I liken the last 72 hours to reading the screenplay of a horror movie; no one will ever be able to convince me that reading horror emotes the same kind of reaction as watching it. One is all about the thrills, the chills, the special effects, the immediacy; the other is more of a head-game where the seemingly endless exposition lingers and haunts after you've put the book down. But since Halloween morning your mother and I have encountered our fair share of faceless, bureaucratic nightmare creatures (hospital workers/administrators) as well as that old horror genre mainstay: the Unknown.
Dr. C said the surgery was going to last two hours. After the third hour of sitting in that waiting room with absolutely no word from anyone about anything, all sorts of fear-induced phantasms were running through my head. After roughly four hours, Dr. C finally came back to tell us how they were really taking their time with you and that they encountered some unexpecteds that they needed to manage. (Apparently the work they did in the second surgery, the Achilles' tendon lengthening in your right leg, was scarred up and needed to be re-done. On top of that they up and decided to cut/stretch one of the tendon associated with your big toes because Dr. C didn't like the way they were starting to hook inward. So, including the pins and the tendon lengthening in your left leg, that brought your total incisions to 10.) Only one of us was allowed in post-op at a time and I cried when it was my turn. When you didn't look lifeless and pale your face would crinkle and contort right before you cried out in exhausted anguish. I sang songs, I stroked your hair, I went through a list of everyone I know to say that they were wishing you well and that they loved you, but your pain was like one of those horror movie monsters that just kept coming back. There was no soothing you. It took two or three hours just to get a hospital room. You would sleep for fifteen minutes and wake up crying. I think the longest stretch of sleep we got was around five or six in the morning when you slept for about three hours straight. Seemingly possessed, you would wrestle and fight with us to try and rip your own IV out of your hand. When we were discharged by Dr. C, it took two or three hours for the nurse to clear it and finally get your IV taken out.
Since then you've been unhappy with just about everything. There's still no soothing you. We'll offer you a slice of apple; you'll whine and cry like you don't know what it is, insulted that we're holding it out to you. So we'll drop it in your lap and you'll pick it up, inspect it for a sobby second, suddenly remember that you like apple slices, and take a nibble. After you swallow it down you'll whine and cry again, just to sort of punctuate the fact that you're still grouchy and irritable even though you're eating a nice piece of fresh fruit.
Mom and I are at our wit's end. I just spent the last 10 or 15 minutes stroking little circles on your back, trying to get you to go back to sleep. Now, mind you, that's 10 or 15 minutes of just that. It took 10 or 15 minutes just to get you calmed down and back in your crib.
I'm sorry that we can't go on walks. I'm sorry that these casts add, like, fifty pounds to your legs and make crawling very difficult. I'm sorry that the train and the trucks outside our house seem to be just a few decibels nosier than they were earlier this week. Welcome to November, buddy. We'll get through it together.
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