Surgeon Report 6 – Half the man I was

Never let the Wolfman perform surgery. Green stockings. Nice!

It is the crack of dawn on a bright, sunny Tuesday morning. 

I fear I have been conditioned by the hospital system of waking people at 06h00 to take their pills. Either that or the pipework, still very much attached is, dragging me back into consciousness, just like it is dragging my willy in a southerly direction.

I finally feel well enough to sit down and spend a bit of time writing this; the last general ‘thank you mail’ I sent out took me almost an hour to write and was only about eight lines long.

I am still not entirely clear-headed and forget things; what day is it? Did I put on deodorant? (Easy enough to figure that one out!) Have I brushed my teeth? (Ditto, although I think I did do them twice yesterday morning.) I also forget if I have spoken to people and require frequent naps. Maybe it isn’t the anaesthetic; I hear this is what happens to old people.

I am listening to my new Amazon purchase while typing this; Noah and the Whale’s “Last Night on Earth”. On the one hand, it is a great CD, reminiscent of the ‘80s and, unusually, each track is a good one.

On the other hand, I find it a sad indictment of the level of religious education provided in this country. Noah?

So, on to the health front:

The hospital was lovely (thank God for private health care) and all the (mainly South African) staff were an absolute pleasure and looked after me extremely well, even though I threw up on two of them in the recovery ward. I couldn’t talk so asked for a note paper to tell them I was feeling nauseous. Forgetting I was not left-handed, I wrote “sore” and “feel sick”

The nurse said “I don’t know what you have written."

I thought that it was odd that someone who was illiterate would be able to qualify as a nurse until she showed me the page. It was a meaningless, incomprehensible doodle without a single recognizable letter. The anaesthetic was obviously stronger than I thought.

At this point I realised the pointlessness of even trying to explain and threw up on her and the other nurse who was leaning over me trying to read my scrawl.

They took it quite well although I suspect not all the bruising on my stomach is related to the actual surgery.

The procedure took about four hours and was done keyhole, except for the large incision in my side through which they removed the offending parts. The surgeon said that the cut was just large enough to put his hand inside me to grab what was needed. At this point, I wished that I had chosen a petite, five foot female surgeon instead of the six foot guy with massive hands.

The first two days were spent in a self-medicating haze of morphine which, as I mentioned previously, does NOT eliminate pain, it just takes the edge off. Frankly, at times it felt as effective as a couple of Paracetamol.

On Wednesday morning, some homicidal sociopath with ingrained masochistic tendencies and a deep-rooted hatred for men (I think I overheard one of the nurses call her a “physiotherapist”) came to see me to teach me how to get out of bed. I am still not exactly sure what she did, but it felt like she had taken a red hot poker and methodically placed it against each of my wounds. I can say without any hesitation that while this last week was the worst of my life, getting out of bed was the most painful thing I have ever experienced.

I managed to shuffle to reception (about 15 feet away) and back to bed before further branding took place. Then I had to have another nap. According to the brand marking, I am now the property of the Lazy D Ranch.

By midday Wednesday I was eating via my mouth as opposed to via the needle in my arm; I managed four spoons of soup and two spoons of jelly, the latter being obligatory in a hospital. If you refuse jelly in a hospital, people look at you like you just swore in church.

I also had my first bowel movement around this time. I would love to say it was unassisted, but the truth is a rather forthright nurse put not one, but two suppositories up what is traditionally a one way passage. She then ran out the room and ducked behind the door frame before removing a tiny little remote control device from her inside pocket. She crouched down and hit the little red button. Next thing I was airborne. After the cramp and colic, I have never been quite so happy! Who would have thought…?

On Thursday the surgeon came to visit and resignedly waited for me to ask my usual questions. He told me that in all his years as a surgeon, no patient had EVER asked him as many questions as me, which probably explains the £200 consultation fee. He also asked if I was a vegetarian. An odd question, but he said it was not medical and “all would be revealed.” I spent all day Thursday and Friday pondering the meaning of this question and all I could come up with was that he was researching recipes and was going to return my donated organ in the form of a paté.

By Friday I was able to shower and the drain was removed through the hole in my chest. I managed not to look, but it felt like someone had tried to remove my catheter from the inside. As far as I was concerned, the less I knew, the better, and kept my eyes closed throughout the removal process. Unfortunately, when explaining the feeling to a nurse, he cheerfully explained that the feeling in my Netherlands was caused by the 25 cm long pipe which extended all the way down to the lowest point inside my torso, presumably alongside the C. I felt sick.

Being the sensitive flower that I am, I displayed a mild allergy to the bandages and now, alongside my four surgery scars, I have blisters, additional scarring and rashes all across my back and side. Nice.

By Saturday the nurses were tired of pandering to my every whim and demanded that the surgeon authorise my discharge. The drive home was interesting and I could feel every single piece of tar on the road. I don’t remember much about Saturday or Sunday although I do remember sneezing on Monday which set me back three days and reminded me of the physiotherapist.

When the surgeon did come in to see me off on Saturday, it turned out that his vegetarian question related to a small gift he purchased for me; some biltong. What a guy! What a hero! Biltong; my best!

So, if you have read this far, I suppose I should give you the facts. The biopsy and pathology reports came back and confirmed the following:

I had a tumour in the renal pelvis (look it up) and Transitional Cell Carcinoma, which is cancer of the lining of the urinary tract. It was a Grade 2 cancer (out of a possible three) which determines how aggressive it is. It was also (fortunately) a Stage 1 or T1 cancer (out of a possible four) which determines how far it has spread. In my case it had penetrated the surface lining of the kidney but was still completely contained within the kidney itself. Lucky it was caught early! As a result, he is confident that it has been completely removed and that there is no need for chemo or radiotherapy which is jolly good news. I do however have to go for regular annual checks and scans for the rest of my life. It would also be a good idea not to become diabetic although he did say I could eat and drink exactly what I did before.

So, that is where we are today. I am hoping the C will be removed this Thursday after an X-ray to determine if my bladder is watertight. Urgh! It doesn’t bear thinking about, especially if it isn’t completely sealed. I have insisted on prescription strength sedatives (the type usually given to recovering heroin addicts) and a pre-med just to take the edge off the removal.

Right now I am sitting rather carefully in a position that can only be described as ‘legs akimbo’. No one warned me of another side effect; swollen testicles. I feel like I am walking around on a pair of space hoppers.

I have not yet left the flat and my only contact with the great outdoors since the 6^th of June was on the walk to the car from the hospital. I am not quite up to receiving visitors, but perhaps that will change after Thursday if the pipes come out. Please do not laugh at my knee high green stockings. No, I have not become a cross-dresser with poor taste; I have to wear compression socks until the end of the month!

For a morning’s amusement, you could always visit early and watch me try to get out of bed. Imagine a walrus trying to flop itself off a rock and back into the sea. That is pretty much me, but only not quite as graceful.

I sincerely hope there won’t be a Surgeon Report 7.