So, you go to your surgeon's office on a Friday afternoon for your follow-up exam just prior to going to the beach for two weeks. You expect to have a conversation about how much swimming you can (or cannot) do, and whether the scar is healing as it should. You expect him to tell you whether or not you still need a nurse to come daily to change your bandages or can you just slap a few bandaids over the worst parts, and call it a day.
What you do not, even in your wildest, worst-case imaginings, do you think that your doctor will drop a bomb in your lap so huge that it rocks the foundation of your very existence. Because he tells you that the lab report came back on the now-removed gall bladder, and the results were... horrifying.
GANGRENE.
GANGRENE????? What the holy fuck is up with THAT? As one of my friends said, isn't that something that soldiers got during, like, the Civil War, like in Gone With the Wind?
In other words, had this gall bladder not been removed toute de suite, and removed successfully... I might have D-I-E-D.
When the doctor told me a week ago, in all seriousness, that the infection he found in there was very, very bad, I believed him. I could see it on his face. But he never said "gangrene", either because even he didn't know it was that bad, or because he DID know, just by looking at it, but needed to wait for the official results before saying anything. The thing is, I had no idea I was THAT sick. I had NO fever to speak of. My first round of bloodwork showed NO infection, although the pre-op bloodwork did show something. Yes, I had tremendous pain, but nothing inconsistent with a "normal" gall-stone attack.
Who knew that the freaking bird's-egg-sized gallstone was completely cutting off circulation to the gall bladder, causing it to nearly DOUBLE in size, and slowly die, without me even knowing it.
I'm sorry if this is too graphic for some of you but you have no idea how traumatized I have been, especially since hearing this, and writing about it sort of helps me get my mind around it all. Georges, in his own way, has been just as upset... he doesn't want to let me out of his sight. He went out and bought us both iPhone 4's yesterday so we'd have something fun to focus on during then next few days while we get ready to go on our two week holiday to his sister's place. (She's been great, arranging for the daily nurse to come change my bandages, because the scar is slow-healing which means NO swimming at all for me for at least 10 days -- major bummer, but how can I complain when I'm A-L-I-V-E?)
I can walk around and do things more -- in fact, yesterday, because I could NOT find a taxi and the buses were taking too long, I walked to the clinic in a heat wave, and then walked to our old house to visit with my friend and wait for Georges to come home from work, and THEN we got a taxi home -- but I tire out very easily and still need naps every day. So I know I'm healing, despite the scar not cooperating (at least it's not infected). It's just really unnerving to find out, after all is said and done, that I was WAY sicker than I ever thought possible.
And frankly, I am absolutely 100% NOT ready to leave this world yet. I have too many things I haven't accomplished -- like writing many books and seeing at least one of them made into a movie. And I haven't had my 30+ years with Georges yet... we're only celebrating our 2nd anniversary on Monday.
That's not nearly long enough to be with the man I waited 46 years to meet in the first place.
