You Know How Sometimes….

…..you’re minding your own business, when your dog decides to rip your arm off?

Does that just happen to me?

Fine, whatevs.

Well, she was unsuccessful in the aforementioned rippage, but only by a thread – no really, the surgeon said I’ve got a thread of tendon left.  I imagine it there, hanging on by its little tendon-nails and screaming at me every time I move my right arm that it’s doing its best, that I am not making this easier and that..

…”I’m giving it all she’s got, Captain!”…

It might be the pain medication talking, though.  I can never be sure.

So, um, yeah, I’m going to have to have THREE tendons in my rotator cuff repaired. Apparently, there are four tendons so one of the little guys escaped injury and is now trying to do the work of ALL THE TENDONS at once.  This results in moments of blinding, excruciating pain.  Followed by hours of agony.  And the whole thing starts over again.

But, it only happens when I move, sneeze, breathe, you know the stuff we rarely do.

The surgeon said words like “mess” and “extensive” when describing the damage.  I’ve torn those three tendons, the bicep tendon, and then there’s something wonky with my collarbone.  He’s going to flay my shoulder, poke around a bit, attach things where they should be attached, clean out the debris that doesn’t need to be there, stitch me up and send me on my merry way.

He also said the anesthesiologist will insert a nerve-block catheter thingy (it’s a technical medical term, I’m very learned in these things now) to keep my shoulder/arm numb and pain-free for FIVE days post-op.

When he told me that part I nearly kissed him.  However, since we’d just met I thought it’d be best if I waited until after he’d filleted me and fixed all that damage before moving to the next level of our burgeoning relationship.  I’m telling you, though, there’s going to come a time when I kiss that boy for relieving me of all this pain.

Between now and then, though, there’s months of rehab/therapy, many days/nights of pain, gallons of tears, a mind-numbing amount of medical bills that (thank God) my insurance will mostly take care of, lots of whining on my part, and I hope to come out the other side with the world’s first arm worthy of a major-league rookie pitcher (of advanced years).  You think I’m joking, but seriously kids I am setting the bar that high for me.

I have to.  It’s the way I am, I have to push myself to do more, to do better, to go a little farther each time.  It helps me focus on the task at hand, and the small victories are oh so sweet that way.