There is nothing like healing from surgery to completely emasculate you (I mean this figuratively, not literally, after all I did get to keep one of the boys). I am limited to somewhere between ten and thirty pounds. At one point I thought the surgeon said don't do anything over ten pounds for at least two weeks, but at my week follow up, I thought he said I could start doing thirty. So, my life the past couple weeks has been relegated to sitting on the couch doing nothing. After all, most of my hobbies involve things over ten to thirty pounds. And most of the things I need to do around the house, involve things over ten to thirty pounds. Have you ever thought about how little weight that is? If I want to barbecue, I have to place the charcoal one briquette at a time. If I want to do laundry (which I don't want to do, but I had to do it), I have to move things into the washer, into the dryer, and out of the dryer a few pieces at a time. In short, I feel worthless.
This is my second adventure with having holes poked through my abdominal wall. This first time was my gastro-esophageal reflux disease surgery, which was five small laparoscopic holes, the longest being about an inch long. This time it is a six inch long (yes, I did just measure it so I wouldn't be accused of exaggerating) slice along my waist line for the testicular cancer removal (technically called a right radial orchiectomy). The bad thing about my first surgery was it was five holes across my stomach. So everything hurt. This cancer surgery is just from my belly button right. In some ways this is better. When getting up or doing certain activities that start to hurt, I can use my left side to get the job done. There are two problems with that. The first one is since the left side seems to be OK, I sometimes forget that the right side is hurt.
And that is what has happened this week. The first incident came Wednesday. One of our basenjis loves walking with us to take the trash our. We have a fairly long country driveway, so it is a bit of a walk. There were three trash bags, but one was really light. My wife took the two heavy ones, and I took the light one and the dog. Being mindful of my recent surgery, and still filling a little sting when I picked up the bag, I held the leash and the trash in my left hand to put less stress on my right side. By the way, for those unfamiliar with basenjis, they weigh around twentyfive/thirty pounds. So, whether I am supposed to be doing ten pounds or thirty pounds, I imagine those pounds aren't supposed to be moving at a high velocity toward something he wants to smell or chase or pee on or whatever his motivation is. All I know is I saw the retractable lead spooling out. I knew the hit was about to come. There was nothing I could do, but wince in pain. My wife, who had made much better time to the garbage rendezvous had come back to get the light bag I had, as I am getting pulled like an epileptic catfish on a fishing line by our dog-on-a-mission. She keeps trying to grab what she thought was the source of my pain, the trash bag. I keep trying to hand her the leash, which jerks violently every time I hold my hand out to give it to her. Finally, my wife caught on and she grabbed the dog out of my hand. I didn't think it hurt me too bad...until the next day. It felt like when you have stomach surgery and you try to tackle your sister's roommate, who wasn't aware that you would try to tackle her in that state so she wasn't prepared and drops you, you know just like that. Oh, I'm the only one that has ever happened to? OK, it's a long story for another time. First of all you have to know my sister's old roommate which is an even longer story. Anyway, I could tell I was hurt a little from Wednesday's incident, but nothing serious. I would just have to take it easy.
The second problem with mainly being hurt on just one side, is you start using the other side to the point that you are wearing out your "good" side.
I knew I had to take it easy after Wednesday night's incident, but I am getting some serious cabin fever. By today, my boredom had overcome common sense and I went up to my workshop, just to organize some tools. First problem, my workshop used to be a tractor-trailer workshop, with giant sliding doors the width of a semi. But see, I'm smart. I know I can't slide those open normally. I take my snake whacking stick (another long story) that is doubling for a cane right now to wedge the door open, which is another genius move to take a stick with a big blade at the bottom and use it to steady yourself as you accidentally kick it (at least I was wearing my steel-toed boots). With the door opened a little, I can lean on the door to slide it open the rest of the way to get some air in the shop.
I am doing pretty good at first. Organizing screws, washers, bolts (no I am not going to make a "nuts" joke here) and other light spare parts. Then I start rearranging some light tools. A little dumber move, but still fairly safe. Then, I take my RIGHT hand and slide open a big heavy drawer that I have opened thousands of times, but this is the first time I have opened it two weeks after surgery and felt a shooting pain down my side. Not ready to go back to the house yet, I decide to make that mistake several more times throughout the day. Each time I do, it makes me lean on my whacking stick/cane more with my good side causing me to do more painful stuff with the right side.
Figuring I haven't done enough stupid stuff today, I decide I will just get a few more tools out of an old box truck I use for storage. I carefully balance on my whacking cane and manage a slow and painful entry into the truck. Dumb move, but I am already inside so I might as well do what I came inside to do. All I have to do is slide the heavy box of tools toward the back of the truck, then I can get down and take them out one by one. I just first need to move this car battery charger out of the way. Ow. Then this little band saw. Oww. Then slide this deep cycle battery to the side. OOOWWW. OK. At least now I have a clear path to slide the tools back. Steady myself with my left hand and my whacking cane. Take my right hand and slide. OOOOOWWW! Slide. SON OF A...OOOOOWWWW!!! Slide. WHAT WAS I THINKING?!?! OOOOOOWWWWW!!!! Finally done. Now I just have to get down. Ow. Ow. Ouch. Ow. Ow. Ouch. Sniffle. Whimper. Now I am hurting way too much to actually do anything. I decide to lock everything up and go back to the house. The spring loaded door on the truck that flew up earlier, is a lot harder to get down. Normally that is the easy part of shutting down. All you have to do is hang on it and it comes right down. Lifting an arm up hurts. Putting my weight on that arm, that surprisingly uses a lot more abdominal muscles that I ever realized, and hurts a lot. I finally close it. Now just to shut the doors...um, there is no way to lean on the door to slide it closed. I try to pull it. I definitely pulled something, but the door hasn't budged. I think I can feel every single place they operated. Luckily, my mother-in-law happened to be nearby walking the dog so she was able to pull it shut. I close up, realizing that sitting and watching the rest of the Top Gear marathon would have been a much more worthwhile activity today.
Now I just have to walk down the hill, up the stairs to the house, down the stairs in the house to get clean clothes, and back up again to take a shower. Declines are much harder to walk on for some reason. The steel-toed boots I put on earlier now seem to weigh a ton a piece. Plus, all the twisting, pushing, and leaning I was doing exclusively with my "good" leg has left my knee and hip in shambles. I swear I was able to watch the complete sunset in the time it took me to walk the one hundred feet back to the house.
Now, I am back to where I started the day, except in more pain. I am back to laying on the couch, waiting for the Top Gear marathon to start back up, and praying I don't have to go the bathroom anytime soon. The bathroom is upstairs and I don't think I do that right now. I wonder when I will be able to lift ten pounds again?
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