About a month ago I had a strange dream. I went to the doc and he stuck a kitchen knife into my groin and pulled out a couple handfuls of goo. He slapped them on my shoulder, for some reason – they looked like a few packs of soggy Ramen noodles. I spent the next two weeks racking my brain to get a clue as to what the stuff could be – for some reason I was convinced that there was great meaning in it all – but only in hindsight can I say that my subconscious knew about the cancer and tried its best to get me a message.
From the mortified-by-morphine dept: even when I first started to fully come around, there were already people visiting and bringing thoughtful gifts. Greg James was one of the first, right after my mom and bro arrived from Florida. He brought a nice big get-well basket from the James gang, including pictures and puzzlebooks, and my mom started handing me everything in it, but I was too stupided up to fully realize what was going on. She handed me a magazine called “Men’s Adventure Journal” or something, and I blurted “Mom why? You know I’ve never read this magazine in my life!” Greg laughed his butt off. :> Doh, what a dope. Funny thing is, it’s a great magazine – full of cool places to visit, stories from adventurers who’d found new places, no hunting (yea!), and there’s a great column by Phil, the host of The Amazing Race. We didn’t realize that he was truly a world traveler, but he has been around! Andrea and I both ended up reading it. Thanks James gang.
I can heartily recommend avoiding colon surgery if at all possible. You will wake up with the most disturbing device – a plastic tube that goes from the root of your stomach straight out your nose. It’s kept in place with a band-aid attached to your nose and wrapped around the tube. The purpose of the tube is to suction your stomach of, well, everything. A major operation like I had on the digestive system means it will be asleep until it heals enough to wake up and start functioning. Which means: you can’t use it. So the tube stays in you with a low-pressure suction and you can’t even drink any liquids to soothe the throat that the tube is scratching and sticking to and gagging. You watch everything flow by in the tube, too – stomach acid, bile, blood… I’m seriously getting nauseous typing about it. I wanted to go through the halls and tell everyone with a tube that it wouldn’t be long before the best day of their lives would come and they would get the tube out. Whew. Anyway, the second worst part, after the tube is out, is NOT having your stomach siphoned. They have to time it just right so that they don’t pull out the tube (even though you are begging them to) before you are ALMOST ready to start digesting. Everything starts to build up in your stomach and small intestine, waiting for the large intestine patchwork to heal and start accepting the backlog. The doc says “walk” – I paced the halls for MILES trying to get things woken up and working. Finally I resolved to jump the first hospital worker I saw, start a fight, and hope for just the right punch in the gut. That, or start up a Rex Hospital patient Fight Club.
The moment the first gas is passed through will bring a tear to your eye (and not just from the smell). I’m still all bloaty and waiting for things to totally flow, but I’m well on the road to recovery now.
This glorious and nauseating Moment of Life(tm) has been brought to you by the wonderful world of blogging. Peace!
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