One Week Post-Op

I am so used to being so busy that lying around in bed and in the recliner all day is boring the living day lights out of me. Seriously, I am not even one week out and I am bored of just sitting around. The past two days I have not taken any narcotics during the day so that I can have a clear head. It is worth it to me because I hate those stupid pills! But then, by the evening time, I am very much in pain, but that is when my family is home and I don't want to just sleep through the entire evening, so I just suck it up and take the pills at night. I can't tell you how thankful I am for the pills at night; it is like clockwork, four hours after I take two oxycodone, I am awake and need another one. I really can't imagine that I need them that badly at night, but the pain is definitely worse at night. So, I figure, why try to be a hero? So I take the pills and manage to get some sleep.

Sleeping through the night would be amazing. Like I mentioned, I get about four hours at a time. Which isn't bad. Some nights are better than others. Since I am in a hip brace, I think that I sleep better than if I didn't have one. Comparing my previous two surgeries, now that I am restricted to a very limited hip motion, I literally can't move, so I don't. This prevents me from being jolted from a sleep in pain every time I move during the night (this is what happened the previous two times). So I get more restful sleep and thus feel better. Also, I feel 'safe' in my brace. I thought that I would hate my brace, but I am actually thankful for it! (I never thought I'd say that!!!). The only bad thing about the brace (besides being bulky and hot) is that I can't move at night, which tends to throw specific muscles into spasm. My tibialis anterior and lower back were the muscles that freaked out last night. I actually had to have my Mum come and massage my tibialis anterior because it was so tight in spasm that I kept waking up.

The hip itself is definitely sore. Just last night it started to give me a sharp pain in my groin every time I increased my intra-abdominal pressure (ie laughing, coughing, sneezing). At first I thought "oh no, the two anchors that were placed in have come out!!" But I can't see how that would have happened since I have barely moved for days on end. Ah well, hopefully it is just part of the healing process.

So, overall, it is not that bad. I mean, it sucks to spend the entire summer inside on a recliner in a brace on crutches. But, I will do everything in my power to get this surgery to work so I can stave off reconstructive surgery for as long as possible; if not forever. I have been praying that this surgery works and could use all the prayers in the world for this surgery to be successful. So, if you read this, and do say a prayer - THANKS!!!! :)