Re: Revise-reprise -- shock and surprise -- chuckles and scars and a torso of stars

[Guest guest]

-

I really think they ought to put your picture next to the

word " survivor " in the dictionary! IT IS SOOOO GOOD TO HAVE YOU BACK

WITH US!!!! You're not REALLY going out to get groceries, though are

you??

loriann

[Guest guest]

Heck no, Loriann. I just went out for some fresh air and a carton of

mango sorbet. I guess maybe part of being a survivor is being an old

cuss who goes where she will regardless. Never fear, the allergists

will have at me again at 11 a.m. tomorrow and may lecture me

effectively on any damage I have possibly done to my bod via the

sorbet-soireee. . . . and then, my friends, just two more exciting

weeks till the Ultimate Staple Removal Fest with Dr. Ondra. Oh, boy,

a lovely spring looms ahead, ne'est-ce pas?

I got Ondra to promise me some suitable digital images of the latest

transformation in my ever-remalleable spine. I'll post 'em as soon as

I can get 'em. He promised to draw in his little plumb-line

measurement as well.

I STILL have to contact my beloved Rand! Priscilla at his office

finally called me around the eleventh hour before my surgery, when I

was beyond being able to return any call from anywhere and was deep

into doing a video-game gait study for some nice young researchers at

Northwestern who are teamed up with Ondra to figure out how best to

operate so as to optimize balance while walking or whatnot. I am

dying to know what Rand would have/could have said as I hurtled off

into yet more extensive revision surgery. I am so fond of him and owe

him so much in the way of starting to get myself straightened out.

Those two years after Boston were a major transition in my life, a

resurgence of hope. I wonder where all this will lead in the end.

That is, I wonder what the pathologist may ultimately say at autopsy,

gazing dumbstruck upon these endlessly experimented spines of ours.

(And by the way, who was it who once wrote, " Life is either a daring

adventure or nothing?)

Well, I have muchos more tales to tell, but the hour grows late. I

will try to get you the quickie snaps I got some family members to

take of my gigantic red lobster vancomysin disaster as it receded

ever more docilely beneath the steroids and antihists and what not.

At least once I can finish off the roll, perhaps with a shameless

fashion shot wherein I totally imitate and plagiarize the plucky

Elissa in her sky-rockets-in-flight TLSO. My own is kinda fatter,

frankly, but luckily I am beyond the age of mourning the post-Twiggy

years demise of one's body, especially after all the other stuff this

old carcass has been through. And I do not intend to apologize for

ripping off the exciting San fashion scene either, Elissa! --

thanks for a wonderful visual metaphor to announce my oncoming

WONDERFUL new future complete with remade spinal column soaring

toward a whole new celestial life-change, renascence, and self-

certified ongoing epiphonhy. (As for remade other body parts, hmm,

not so sure right now. Got that old song from the seventies floating

around amidest my frayed old brain cells, leaping the synapses with a

sort of eerie chutzpah, going, " Look what they done to my song,

Ma. . . Look what they done to my brain, ma . . . " And what comes

after that? Something like " They wrapped it up in a ziplock bag and

I think I'm half insane, ma . . . "

Fortunately, disturbing as that littl ditty is to recall now and

then, it always gets wrapped up in my thoughts with some other snappy

Euro-youth-scene-evocative numbers from the same general era, I

believe including such old favorites as " Sky rockets in flight . . .

Afternoon delight . . . oh-oh-oh-oh, afternoon delight. " (One of my

favorite therapists this time, BTW, handed my son the official

preserve-your back literature so he could help me make sure i was

wearing the brace right or something. My husband was not around that

afteroon, but she made a point of pulling me aside -- into the

bathroom, actually -- and slipping me alittle somethingt extra, a

full-color glossy pamphlet about post-op rolls in the hay! " Only when

Dr. Ondra says this is ok, of course, " she stressed. She

commented, " I'll just slip this in with some of the stuff you're

packing for home, very discreet. You know, I can't even think about

my own parents having sex, I still think it was all the immaculate

conception, you know? "

Well, Lorri, before I go babbling on for the rest of the night, just

a quick and heartfelt thanks for your warm welcome-back. It's great

to be hear and I'll try to work my way up to speed before too long.

So much to catch up on with everyone else's adventures and concerns.

Repeat thanks to all the dear folk who called and cared and graced me

with a lovely lucky bamboo plant and touched and helped and nurtured

my spirit along through this last amazing episode of musculoskletal

surreality.

Love you all,

E.

> -

>

> I really think they ought to put your picture next to the

> word " survivor " in the dictionary! IT IS SOOOO GOOD TO HAVE YOU

BACK

> WITH US!!!! You're not REALLY going out to get groceries, though

are

> you??

>

> loriann

[Guest guest]

Welcome back, !

Sounds like you're getting back to your old self, complete with sense of humor.

So sorry you've been through so much with the drug allergy!

Your post-op delusion sounds much nicer than the one poor Cheryl had. You'll

know what I'm talking about once you've caught up on the posts. Some time next

November, perhaps!

Keep taking care of yourself, posting as your heart desires, and ignoring the

typos! (Imperfection is such a liberating state pof being!)

Fondly,

Sharon

Revise-reprise -- shock and surprise -- chuckles and

scars and a torso of stars

So hi, y'all. glad to be dragging back over the uncertain shoals and

shallows of state of the art re-revision. Glad to be HOME!!!!!I will

delightedly avoid any further suggestion of an inpatient soujourn

anywhere on earth . . . .

