Saturday July 11, 2009 – Day #3 of recovery

Okay, sometime during the night, I decided that this is almost not worth it. Before you start throwing all of my words of certainty back in my face, please note that I said almost not worth it. I am still convinced that I will look back at this and be glad that I did it, but if I had truly understood the full extent of the pain I would suffer, would I have gone through with the surgery? I’m honestly not sure. This experience has pushed me to the limits of how much pain I thought I could feel. I can frankly say that I have never felt such excruciating pain in my life, nor do I ever wish to feel it again. I gave up and went to bed last night at 9:30pm, praying for unconsciousness. Sleep is the only thing that gives me any reprieve from the world of pain that I am living in. I slept until my alarm went off for my next dose of Hycet, or until the pain finally woke me up, whichever came first. If the pain is what woke me up first, I would count down the minutes until I could take my pain medicine. Even the Hycet only succeeded in dulling the pain and helping me sleep, therefore starting the whole cycle again. I tried not to swallow until I was able to choke down the pink liquid that is my only savior in this never-ending nightmare of pain. I stood, my eyes squeezed shut, muscles tensed and rigid from pain, gasping for breath until the Hycet started working its magic on my throat and ears. Only then could I go to the kitchen for more ice water. I sat on my bed, in the pitch black of either 1:15am or 5:15am, and each time forced myself to gulp down a big glass of freezing ice water before I would let myself sink back onto the bed and into the blessed oblivion of sleep. Combine that with the fever that hasn’t gone away, and if you had peered into my room after one of these twice-nightly rituals, you would have found me lying on top of my blankets, shaking uncontrollably from the shock of the pain or ice cold water filling my stomach, I’m not sure which. Probably both. Thankfully, that only lasted until the hydrocodone in my medicine kicked in, and then I felt high as a kite. I actually had to open my eyes once to check that I wasn’t literally floating a few inches off my bed. Haha! It seems funny now. Never having done any kind of illegal drugs in my life, I suppose I should appreciate this, the one and only time I’ve ever felt “high” and its legal! :) Finally, in this blissed out state, I fall asleep, and my dreams are very interesting and detailed. I think if I could remember any of them, I could write a pretty cool book from their content. In any case, I didn’t get out of bed until about 11:30am. And even then I only got up because I didn’t want my parents to freak out and think I had died in bed. (Seriously, my mom checked on me enough in the morning that it was justifiable.)

When I finally did get up, my sister came over to help me while my parents went out for the afternoon. I could not talk really at all, so I tried to sign to my family (I really do know American Sign Language) but it was slow-going, since they only know a few signs. They did good though, and I only had to resort to writing down what I wanted to say one time. My parents left, and my sister and I were settling in to watch a movie after my 1:10pm dose of Hycet when I suddenly got a severe “tickle” in my throat, on the right side, and felt the urge to cough. I was warned to try NOT to cough, so I tried to suppress it, and drank a ton of water to try to smooth it out, but nothing worked. I ended up coughing several times, pretty hard, and I was scared to death that I was going to start bleeding. My poor sister was freaking out, since I couldn’t communicate with her during all of this, and she probably thought I was going to bleed out on her watch. Poor thing! I hurried to the bathroom to try to see what my throat looked like, but my mouth was so swollen and sore that I couldn’t see beyond the top of the holes. I did not see or taste any blood, so I figured I was okay. I kept trying to coax my mouth open more, until I could see most of the holes, which have been totally white, are now spotted with a darker color. I think this means I’m starting to scab over. We tried to take a picture, but they did not come out very good, sorry!:

At least on the right side, which is the worst and biggest hole, this new sensation does not feel good. It feels like something is hanging halfway down my throat, but I guess it is just the scab being continually touched or stimulated, which makes me want to either gag or cough. Usually both. Good thing I am well practiced in suppressing my gag reflex, from all those years of sticking toothpicks into my tonsils to clean the stones out. So I am dealing okay with the less-than-pleasant sensation in my throat. If I try not to engage my neck muscles as much as possible, the pain is more manageable today than it was yesterday.

My biggest complaint so far is that I cannot swallow at all without excruciating pain. That means I cannot eat or drink as much as I should, because it hurts so much that I will start to tear up. And if I start to cry I know I will feel even worse, both physically and emotionally. And it will make my family feel horrible to see me cry. So I am trying to time my eating and drinking in massive amounts after I have had my dose of Hycet, when I can stand the pain. I’ve noticed that my saliva has become very thick in my mouth, but everything in there is swollen, and I am still peeing a lot, so I think I’m getting enough water. Planning to go to bed early tonight too, although I am not as desperate for sleep tonight as I was last night. That must be improvement, right?! (Please say yes!)

On a side note, I did end up taking a stool softener on Thursday night, and I did have one bowel movement on Friday morning. Could not stand the thought of swallowing a pill yesterday, so I have not taken any more stool softeners, but I am trying to work up the courage to take one tonight. I do not enjoy feeling bloated and gaseous. I don’t think I should have to deal with that also, on top of everything else. No fair! (Okay, done complaining now.) Here’s hoping tomorrow will be even a little bit better!