Easy-Peasy (mostly)

Home and comfy. No awful staples running Frankenstein-like around my neck and I'm only on Tylenol.

Operation went well. Many handsome interns & students lurking around ~ just sayin'. The lovely pedicure I gave myself was wasted, due to having to don a pair of beige booties. Got a pair of my very own hospital issued Big Girl Panties... Bring it!

Here's my Anesthesiologist, Mark Caruso, who I wanted to make good friends with because he was going to make sure I was deep in dream-land when this all went down. I quickly drew a Happy Face, with a neck with dotted lines & scissors showing where to cut & "Have A Nice Day... Please!" written on it and left it lying on my chest as they wheeled me in to surgery. I want people to be happy when they are cuttin' on me.

Mark did a good job, as I don't remember a thing. He needs to work on his "Goin' Under" shtick though. He had nothing! I said, "Do I need to start counting back from 100 now?" And that's all I remember for about 5 hours as a whole group partied around my neck. I just hope nobody dropped a Junior Mint in there. They took out all the lymph nodes in the left side of my neck. I can just picture those little old nodes, sloshing about in a beaker somewhere. Self-disappearing stitches & steri-strips (white tape) & I'm done the first stage.

Here's my surgeons, who were really nice ~ no God-Complex attitudes in evidence.

 Dr. O'Malley

and Dr. Weinstein

Here's my Before & After pics:

Before

After

 Hee-hee, okay, here's the real after:

It's still swollen, but isn't scary at all. Squeamish me could even look at it. I screwed my diamond earrings back in and am ready for the next step.

The only bad thing was that I found out I'm allergic to morphine. No opium dens for me, kiddos. That was The Worst feeling. Imagine your worst headaches & nausea. (Elisabeth, I thought of you many times). A few more hurls and they deduced I was allergic to morphine. My room mate was a lovely older woman who was operated on earlier in the day and as I hurled into my puke bucket, she shouted "NURSE! NURSE!" for me. Thanks, Elaine ~ love ya. The poor woman had to hear my moans and feeble weeping all night, punctuated by hurling noises. My only complaint: The nurses didn't/couldn't figure it out sooner & didn't/couldn't give me anything else. It wasn't my neck that was hurting ~ just the worst headache I ever had ~ even compared to my one & only experiment with Tequila shots many years ago. Saving grace came in the form of my morning shift nurse, Maria, who brought me crackers, ginger ale &... Percocet:) Within 25 minutes, I could have wept with relief, as the headache faded.

Next is transoral robotic surgery, or TORS. O'Malley & Weinstein are the inventors of this procedure and have gotten may accolades for this technique. No external cuts ~ it's all done through the mouth. I just wish I had a bigger mouth. If Carly Simon & The Cookie Monster had a love child ~ that big.

The more I do this surgery stuff, the less it worries me ~ must be all my friends and family praying & thinking of me. Thanks so much! I go between weeping and laughing as I read your comments & emails. It's all Good Medicine, friends:)