Certainly one of those moments in life where a week has certainly not gone by. But the calendar doesn’t usually lie.
I’ve spent more than enough time lying down and resting and not exerting myself. This is getting really old. But I understand why it’s necessary. For just when I think I’m well enough to pop out to the store or to run an errand, I’m slowly washed over in this dull ache of lethargy and apathy. All I want to do is lie down. Is this the lingering anesthesia? Is this just my body sacking reserves and resources as it performs whatever internal repairs?
A week on, I can cite some evolutions in my symptoms.
Alternating moments of spunkiness which beget lethargy
As noted above, I get these winds of normalcy, where I simply must get out of bed & pull weeds or filter Jude’s room of toys greater than X months old. And just as quickly, my knees are taken out from under me.
Alternating conditions of wet sinuses followed by dry sinuses
Imagine for a moment that we don’t live in a humid climate up here in Marin County. My sinuses are behaving like a dish sponge. Soaking wet after my rinsing, followed by a slow drying up over the next 5-6 hours till the next rinse. But just like that sponge, I can literally feel my tissues and cavities shrinking and hardening over those hours. Where the septum stitches are, this is at times painful, especially when I smile or open wide. But mostly it’s just a general feeling of contraction. I can feel it when I press my tongue hard to the roof of the mouth. As well as when I look hard-right or hard-left. Hard to explain any more than that.
These moments follow the nasal rinses, which I must say, save for the tampon removal, have been the most satisfying of my recovery. Even a full calendar week on, I am getting significant debris flushed out of each nostril. Black jellyfish the size and probable weight of silver dollars, which only seconds before were, or were attached to, the very dryness and crustiness mentioned above.
Headaches
Prior to the surgery, I used to 2 and only 2 different kinds of headaches: {A} the hangover brand, which seemed to nest itself around the base of my skull in the back, and {B} the eyeball kind, which I would get if I spent too much time in bright light without sunglasses, or after long days with contacts. But since the surgery, I am getting a different kind, one that seems to be a mix of the eyeball headache, but centered high and forward on the skull. It’s as if the pain is a focused core just on the other side of my forehead. I’ve had 3x of these in the week since, 1x of which was severe enough to prevent me from walking upright and seriously considering mainlining one of those Vicodins.
Boredom
I hate TV. There are simply loads of crap on, regardless of time of day. The later the day progresses into night, the worse it gets. Nothing but mind-numbing, spirit-crushing crap that people I love are by every definition hooked on. Perhaps I should have temporarily upped the number of Netflix discs I could have out at any one time. But there have been days where all 3x discs are in the mail, and I’m left only with the telly in the bedroom, which was Anna’s childhood TV. I can spend 30-45 minutes at a time sitting at the computer with a comfy pillow under my ass, before the waves of fatigue wash up me. Reading has helped pass the time, but I’ve so far been unable to focus on the development of plot. And I haven’t the energy to get behind my workstation such that I can string a network cable all the way into the bedroom (why can I not make a VPN connection over wireless again?).
Grumpiness, Irritability
Ok, those two terms described me fairly accurately before the surgery. But since, I’ve been more so then usual. I have less patience for many of the same types of situations around the house. Be it Jude perpetually forgetting that Charlotte is asleep, or simple things like inanimate objects not doing as they’re told, I feel myself getting close to the snapping point. Which may all well be the lack of regular medications I’ve been suspending whilst I recover, which I take for some wicked ADD. It’s called Concerta and I must include the lack of this medication as a likely culprit.
I’m writing all this down in with so much detail because this is the kind of post-op account I wish I would have found beforehand. I only found one blog that provided the level of detail I needed on the special kind of surgery for which I was scheduled. If any of that guys’ account was going to be true for mine, I was in a better headspace after reading it. Turned out that his recovery, save for some pain involved with septum splints as well as some GI issues, and has tracked fairly closely with how mine has. Again, certainly NOTHING like the blogs & comments on others’, where pain and severe discomfort and warnings of such were all that I could find. Hope my details and description of the passing of post-op time helps you should you find yourself staring down the business end of endoscopic sinus surgery.