I Want a New Drug

Okay, snow I understand. Whatever. Rain? No biggie. Hail? A pain, but not too bad. Freezing rain?... What the hell?! This one is new to me. I'd heard it exists, but have never had to deal with any sort of frozen rain/sleet-type stuff. Eeew. I felt like I was on a Slip 'n' Slide on the sidewalk! Thankfully, by the time I got back to the city and up from the subway it wasn't that bad, so I only had to deal with it on the way to the train. But let me officially say that that stuff sucks. I'm extra glad for good, water-proof boots.

I had another round of spinal injections this afternoon. While I've gotten pretty used to them, having gotten them about every 3 months for a year and a half (although this batch is about 4 months overdue... oops), we shook things up a bit today. Before, it was a half of a day's worth process-- don't eat all day, check into the hospital, in pre-op 2 hours prior, up to the OR, get drugged up and sedated, wheel into the room, get the injections, back out to the recovery room, spend an hour coming down to planet earth, then wheeled out with someone to drive me home and babysit, then proceed to get sick from the anesthesia and deal with the horrid aftermath. I don't handle opiates well, to say the least.

This time? No sedation, no hospital, no babysitter (technically, I'm supposed to have one according to my release forms, but I'm not high or anything-- yet, just a little fragile). He did it under local anesthesia right in his own little OR downstairs from his office. And, much to my surprise, it wasn't horrible!!

Yes, we learned that I did have to have extra local (same when I go to the dentist-- apparently I have sensitive tendons and stubborn nerves-- go figure), so I felt some things I would rather not have felt, but it wasn't too bad. There have been times I've felt them all the way shooting out my toes like a lightning bolt, screaming, "Ow, ow, OW!!). Since I was sedated, though, I didn't really care too much (but it still hurt like hell).

Today, I felt perfectly fine for most of it. When I felt things going in and winced too much, he'd stop, put in more local, and the rest was easy peasy. Sweet! So, no horrible aftermath and 24-hour downtime.

This doesn't mean I'm not in pain now, as the local wears off (yeeouch!). And there are things I haven't experienced before because I was probably too high as a kite to notice (like the screaming headache I've got going on, on top of the usual ice pick in my forehead). The injection sites are usually tender for a couple of days and the joints are definitely aware something funky was going on, but I can handle that. Ice packs, rest and being extremely physically careful are a lot easier to deal with when it's not compounded by being sick as a dog at the same time.

I go back in a few weeks for another round. I'm a lot less apprehensive about the procedure sans sedation for next time.

On that note, I'm going to go take a long nap, probably followed by dinner ('cause, hey, look at me! I can eat!!) and more sleep. I'm back at work tomorrow, but it should be a pretty easy day. We're doing a lunch in the afternoon then outa' there.