Saw my apartment and other updates

I haven't updated on my own situation in a while, there hasn't been too much to say. Last week I saw my CR surgeon, my stoma nurse, and my plastic surgeon. All agree that the wound is healing, the tissue looks good, and it's just slow. My CR surgeon said that they only see this slow wound healing with diabetes, radiation, and Crohn's disease. She thinks that Crohn's changes the nature of the tissue in some people, says it will heal, just is very slow.

My nurse suggested that we try aquacell instead of silvadene, as maybe the wound is too wet. Plastic surgeon went for alternating every two days. The aquacell is more comfortable, nice to not have all that cream all over me.

Slowly I am allowed more mobility. I still can't sit, but I can bend a lot more -- not all the way to the floor and not quickly, but I can get on the couch now and can do a lot of things I couldn't before. I can be on my back when I'm lying down, which is nice....

It's not as hard for me to be in the car -- we put the seat all the way back and have a bunch of pillows. It's hard to get in and out w/out bending much (kind of a limbo thing) but not so bad once I'm there.

Up until yesterday, I had only been in the car to go to the doctor, but yesterday my partner drove me to my apartment, which was so wonderful. I haven't been there in two months. It's nice staying with her, but most of my stuff is there, I've lived in that neighborhood for twenty plus years, etc.... I picked up some mail, some clothes, books, a few peppers that were still alive on the porch etc.

I am doing some of the work projects I planned for my sabbatical, and also working on a crocheted blanket that I started after my last surgery (and abandoned when the weather got warm). I've been reading and watching videos. I go for a long walk every day. It's not awful by any means, but I do find myself frustrated sometimes, as it's been nine months with an open butt wound..... my partner checks and dresses the wound every night (we call it "butt check") and it's really not a level of intimacy I ever imagined, but it's fine.... although now and then she mentions that she never considered nursing as a career....

I have started doing a little shopping in the neighborhood (nothing on the bottom two shelves, ha ha). Last week I was checking out of a crowded store and I accidentally dropped a dollar bill on the floor. I kind of froze and pondered what to do (left my grabber at home). After a bit, the woman behind me picked it up and handed it to me, and I said that I had surgery and couldn't bend and was just getting out and about, and she said that most people pick up money when they drop it, so she figured ... it was actually a very nice interaction (in Boston, people don't always talk to strangers). I said it really wasn't worth a dollar to me to bend all the way to the floor and we laughed.

So, that's about it for me for now..... it has been nice posting here a lot too, especially as now I actually know answers to some of the questions..... thanks.

Wow, blueglass, it sound like it has been a rough go. I find that the support of a loving partner is soooo important. My hubby was instrumental in getting me through my rough patches; I am glad you have your partner to help you too. That comment re: not considering nursing as a career...my partner said the same thing a few times! Anyway, glad to hear that things are coming along...it will be slow but at least you are getting out and about a bit. I had a pressure sore in and around my nether regions for months from being incapicated with UC prior to the surgery, so I know what a pain in the butt (literally and figuratively) a slow healing bottom wound can be.

Hi Bluegrass, that is so important, going back to your own apartment. You've been through so much and finally some progress and the healing has come noticeably, if slowly, far enough that you could go home and start picking things up again. And themain thing is really starting your sabatical work. If it were me I would have turned into an absolute stink bomb and made myself unbearable. I don't know if I could have waited that long before picking work again that I really care about and so I'm going to think about you the next time I start feeling sorry for myself (which is sort of fun but not really :_)))) Clearly your partner is there through thick and thin, sorry, I can't think of any good puns...

Hi Blue, I understood you only went to your apartment to pick up some stuff. That in itself is great, as I said. And I think it's fantastic that one project is happening, and the other just has to wait until you're up for it again. That alreaedy sounds like a full program. Convalescence plus one project, not two, is enough.
I am really enjoying my new apartment, I donÄt know how to say in English how it is upstairs. It looks like a barn, with old wooden beams running through the walls (like the outside of a tudor house), and two old wooden posts between the floor and ceiling. It was so NOT a city apartmetn up here, more so downstairs, that I had to take it. Built in 1845, it's a landmarked house, I got the place super cheap and I can't stop bragging.....
I was searching for a new place in a way that is very connected to having UC, the colectomy, and the next two operations. I was looking for a place where I could convalesce happily and just feel better for living here. Weird thing is that I sleep upstairs and the bathroom is downstairs. I figured worst case scenario is someone has to bring my bed downstairs into the living room if I can't handel running to the bathroom a couple of times a night for the first few months. Iwondered if it was smart to take the place at all for that reasons, but I also needed to look ahead to the time just a few months down the road when being separated from the bathroom by a staircase won't be a hardship.
Work is another matter, I'm swamped, bringing work home, and my colleague, with whom I share an office, is a difficult person.

