I suspected something was up when they didn't take me straight in for x-rays. And I further suspected that my hopes would be dashed when the Cast Room Guy removed the dressing and cleaned up my foot but did not take out the stitches. Then I waited, lined up with a bunch of other bunionectomy patients, for about 45 minutes for Dr. B to come in, say "looking mighty fine," and REWRAP my foot in all that bulky dressing, topped with Ace wrap. Apparently 8 days out is too soon to remove stitches. I was SO disappointed. I have to go back in on Tuesday. I groused a bit about spending 4 hours of my day for what amounted to nothing being done, but I did have to admit that getting the bloody surgical dressing replaced with a clean one and getting a glimpse of my foot made the trip downtown almost worth it.
I always look for reasons to be grateful, and I found them on this trip in two places:
1) The other ladies lined up on the tables in the cast room were all previous bunionectomy patients. Their first surgeries had been botched by podiatrists. Dr. B had done corrective surgery to fix some of the damage done. One woman came close to losing a third of her foot, because of an infection that set in post-surgery and was not caught by her podiatrist. Hearing their stories, I was grateful all over again that last year, after I had chosen a podiatrist to do my surgery, a few people, including my daughter Stephanie, told me to not make a final decision until I had at least consulted with an orthopedic surgeon. I'm grateful for my very skilled surgeon.
2) I asked Elizabeth, who's considering a medical career, if she would like to come with me, see the phenomenon of the cast room, and watch them take my stitches out. She came along and it was wonderful to spend that time with her. She's such good company, and we had a lot of chat and a lot of fun.
After returning from the appointment, I went back to work to pack up my stuff and move it from my instructional coaches' room to my new classroom for next year. I guess that going back to work so soon after my surgery and also going for this follow-up appointment made me feel like I was farther along in recovery than I really was. Also, this foot has not been nearly as swollen and bruised as the other foot was, so I had a false sense of its ability to tolerate activity. I scootered all around the building on my knee walker, packing and moving boxes. I had some help, to be sure, but also stayed a few additional hours and transported boxes on my scooter. By 5:00, I was exhausted and went home and fell into my recliner. When I went to get up a bit later, I immediately regretted my over-activity. My foot had that burning stinging throbbing feeling that I remembered from the other surgery but had not yet experienced with this one. Shoot! My foot was definitely not ready to be hanging down that much and had swelled way too much in the course of the day. So now I'm doing penance, staying in my recliner all weekend, trying to return it to the path of healing. As Elizabeth said to me this morning, "PATIENCE." It's not my most prevalent virtue. Here are the pictures of my briefly unwrapped foot.
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