids."

And I just want my own bed, in my own room, where I can turn on the damn air conditioner before 3 in the afternoon (Why?), and where I can get away with just eating mashed potatoes and bananas all day, and where there's soup so I don't have to, and where Mom knows me well enough to know that this is not my mad face or my depressed face, this is my HOLY JEBUS WHY THE ...WHO THE HELL GETS A SINUS INFECTION IN THEIR EAR face.

So, yeah: I'm supposed to be on a kid-less vacation this week, enjoying my time with the lovely people I am staying with, and instead I feel like an emo harpy who sits in the dark room and watches reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Hulu all day. Awesome. I'm sure they'll want me to visit All The Time.

Blah.

So here's what I thought I might do

blog everyday for two months straight, right up through Christmas, and then get really sick and abandon the whole thing for over three weeks. That's a great idea, yes?

Sorry to have disappeared, although I am sure you are not - my faithful readers - particularly surprised. But the fevers have finally broken, the steroids and antibiotics are starting to wear off (they always kick my ass), and my brain is plugging back in a bit. So I just wanted to say "hey: hope 09 isn't beating you up like it's been beating me up", and that I'll be back ASAP, as I've definitely missed the world outside my room.