Sunday, January 1, 2012

A peice on Phantom Pain

As most of my regular readers know (ye brave, ye few), I had "righty" (my right ovary) removed in the summer of 2010. In so many ways, it was a refreshing experience. On a personal level, I got to see how people handle their own fears. I got to see how I handle mine in a situation that could have turned deadly. And I got to see who was really in the trenches with me, and who couldn't be.

5 days post-op in Disneyland with Gerber Baby Family. Like my wheels?
 I'm about a year and a half out from that and I'm finally understanding some of the strange experiences I have now because of the surgery.

It actually started yesterday, and I didn't want to believe it. Thinking I was just exhausted from working such long hours and generally stressed, I thought I'd "sleep it off". Well, today, there is no mistaking it. After a little research, I'm convinced.

There is such a thing as phantom pain. I mean, I assumed it was true for limbs, but missing organs? Apparently the scar tissue can tighten and swell because your body is still designed to vascularize each ovary, depending on what internal schedule your body is on. Apparently it's been "lefty"s turn for a while and now it's "righty's" turn. Only "righty" checked out of hotel body a few years ago, and now the body is going, "What the (fill-in-explative-of-choice-here)?!".  It's not as bad as I felt when I still had the tiny ball of disease growing in there, but it doesn't exactly make me want to get up and move around today.

But I've never let a little thing like pain keep me indoors, and today is no different! It's my first day off after four 10-12 hour days! I plan to enjoy it. I slept in for a good chunk of the day, and now I'm headed to take a shower, get dressed and head to a movie! And yes, I plan on starting the new year off right. I'll be walking to the movie theater and back. It's the first day of the new year!
New Years eve dinner - chicken and barley soup, spinach salad, and steamed veggies

I ended the new year on a healthy note, and I plan on starting off this one the same way and keeping it going. I weigh less at the end of this year, than I did at the end of last year! I plan on hitting my birthday in a few weeks in 1-derland, and I plan to stay there.

So there that's how I'm starting off 2012 - learning something new, making good choices, and, as Lou Mongello (and Walt Disney) said - "Keep Moving Forward."


3 comments:

  1. Phantom pain is real and scar tissue can do odd things too. Scar tissue causes adhesions that can sort of cramp and cause quite a lot of pain - I get this every now and then from my gall bladder scars. Sort of annoying!

    Looks like you have been making great choices on the food and exercise front - keep it going!

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  2. Phantom pain sucks. So does scar tissue pain. Been there, done that. I know exactly how you feel... maybe not exactly where you feel it, but I know how it is. Sleep does wonders for me. I've been sleeping all day! (From 8pm last night to 8pm tonight, actually. Only a few hours awake in between)

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  3. Yeah - I scar from EVERYTHING on the outside (I form keliods, which means the scars grow bigger than the wound was), so since this was my first internal surgery, no one really know how this would effect that. Sometimes people that scar on the outside, don't scar on the side, but I already had adhesions when they went in (probably due to years and years of ruptured cysts). So I'm guessing that's what is going on. Been totally productive today though to keep my mind off it! Cleaned out the car, ran errands, cleaned the house. Did laundry.... And now I think it's finally movie time, but I'm scrapping the walk. I still have over 800 calories to eat and it's almost 7:30pm, I don't want to end up screwing up my progress by falling SUPER short because I added on 300-500 by walking! So tonight is a relaxing night. :)

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