Post-Op Follow Up

Yesterday, I went back to the hand surgeon for my post-op follow up.  Overall, everything is looking good. The hand surgeon told me that my surgery was more complicated than he was expecting it to be, and he was expecting it to be complicated. He had to use a different kind of a plate to hold everything in place where it should be, but it seems to have worked.

When I saw the X rays, I was surprised by how the plate looked. I was expecting it to look like a rectangle laying horizontally across my wrist. Instead it looked more like an interesting cocktail toothpick, more like an artificial bone, which is probably closer to what it is.

I was surprised by my reaction to the taking off of all of the material that has swaddled my wrist since the surgery of Monday, May 2. There's always some part of me that expects with surgical dressings removed, all of the stuff that's supposed to be inside will fall outside. I felt the same way when my spouse had back surgery--the bandages came off and I was expecting to be able to see his spine, but of course that's not how it works. 

The X ray tech reassured me that I was not going to be able to move my hand and undo all of the surgery. It was a message that I needed to hear. As I moved through the appointment, I compared my experience post surgery with my experience of April 28th when I first went to the office. Even though I still feel some pain, I'm not feeling the same kind of pain when I move my arm.

I now have a different kind of wrist protector. Now I have a cast. The person who does the casting asked me what color I wanted, and I said purple. As she was wrapping my arm, I thought wait it's the wrong liturgical color--I should have chosen green. But I do love purple, so it's fine.

I had hoped that when all of the postsurgery swaddling was removed, my finger mobility would come back. I still have stiff and swollen fingers, and I have trouble straightening them. The good news is that it's fixable. Off I will go to the person who specializes in hand physical therapy which will be different from the wrist physical therapy that I will do later.

I am still disturbed by all of the destruction that happened from a tiny fall. It's not like I went skydiving. I fell the distance of maybe two feet onto grass. I am trying not to feel spooked about it all. At some point I need to get back into my habit of daily walking. At some point I hope my digestive system is recovered enough from the antibiotics that I can do that. I went out yesterday to get some of those special yogurts with extra probiotics, so hopefully I can rebuild my gut biome.

It's getting easier for me to sleep with a cast and easier to go about regular life with a cast. Yesterday my doctor told me I can exercise and drive get back to regular life as long as take care to keep the cast dry. I have found that having a cast on my arm (or a splint, or a bunch of post surgeries stuff swaddling) is an interesting conversation starter. I am amazed by how many people have broken their wrists and how many people have had to have surgery. Again I am trying not to feel spooked about it all.

But I do feel a little spooked by it all.