Night of Hell

I was beginning the think the post-surgery convalescence would be uneventful. Unfortunately, I was mistaken.

At around midnight last night, I noticed my back was hurting some. Down in the lumbar area. That happens periodically anyway, and didn't cause any concern at first. It also happened to a moderate extent five years ago when the colon was removed, figuring the cause was probably from lying around in bed too much. As you may recall from an earlier post, my "pain control" is from an epidural put in before the surgery. It has worked great.

Well, by 1:00 a.m., not only did my back feel like it was on fire, my abdominal area start hurting. by 2:00, I was in quite a bit of pain. I called my nurse.

Now mind you, most of the nurses here have been excellent. Unfortunately, she was treating this a "as regular course of business" thing, and I was trying to convince her it was not the normal ache. In any event, unable to lay down, I sat up in a straight back chair all night waiting for the doctor to get here.

One of the doctors did get here early, and immediately prescribed an anti-inflammatory, which did wonders with the back. Unfortunately, the stomach area was still problematic. Kim came in and asked what was leaking on my back. A good question, I thought. We called the morning nurse (shift change), who immediately called "pain management". Seems as though the epidural had come out on it's own during the evening. I would suggest around around midnight. In any event, I'm now on yummy Oxycontin for the remainder of the hospital stay, and I presume for some time period afterwards. .