It's been a scant week since my spine was surgified, but already I am suffering the ill effects of being cooped up indoors like an asthmatic, accident-prone child with a sunlight allergy. Every time I peek past the drapes to spy on the world as she disrobes for her annual spring frolic, I get both wistful and grumpy. Just as I so desperately want to join in the (maybe not skyclad) frolicking, I know for certain that I will manage to trip, stumble, crash, or any other number of verbs which lend themselves to my ending up horizontal and slightly mangled on the lawn. This is the luck of the Irish (which in itself deserves a blog post of its own...this will happen).
I knew it would be annoying, but being stuck indoors this time around is somehow worse than the last time I had back surgery in 2009. Perhaps it's because the recent procedure was more intense (I endured a spinal fusion versus a simple microdiscectomy), but my thought process these past few days runs along the lines of, "I want to go run around and cavort with the friendly neighborhood creatures! Dead grass and snow-slush igloos shall pave the way to the glories of April with her noontide tornado sirens and daisy chains!"
But here I am, homestuck and cranky. To ease my boredom, I've compiled a little list of things to expect, post-op-wise, if you are having back surgery. I got through it twice (so far), and I'm assuming you can as well. I didn't catalogue everything, just the major things that stuck out for me.
- The fun part, waking up from anesthesia. Odds are you will be horribly groggy for several hours after your procedure, so take advantage of this induced snaily state. When you finally kick the anesthesia, you are going to be achy and not want to move. Luckily, the nurses will have equipped you with a trusty morphine pump, which you can use to distribute the drug every ten minutes. And you will distribute it every ten minutes, believe me.
- Moving around will seem like the last thing you should do, but the day after the operation you'll be dragged to your paws and made to march down the hallway, probably in a nifty back brace (mine's brand is "Ninja," and it it looks very shinobi-like. I think there are places to stash kunai...). Walking will suck, but it forces your body to jumpstart the healing process. Because you will be expected to perform less tasks than are expected of a toddler, people tend to think that while you are homebound you will have to be bedbound. Not the case. Lying down may feel more comfortable than standing or sitting, but don't give in to the charms of the mattress! Stretching out your muscles (without overdoing it, please) will make you feel better in the long run. If you have staples closing your incision, you are going to be uncomfortably aware of them, especially if you lie on your back. The doctor will remove them about two weeks after surgery, thankfully, but in the meantime try to zen-out and pretend like they've always been there, or else you'll be driven crazy feeling like your spine is the spine of a cheap book.
- Well before the day of the surgery, you should stock up on things to do - have a pile of books at hand, or board games if you have family and friends willing to help you feel less useless. I took up knitting (badly), and of course my sketchbook is never far from my paws should I feel the need to doodle. I also made sure to put my important day-to-day items in places that wouldn't be difficult to reach, mostly at counter-top level, because DROPPING THINGS WILL KILL YOU. Well, technically, BENDING TO PICK UP THE SHIT YOU DROPPED WILL *HURT LIKE HELL. Trust me, even bending a little bit to pet your cat or dog will end with you howling like an arrow-pinioned woodsbeast. Get one of those grabby picker-upper sticks, I have no idea what they are called, but they will be so useful that you will wonder how you could have cleaned your room without one. Just today I spilled a bottle of ibuprofen on the floor, and I used the grabby stick to clean up the mess. Like a boss.
If you are used to doing things on your own, the weeks after back surgery will teach you, none too gently, that sometimes we have to rely on other people to help us out. I'm one of those obnoxiously proud people who become offended if someone implies that they can't do something on their own, so being in a recuperative state has humbled me by several degrees. There is a difference between requesting help when you need it and placing unnecessary burdens on others with your demands, and most people will let you know if you are crossing a line. Hopefully they won't do it by smacking you upside the head with a grabby stick.
*I don't think you can actually die from bending over post-op, but I really don't want to find out, so please let us leave that avenue undiscovered...
