It worked for us!
Close! Close! Close!
I hope it works out this time!
Oh-oh, earworm. I have Devo playing in my head…Zip it! Zip it good!
Speedy healing thoughts going out to you, norinew.
Healing thoughts from me, too.
Close close close!
Add me in to the group cheering for the wound to close.
Robin
Cloooooooooosssssseeeeeee!
Thoughts heading your way.
Heh!
Of course, now that surgery is day after tomorrow, that could read as ‘Cloze, cloze, cloze’ or “close, close, close”
Because the surgery is close (as in soon), but we do hope it will close (as in seal!)
Thanks for the good wishes, all!
You would think, having had so many surgeries, I’d be ‘over’ the whim-whams about it, but I’m not. I find myself thinking freaky thoughts like: “What if I can feel everything that happens during surgery, but because of the drugs I can’t remember that I felt it?” and "They can call it ‘putting you to sleep’ all they like, but it’s really more like being ‘temporarily dead!’ "
Fortunately, I have a 'script for Xanax, and I will be making use of it Wednesday morning!
With a ‘minimal amount of water’ as they say! 
Yes, I originally read *close *in the sense of *soon *and thought it was an odd post. Later I got it. I’m a little slow today. (or maybe more often than that.)
Given the number of surgeries you’ve had, it’s a perfectly understandable mistake!
For some odd reason, I always find stories about wounds failing to heal very interesting (in a medical sense). I’m intrigued as to why this happens.
So in the surgery, will they just re-open the wound and take out the old sutures, and re-close it?
Does the wound hurt a lot? When you go to the wound specialist, does it hurt lot when he examines it? Does it bleed or just ooze fluid? Do you have to keep a bandage on it all the time?
Good luck, Norine, I will be thinking about you!!
A close friend had multiple hernias repaired last June, I went to stay with her for a week when they allowed her to come home. She had a horribly similar experience with the entire ginormous wound healing except for a teeny tiny stubborn inch that refused to close. Went through the same processes you’ve been through, and wound up at a wound care center for months, but I’m happy to tell you last week was her final visit and it’s all better now.
Granted, you’re already four months later into this particular crap saga, but the larger point is, it did heal. So, take heart.
Close! Close! Close!
Yep, that’s pretty much the plan. No one seems to know why this happens sometimes, but it’s my understanding that once it’s re-opened and re-closed, it would be very unusual for it not to heal again.
It hurts when there’s direct pressure on or around where the infected sutures are.
Maybe I’m just a wimp, but hell yes, it hurts! Even for just cleaning it out, I pretty much beg for lidocaine gel first!
The discharge is bloody sometimes, but not usually.
Here’s my double-whammy: I’m allergic to pretty much all adhesives. The area around my wound looks way worse than the wound itself because my last round of bandaging actually left blisters which are now all dried up and scabbed over. Yuck! So most of the time, I just tuck a maxi-pad (absorbent side against my skin) down the front of some snug-fitting undies (the ‘light control’ kind work great for this!)
Thanks!
I’m glad your friend healed! But my insurance company decided not to approve any more visits to the wound clinic, since we weren’t seeing any progress. They had no problem approving surgery, though. I don’t know if an hour-long surgery is cheaper than a year of twice-weekly wound clinic visits or not. Of course, I guess their feeling is, they could end up paying for a year of visits and it still might not be successful, and they’d still have to pay for surgery anyway.
Actually, at this point, it has pretty much stopped oozing. That happened once before, when I was going to the wound clinic, and I thought it was a good sign. But the therapist started poking around the wound to check for pain and tenderness, which is still there, and said if we let it close up over infected sutures, that’s very, very bad. So he actually re-opened it :eek:
If that sounds painful, let me assure you, it was. I may have said bad words.
Many of you won’t know this, but the weather here in western Maryland sucks monkey balls right now. Therefore, my surgeon’s child’s day care was closed today. Therefore, my surgeon was forced to re-schedule all the surgeries she had scheduled for today.
I am re-scheduled for Friday, Feb 6th.
I’ve been avoiding drinking my dinner-time wine for a week now, as per my pre-op instructions. So, fuck it. Tonight and tomorrow night, I’m damned well going to enjoy my wine. As of this Friday, one week pre-op, I’ll be wine-free again!
Another week. Sometimes waiting is the worst part.
Enjoy the wine!
Oh, darn, I was hoping there’d be good news.
Closecloseclosecloseclose…
Yeah, the waiting sucks! However, when they first called yesterday morning to tell me it had to be canceled, they said her nurse would call me back today to reschedule, and I was thinking it was going to be at least another two weeks (you know how most docs who do surgery have a ‘surgery day’; hers is Wednesday), so at least it’s not quite that long.
I did enjoy the wine, though!
drink! drink! drink!
then
close! close! close!
I drank more wine with dinner tonight. Tomorrow, I’m back to Diet Nestea, thankyewverymuch.
Thank you for your good wishes!
Close closer! Close closer! Close closer!
How aggravating, Norine. You are a woman of patience and fortitude. I’d be climbing the walls.
(Oh, hey, have you thought about tucking a bribe for the surgeon under your gown? I did that when I had my gall bladder out. Put a pound bag of Hershey’s miniatures under there with a note “it’s my first time. Please be very gentle.” I understand it was a big hit. The anesthesiologist hogged all the Special Darks.)
What makes you so sure I’m not climbing the walls?? 
Heh. I’ve had lots of surgeries and never thought of that. I may have to try it! 
So how did it go? (I’m remembering correctly, am I not? It was yesterday?)