Back in the Saddle

Or should I say wheelchair.

I arrived at Johns Hopkins Bayview on Wednesday to have the first of what is turning out to be three surgeries. On Wednesday the team debrided the hypergranulation around my aperture and attached a wound vac. The tissue has been cultured, and up to today it showed no sign of infection, but today it started growing something, so surgery number two was today to do some more cleaning and attach another wound vac. On Sunday the plastic surgeon will take a small amount of skin, likely from my thigh, and apply a skin graft.

I had been dreading the need for a skin graft because it will keep me in the hospital longer and off my prosthesis for at least two weeks. But I am trying to look at it differently.

One of the biggest risks of osseonintegrarion is infection. The plastic surgeon here at Hopkins spoke to my surgeon at HSS in New York, and he thought the skin graft was a great idea. And while it will keep me in the hospital longer and off my prosthesis, I am starting to realize that in the long run, it is likely the way to go.

So here I am equipped with a headset and I will spend the next couple days streaming videos. I had hoped to do some phone interviews to write profiles for Barcs, but I have a roommate who spends a great deal of time singing the song of her people, consisting mostly of Oh God and Damn. She likes the temperature in here turned up to sauna level and if I even suggest we turn it down a degree she tells me she is freezing. Right now she is having a conversation with, oh, I don't know... her bed? her television set which never gets turned off? No, this is not HSS with a view of the river and a room bigger than most New York apartments.

Yeah, I'm complaining, but isn't that the first sign of recovery? I know in a few days I will be home with the best husband in the world and three kitty therapists, who are very good at their job.

And in a couple of weeks I will be back to working on walking.

I'm alive and I'm getting better. I can't ask for much more.

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