Tubes Coming Out

There’s no place like home.  It was so good to break out of the hospital on Sunday.  Although, resting in the comfort of my own home includes a lot of chaos from the kids that was not present in the hospital.  Mom, of course, has dropped everything to be here and resumed working her full-time job:  me.  I say it all the time, but thank goodness for her.  I seriously don’t know how I could recover with a 2 year old at home and the moving/lifting restrictions placed on me.

Recovery is going well.  I took one dose of the prescription medication I was sent home with, hated how it made me feel, and ditched it for plain old Tylenol.  That seems to be doing the trick.  I am more sore on the left, where the infection was and also more work was done during surgery.  But honestly, the biggest annoyance/discomfort are the drains and PICC line.  My wrist/arm hurts a lot inside where the IV lines were, and I’m very bruised on my arm from the IV.  I am also bruised on my stomach where the nurses were giving me daily shots (to minimize the risk of blood clots.)

I am happy with the physical healing.  Emotionally, I am up and down.  I am still in a state of shock that this has happened.  Usually I’m ok, but it’s really hard to see myself after stepping out of the shower or re-wrapping myself for the day.  I’ve been unable to hold back the tears when talking to a few friends, and thank goodness for amazingly supportive people who would never expect me to not cry, and in fact, cry right along with me.  I know it’s going to be a process and I have to grieve what has been lost.

The great news is that my antibiotic has remained oral.  I will be on a 2x/day dose until early November.  So…tomorrow (Wed) I will see the nurse practitioner at Dr. Hijjawi’s office to have my post-op check up and get my drains pulled!  Hooray!!!!!  Then I will go over to the Infectious Disease clinic and have my PICC line removed.  Double Hooray!!!!!  I’ve been told the PICC line removal will only take a few minutes but I will have to wait about 30 minutes while I am monitored.  I’m guessing because the line goes so close to my heart, they will need to make sure everything is ok.  I am so relieved to have these tubes pulled out.  I know I will feel so much better.   I will actually be able to get comfortable to sleep.

This is my current state of being wrapped up and tubes and lines.  So very happy to see it all go!