Naw, it was not that bad, but you know, it's never predicable and

always a mite surreal and all that.

The one-time final revision ( " We'll wrap it all up in one 12-hour

session " ) was a nice idea but Dr. Ondra was apparently exhausted

after 12 hours, following total success in removing allthe old

implants back to the harrington rod. A litte less than a week later,

he went back for another eight-hour stretch. We had arranged all

kinds of safeguards to prevent another post-anesthetic delirium like

the one two years ago in Boston. In the end, though, I had a doozy

and may write a short novella about th whole fiasco after gaining a

bit more distance. I've had more opportunity to learn about others'

post-op deliria as well.

Ondra and company were conscientious and capable and finished the job

with aplomb, at least as far as I know so far. But then I studdenly

began spiking high fevers. It eventually turned out that I was having

a dangerous and serious allergic reaction to vancomycin. They hauled

me back down to the OR toward middle of the night (after perusing a

suspicious CT-scan) and spent five hours extracting a hematoma.

(Technically, this was operation number 3 for this particuar hospital

stay.)Then they held off on following some other specialized advice

to get me the heck off the standard prophylactic antibiotics, in my

case gentamycin and vancomycin. I turned bright red and mottled and

fiercely itchy over the next week or so. Various goofs and gaffes

were made. Eventually someone took the risk of yanking the

antibiotics and putting me on a full course of anti-itch remedies,

antihistamines, high-dose steroids, etc. I am now beng monitored

pretty much non stop by several darling lovable teams of allerg-

infectious disease mavens, many of them delightful and very smart and

funny women who have helped to keep my spirits soaring despite some

pof the recent weirdness.

I also met a casts of dozens in the nursing and medical professions

whom i will never forget. Plus a feisty elderly psych nurse in a

motorized wheel chair who gets sent out to reason with

occasional " problem patients " like md from time to time, plus a sexy

spine fellow who made the mistake of coming in and attempting to chat

with me about who knows what during an acute semi-Colase-failure type

scene of the type that can make you nutsy and embarrassed--I mean,

I'm in the midst of this intestional fiasco after some weeks of

stoppage and so forth, and he is there in my rooom as my witness

desiring to chat with me about inanities. I yelled at him about four

times to get some respect and get a clue and get out. He kep saying

things like, " Do you know who I am? " I actually got some brownie

points and appreciative chuckles from people re my chutzpah in

sending this guy flying down the hall to go somewhere and try to

learn how to act like a mensch. The motorized problem-patient psych.

nurse thought I gave him what he had coming. In the end, he came to

say good bye my last morning in the hospital and told me what a nice

patient I had been -- how people going through experiences like some

of mine can get very sharp or difficult and understandingly angry or

whatever, but I managed to stay so nice!!!! At that point, all was

forgiven. An all round sweeet young guy who might have learned

something from me even as I learned something from him. Sometimes it

is so hard just to figureout what to say to each other,how to be with

each other, what the heck is going on in someone else's troubled

noggin in the midst of some already insane and perplexing inpatient

hospital scene . . . .Well,as you can see, I got stories galore. But

I also need to " run " out on a first quest for some groceries and

household sundries, so ciao for now.

Love,

Eliana Revisionistia of the Faraway Spinal Realms that

Perplex and Confound the Best of Us At times . . . .

Oh, yeah, and then there was that evening I woke up and walked

around a little in my hopsital room, thinking i was in some kind of

English country cottage. I'm not even sure I was allowed to be out of

bed at all yet (One ofmy little sleep problems after someone forgot

my narcolepsy meds for a week or so.) Somehow this little narcoleptic

foray inspired me, quasi-comatose as I may have been, to carefully

remove my central line and my Foley catheter, and somehow things

began to get better shortly after that. Sometimes you just gotta do

what you think you gotta do, especially upon finding yoursef in a

pleasant and inspiriting English cottage burried in a secret room of

your secret room of Northestern University Medical Center, Chicago,

Illinois.

, becoming restored to her senses albeit at her own

lackadaisical and languidly feisty pace . . ..

Support for scoliosis-surgery veterans with Harrington Rod Malalignment

Syndrome. Not medical advice. Group does not control ads or endorse any

advertised products.

[Guest guest]

Hi ,

It's so good to see you're back from another foray into the

surgical fray and feeling well enough to post. You sound terrific,

attitude-wise; your posts are thought-provoking, sometimes a little

alarming, and really funny! I hope that doesn't sound cavalier,

you're certainly having a time of it during your recuperation,

but

some of your descriptions are pretty entertaining.

Not wanting you to have to cover ground you've certainly

detailed

before, probably numerous times, I'm going to go back and look up

your posts from the very beginning. I'm really curious to know

why

you've had to have so much surgery and why it had to be redone.

I

did start out reading the earlier posts but got derailed just trying

to keep up with current ones on the limited time was able to spend

at the computer.

Take care of yourself. Load up on those thrillers and retreat to

your nest for as long as necessary! And don't forget an

occasional

dose of trash t.v., ie, the E channel (ick, shudder, sick

fascination!) and old black and white movies from Dad and Mom's

era

(a personal fave of mine when bedridden)

All my best, Dianne S. Rhode Island