Mixed Messages
You know you're in for it when the nurse who's about to take your stitches out, takes one look at your leg and says, "Oh, you have one of those. . . I'll be back." My surgeon does this running loop stitch thing and it mimizes scarring but stings a bit more than normal stitches when it comes out. When it comes out, it's one piece and you can feel it tugging underneath your skin.
She came back a few minutes later and peeled up the steri-strips. "Oh" she said, "I'm going to need to go get him. It's still open." My surgeon came in, took a look, and told her to go ahead with taking them out. It looked so disgusting that I wasn't sure if I wanted to gag, throw up, or pass out. With all the mixed signals, my body just decided to ramp up the heat as it began to feel like I was in a sauna and I broke out in a serious sweat. The bonus of having an incision that isn't completely closed yet is that the stitches don't pull as much coming out. Still, I couldn't watch.
Instead of watching the nurse pull out the stitches and put more steri-strips on the incision, I concentrated on my surgeon's face. He said that he removed part of the sheath, and all the scar tissue that had built up all around it. He said there was a lot of fluid in there too and that I should be good to go now.
Of course, there are limitations. I'm supposed to take it easy for the next 7-10 days and avoid doing any type of activity or stretching that would widen the incision and subsequent scar.
When all was said and done, he told me that in a few weeks I can get back to normal. We talked about pivoting, twisting, kicking and sparring and he made it quite clear what he thinks about me sparring again.
"Three step sparring is o.k. but if I were you, I wouldn't do anything beyond that. Revision surgeries do not have a good success rate, and we're talking about your leg and the rest of your life here."
Truly he's right. It's just not worth it.
As I was leaving he smiled and said, "I'll see you around, just hopefully not here." I should have invited him to my birthday party.
On the way home, I stopped at the gym to ask them if they could put a medical hold on my account. In total it will probably be about three weeks that I'm out of commission. At first, they seemed really willing to help. Then she said she would need 20 days prior notice to put it on hold. "I don't think I even had 20 days notice that I was having surgery," I told her.
I asked for the guy who signed me up and he saw me coming as I walked back to his desk. "Remember that free month you promised me when I signed up? I never got it. I've been paying every month since I signed up. I'd like you to put that free month through now. I threw my leg up on the chair and pulled my pant leg up.
He wrote down my membership number and said he'd take care of it. I figured that flashing a little leg would work, just for different reasons than one would think.
Apparently, the 20 days prior notice business is somewhere on my contract, in microscopic print, on the backside of the paper, written in Arabic code, and requiring a decoder pen from a cereal box. I would just like to know when helping people became secondary to screwing people.
“Little Cooker” and the Cold
Last week, Lil C and I spent our afternoons (and many evenings) watching The Food Network. She calls herself the "little cooker" and I am strongly encouraging her in this interest since it may limit the time I have to be in the kitchen in the very near future. Plus, if she gets her own cooking show someday, she can buy me a beach house to thank me for all the patience I've shown in the kitchen over the years.
I imagine her starring in a show as a little ninja chef. Kicking recipe butts and taking names. Plus, she's really anxious to get her hands on my knives so it fits. Yesterday was not her best day in the kitchen, however.
One of the shows we watched last week was "Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee." Lil C liked her show so much that she kept asking me when it was going to be back on. I don't think she bonded with Sandra Lee so much as she just liked that the first episode we watched was all desserts. Since last week, she's been bugging me endlessly about making one of them so we decided to tackle what seemed like the easiest (the wine dumped over frozen yogurt recipe doesn't count because she couldn't eat it).
So, we went to the store yesterday and searched endlessly for phyllo dough. I can't imagine many people come looking for it because it was like going on a treasure hunt trying to find it. The recipe is called "Chocolate Mocha Phyllo Cups" and it looked super easy on TV.
We came home, washed our hands, and got to work. Phyllo dough is delicate so I peeled each of the three layers we needed off and put them in front of her. I sprayed them with cooking spray and let Lil C sprinkle them with cinnamon sugar. When it was time to cut them up and delicately place them in the cupcake holders, Lil C was a little antsy, and I spent my time doing damage control. We put them in the oven and got to work on the pudding.
Meanwhile, Big I confiscated her computer and closed out my recipe page. I knew they had to be in the oven for a couple minutes but I was going to check the details after I got them in. Needless to say, I couldn't find the page again soon enough so the kitchen's sweet cinnamon smell soon became a burnt nightmare and I knew the first batch was done for.
Lil C was busy stirring the chocolate pudding when I removed the burnt phyllo cups from the oven. It was as I was dumping the last one into the trash can and subsequently burning the skin right off my hands, when Lil C started sneezing. . . right into the pudding bowl.
