The Healing Process.

As I sit down to write this, I am 5 days out from surgery. Last time, I would've been in the hospital this long so I can't help but be thankful that for the bulk of the last 5 days I have been on my couch rather then trapped at Sloan. I am also thankful that most of the time I have been home, I have been mobile and able to do a few other things aside from staring at the TV day in and day out. Last time, I thought I had somehow woken up in Hell and it was made to look like the inside of my house.

Because the weather has been ridiculously nice the last few days, my dad asked if I wanted to get out of the house for a little and join him in going to the food store yesterday. I know, I couldn't contain my enthusiasm for this a-mazing outing either. But alas, I managed to stop jumping up and down in excited hysterics and threw on some clothes that didn't make me look like complete trash.

As I looked in the mirror, prepared to slap on another coating of moisturizer on my chemically peeled face, I noticed that the peeling was almost gone in most places. Good thing because I was starting to wonder if I should call Sloan and tell them I needed some skin graphs aside from my xrays on the 18th. Now let me be clear - this is 5 days of nonstop peeling. And when I say nonstop, I mean it. I have been doing nothing but coating my face with moisturizer and Vaseline since I've been home. That's pretty bad.

The ride in the car wasn't super horrific but little bumps weren't pleasant...plus my dad likes to jam on his breaks CONSTANTLY so the jerking back and forth wasn't the best either. Oh well, at least I got out for a little although I'm not sure if I plan on doing it again anytime soon.

The crinkling in my neck is completely gone - woohoo! Whatever that was, I hope it doesn't come back. How weird.

I was able to take my first full shower earlier today. I had to do most of the washing with my left arm as it's still extremely difficult to lift my right one. Other then being totally out of breath from washing my hair and shaving my legs, it was great. I finally took the bandaging off my tattoo completely - not only because it's healing but because my skin is starting to (EW) rip due to having that freakin' medical tape on it all the time. I want to puke just thinking about it. There is a small wound above the incision from just that - as you can see:

But seriously - how happy am I that the incision is right inside the lines of my mic?! It'll heal as a scar but so what. At least it's not completely across the entire thing or going vertically or something. This makes me very happy.

As for the other incisions, the tape is going to be on them for a while. There are large wounds under there and I don't want to mess with that. The last time I waited till the last possible second to take that off. Yuck.

So far, so good, I guess. Little things still obviously hurt that I probably shouldn't be doing. For example, my dog Lily jumped on my bed to sleep with me yesterday morning and because she was on my right side, I guided her - legit guided, not lifted - to my left and wound up paralyzed for a few seconds from the pain. I guess I should just get used to trying to take it easy for a few weeks even though I feel a lot better then I did at this time the last time around. Until then, pj's and TV-watching it is.