POST-OP AFTERMATH

The days after breast surgery can be pretty tiring. The next day was Thanksgiving. It was a quiet day, with family coming and going, bringing in food from the other in-laws. My wonderful, helping daughters had to go home Sunday. But the ladies from church continued to bring food for several days.
We went back to the doctor on Monday. The nurse practitioner came whizzing in. She was all bright, moving too fast, and talking too much. I couldn't get in a word edgewise! The nerve of her. I am the patient, right? All the time she was talking, she was digging off steri-strips. (There goes my security! It had only been 5 days!) I told her that I guess she knew if my incision popped open, I was coming after her. She just laughed and said, "It's not gonna come open." Then she pulled out one of the drain tubes. I was expecting it to be about two or three inches long, because they had told me to be sure and not pull them out. That thing was a good 10 to 12 inches long, all swirled around under my skin! After that, she told me (notice, I didn't say 'asked') to stretch my arm straight over my head. I was lying down, so I stuck my arm straight up in the air. I thought, "This is a breeze. No sweat." She said, "No, back this way, and made me reach over and behind my head, till my hand touched the bed behind me. I thought my armpit was gonna rip! She bragged on me. I thought, "Huh!" Then she started re-wrapping me, still talking 90 to nothing. I just sat there in amazement and watched while she put on more gauze and tape than the surgeon did after surgery. When the doctor came in, he said he wanted to see the incision, and she said, "Well, you didn't say before, so it's all wrapped up now." So I went home, without the doctor seeing my wound, minus all my steri-strips and one drain tube, and with gauze and tape sticking out the neck of my shirt. I was a-gg-i-tat-ed!
There's nothing worse than a bright, cheerful, practical person making you do things that are good for you, that you don't want to do, when you are in the mood to be petted and doted on.

I went back to work at school the following Wednesday, exactly one week after surgery. I still had one drain tube in, so I stuffed the bulb into the bra pocket on my camisole, and made a 'prosthesis' out of it. My co-workers helped me by pushing Jessie's wheelchair and anything else that they deemed too heavy or too strenuous for me to do. At least six co-workers gave me one of their sick leave days, to offset all the time off I would need for two surgeries. And I can feel the strength of people's prayers.

I had some trouble sleeping. I was sore all under my arm and ribs, and troubled by little nagging worries. I told one of my sister-friends that I did okay as long as I was up and other people were around, but when I got up in the night, alone, that was when the doubts and fears jumped on me. She looked surprised, and said, " The Lord has woke me up the last three nights in a row to pray for you, between 3 and 5 in the morning." So there you have it. We are never alone. That's what Jesus promised, right? In the battle, or in the aftermath, He will never leave us alone.