Big I clutched her stomach and sort of groaned. I did the same and the pudding was dumped down the sink. So much for that.
I checked the pantry closet and found a package of vanilla pudding and changed the plan. "Let's make vanilla berry phyllo cups," I said.
This time, I did the cups and the pudding on the other side of the kitchen. It was obvious Lil C was breaking out quickly with a cold and I wasn't going to toss two desserts in one day. One is already a crime. She did help decorate the cups since she promised not to breathe while doing so, and after we washed her hands again for about 10 minutes straight.
With no additional "ingredients" this batch turned out perfectly. Plus, we created our very own recipe and they were absolutely delicious.
Today the little ninja chef is super sick with a nasty cold. I think we'll put the cooking lessons on hold indefinitely.
Party Like a Martial Artist
February 7th. . . Another misssed opportunity to test for Shodan.
On February 7th, three will have passed me by since my ACL tear back in October of 2007. There are only two opportunities each year. My next chance is in June. Testing in the summer usually occurs in August. Once again, I doubt I'll have enough training time in to be ready, even if I get back right away. What I thought was going to be a six month delay has turned into a two year delay.
It sucks.
So, while some are in the Big Easy testing for Shodan, I'm going to be partying. I may not be doing kata, but I'll be dancing.
Many years ago, I planned a really fun party night for Mr. BBM. It took me weeks. It involved friends coming from out of town, dinner and a surprise cake, and an eventual limo to take us for a night out on the town in Philly. Four days before the birthday bash, he came home from work sick with what he thought was food poisoning.
24 hours later he was having emergency surgery to save his life. It was a nightmare. He had to go on disability for a while and the birthday bash never happened. He didn't seem to care. Truth be told, his idea of a perfect birthday is a home-cooked meal and quiet.
Mine is different.
So this year, I'm planning my own party. Mr. BBM said he couldn't do it himself. I talked to a friend who knows where to go and she had a great idea. We're going to reserve a VIP room at a dance club and I am going to celebrate my solid-ready-to-get-back-to-karate-knee with some serious dancing.
You in?
Apparently it's Delurking Week so delurk already and say hello!
Of Crashed Computers and Rainbows
I have yet to get my computer back and I am starting to freak out. I start back up with teaching again next week and I don't have my syllabus finished yet. I'm teaching the same course as last semester, and only one this time, so technically, I have a completed syllabus. But I have things I need to change and stuff that needs to get done and copied before next Tuesday. I am about to have a major freak-out.
Mr. Computer Doctor Man had to wipe my computer completely clean and install an entirely new hard drive. While Mr. BBM was able to get most of my teaching documents off while in safe mode before taking it to him, I have no way of using those documents because my daughter's laptop doesn't have any of the programs I need to get it done.
I spent this morning revising my syllabus with a pen and hoping I get my computer back today. He's been saying, "I'll be finished with it today" for a good week now. More actually.
I could just type the sucker up but it's six pages and my daughter's computer doesn't even have a word processing document, so I guess I couldn't actually just type it up.
In addition to the teaching related freaking out, my leg is turning lovely shades of yellow, purple, red, blue and green. It's like a rainbow, but not quite so pretty. I peeled up the edges of the steri-strips the other day because they were driving me insane. This morning, I woke up to find that the one strip is peeled up clear to the incision and it's sort of goopy, oozy and thick bloody under there. It is totally grossing me out. Dried blood I can deal with; live blood, I can't.
Once I get my computer back and my stitches out I am popping open a bottle of champagne to restart the New Year. 2009 can not continue at this pace. It must get better; my sanity is at stake.
Improvement
The bandages came off yesterday and within minutes I was in the shower. Having a shower after child birth or surgery is like a little slice of heaven. I was actually surprised how little swelling I had, but the bruising is another story.
When I had ACL reconstruction last year, I didn't have any bruising. I thought that was weird. Everyone gets bruising from that, but this minor insignificant surgery has caused more outside bruising than I thought it would.
The knee before surgery. The bruising has been a regular issue for me since my surgery last year. At the very top of the scar on the left side, you can see a bumpy area (difficult to see on a photo), which is what my surgeon removed. There was a vein right over top of it that was causing rubbing and bruising every time I did something active.
I've been avoiding bending because it burns and feels sore and stiff, but last night I slept with my knee bent and it seems to have loosened things up a bit. I'm still pretty sore, but the bruising seems like it's stopped getting worse and may start to clear up gradually.
After bandage removal yesterday.
Not too bad in the swelling department considering he was scraping my tibia and cutting stuff out.
I have several steri-strips over the incision but I can tell he did one of those running loop stitches again which means it will sting when it comes out but I'll have less of a scar, so that's a good thing.
My stitches come out on Thursday and I hope to be back to normal better than normal soon after that.
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