Anyway, you are no way losing time, although when we get sick that's the first think we get angry about, is this sense of losing time. But this is your body speaking in some way, and you have learned to live with illness and convalescence, and the best thing is now you are working on one of the projects. I am totally warmed that you get back out there to the extent that you can, as soon as you can!

B'Dereh, I'm not positive how to say it either, "exposed beams" or something like that, but it sounds really nice. You can figure out something to make it work when convalescing.... nice to look to the future. It's nice you have a place you feel good about.

I got a bunch of new furniture last year.... I really didn't feel good about my place, and I was so sick and not keeping it up, and I'm not so good w/that anyways.... and finally I thought my space was making me worse, so I took some $$ from savings and upgraded some things... figured if I was going to be home all the time, home should be a nicer place to be..... so, when I went to visit, I smiled at the newer things (which I did get to live with for several months....)

I do appreciate the reminder that I'm convalescing. I forget that sometimes, much as it doesn't make sense.... easy for me to focus on what I'm not doing.

I have been doing some writing about being sick for my website, I mentioned that in another post; it's a series on teaching w/a chronic illness, more about before surgery (not teaching now)... my website is the project I'm working on, and it's one where I can do a bit here or there, as I feel like it. I changed a lot of the look and feel so I like it better now. I have a book project too (work related), the one I was really excited about, and I did write a lot for a month or so before surgery, but I just work too hard on it, doesn't go w/convalescing so well (and w/not being home....)

Thanks everyone....

So glad you are finally able to feel some progress. It's amazing how something as little as being able to go to the store sends us to cloud nine. I am always impressed with how well you seem to carry yourself through this lengthy ordeal. I'm sure you have down times, but your overall attitude is so good and you are so active and helpful with everyone here.

I am back to crocheting now, too since the weather is colder. I am in a bit of a crunch as I boldy endeavored to make a bunch of scarves for Christmas. I can only get done what I get done, right?

Oh, you're in the home stretch with that blanket now.

This is the pattern I'm using for the scarves: http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/silk-garden-sock-hakelschal--silk-garden-sock-crochet-scarf

I have six different multi-color sock yarns for six different scarves. The one I am currently working on is a mix of oranges, green, brown, etc....very fallish. One sister-in-law loves orange so that will be hers. The other color combos are all different some greens, pink, purple, etc.

Those squares are very pretty! I love the color combination. I agree the border is the way to go....it will look so polished.

Aren't we just crafty, LOL! Nice to talk about something non-butt related once in awhile though! ;-)

Yeah, middle school, and home economics courses, don't get me started, it was a nightmare of, well ok I was bookish and withdrawn and dreamy and all the nasty girls who thought they were so slick made fun of me. What I didn't understand was why I had to do these home ec classes, let's faces they were sub-level, and the boys got to do shop, so they made things out of wood, which made more sense but I wasn't allowed to switch. I have this seering memory of the idiot home ec teacher explaining in such a long, drawn out way, how to level off the flour in a cup, or the baking powder in a teaspoon, with one side of the buttering knife or a spatula. Very distint memory of being so bored and felt so insulted somehow I wanted to throw up or faint or something. If I had a kid I would pay for private school before making them go through anything like that.
So I flopped at sewing, anything wrong with that? I jammed the sewing machine within one minujte every time. And we had to do a sewing project and sew ourselves something using a pattern and I just couldn't manage it and my mother yelled at me for wasting money on fabric, etc. etc.................

It's ridiculous when I think about it, I don't let my sister in law belittle her kids because they 1)gained two pounds or 2)are simply disapointing her narcisim simply by being who they are. The "fat" one plays the basoon and can go to a conservatory after high school, she is so great.

i'd love to have a job protecting 13 year old girls from the world's stupidity. I never called myself a fiminist but I deeply believe we are only meant to unfold as exactly who and what we are and no one should interfere with that, whether we're girls or boys. I see an entire city of people who are totally interferred with.

OK I'm jagging about 13 year old trauma but please know I'm doing it with a smile.