What does it feel like?

This courtesy my nephew.

Best I can describe - at least for the physical realm - is this: imagine doing about 400 crunches in the wrong way. Then picture how you feel the next day, and add some itching to boot. That's about the equivalent.

I have been very, very fortunate in that I haven't experienced a lot of physical pain to this point. Of course I am a wimp and am very careful in what I do (it's really fun to drop things on the floor and ask someone to pick it up because I can't get to the floor yet) ... but otherwise, the discomfort is mainly that due to sitting still or lying still for hours on end.  I haven't sneezed yet, though. . . 

Hugh Jass

Okay, so, this is one of the fun little things of surgery... at least of abdominal surgery.

When I checked in to the UW on March 24, I weighed in at 134.8 lbs. A little disturbing, since this was 5 lbs less than my annual checkup about 10 days prior - but given the rather surreal nature of the day, that concern barely registered on my brain. (I had been losing 2-3 lbs a month over the last several months without changing behavior. An indication that my body was starving from the inside... but...)

Jump to April 1, when I checked out of the hospital at 151 lbs. Now. A difference of 16 lbs, give or take, and it was not due to the scrumptious hospital food, the nourishing glucose drips, or the intensive muscle-building workout regimen.

When the body undergoes trauma it creates fluid. Ick ick ick ick ick. So, let's see, add 16 pounds to a body that's already in poor shape. Ask that body to carry it around, and the body is soon winded and the heart pounding.

16 lbs is about 2 gallons of water. I've tried to run up and down stairs carrying two gallons of water... that's not so easy. But instead of 2 gallons (you know, those nice plastic containers with handles) it's more like, um, 32 cups of water. If the average water balloon holds about a cup of water, that's like carrying 32 water balloons around. Mostly below the torso... and this explains the need for compression hose (sexy!) and really, really, big drawstring pajama pants.

Luckily I still had my "clown butt pants" from Before. :-) And even better, the fluid weight gain only lasts about a week, with the rest of the normal level of fluid retention finding its normal place in the body... so "regular" clothes can't be far behind!!!! Yay!!!!!

04.12.09

Today is Easter. 

Over the years, this holiday has waxed and waned in its importance in my life, in the deliberateness with which I have observed Easter, Passover, Oestara, or the like... but if I were to think about it very deeply today, now, there would be new parallels between Easter and my life. The whole notion of re-birth, new beginnings, the start of a new cycle, blossoming, flowering, and - yes  - rain/sun/rain/rain/rain/sun/rain seems a little more significant.

So today I did eggs for the peops at work (odd to be in the office and find Karla there!!!) and walked through a more-deserted-than-usual downtown. Indulging in a BattleStar Galactica marathon with Martin, playing with the cat, reading, eating well, and snoozing. 

Feeling decidedly normal. In that it's a re-birth.