Okay.  I had a thing done to me.

I finally got my knee replacement.  And it has been (and continues to be) an adventure.

In case you are unaware, knee replacement is a fucking terrifying surgery.  They cut off a hunk of your tibia, hammer (yes hammer)  a spike into it (for the base of the knee) and then they remove the knee cap and glue a replacement to your femur. 

I was planning on being in the hospital overnight (because of the issue with low platelets) – I was finally released to a skilled nursing place a week after the surgery; and then finally got my fat ass home a week after that.

Why was I kept in the hospital so long?  Several factors.

1) pain management.  Holy fuck does this hurt.  Oxy10 was not touching it; morphine was not touching it; finally  dilaudid does the trick.  Doesn’t remove the pain, but takes it down where I can actually get up and use the bedside commode (the toilet being at least one step too far). 

2) Constipation – which started 2 days before surgery and continued for 7 (count them) 7 days.  I stopped eating because everything I tried to swallow came right back up.  I ready for them to just squeeze me out like a tube toothpaste.

3) Fucked up insurance mixed with the fact hat I am not on Medicare – which people take a look at my fat old lady face and assume that of course I’m on Medicare – and therefore, end up having to do paperwork twice.

My big mistake was going to skilled nursing instead of home.  But both hubby and I were understandably nervous.  Trying to wrangle this fat old lady ass when one of her legs is not working is good cause for concern; especially when you have this really big house with long hallways between everything and the toilet.

Nursing care was a nightmare except for their PT department which was terrific.  The food was mostly inedible – at the point of going home I have lost 20 pounds in just two weeks; and am working hard to get back to eating enough to fuel my recovery.

Every morning the med nurse would hand me a little bucket of pills.  I would ask, “what are you giving me,”  and the answer always was “I don’t know.”  Fuck me.  I have medications that have to be taken hours from each other because they don’t play well together.  So yeah, this is a problem. 

Leaving the hospital I was on high doses of Tylenol.  The nursing facility had me back on oxy5.  Because it cut the pain and helped me sleep I stayed on it.  But now I’m home, I’m taking ibuprofen (which I shouldn’t be taking but I want some pain help and Tylenol just doesn’t cut it.)  However, to get my pain meds, I would often have to wait for 2 hours or more after I requested my med 

The constipation stopped and diarrhea arrived on the scene with a vengeance.  This lead to me getting up and going to the bathroom without assistance – because ain’t nobody got time to wait 20 minutes or more when shit is literally knocking on the back door.  And I didn’t always make it.  Some fun.  After my nurse liaison asked the med nurse for something for the diarrhea it only took 15 hours to get some immodium. 

And now I am home.  What a joy.  I still hurt.  I have trouble sleeping now that I’m off the oxy. I have been sawn into pieces and hammered into place; stopped up; beshitted; wheeled about; drugged to the gills – oh and you know those platelets that were such a problem?  Ever since the surgery they have been having a god-damn party.  The last they were checked, they were up in the 190s.  Mutherfuckers.