Me Not Healthy: The Lung Cysts (Part 2)

If you're just joining us head back here to read part 1.

To clarify a few things this surgery actually happened a few months ago and I'm trying my best to recall it. Painkillers seem to have a way with messing with your memory, or maybe it's the pain that they don't block out that causes you to forget. Either way, that entire week was kind of fuzzy.

What I do remember was that my surgery was scheduled 4 days after the discussion I had with the doctor. He's one of the few specialists who are able to do the surgery and thus managed to work little things in the system for me. I was pretty lucky.

It was on a Saturday, scheduled for 11AM and my parents accompany me to Emergency, file out forms and wait for me to be wheeled off to the operating room. They tell me that 3 incisions will be made; 1 under the arm for a camera to be inserted (to see the cysts), 1 on the side of my chest for a tube to suck out blood and air, and 1 in the front of my chest for cyst removal.

They also tell me that this is a MASS improvement over the original surgery. They used to cut down the back of an individual, basically peel him open and then remove the cysts that way. My Aunt's friend's son had the old operation, he has a huge scar apparently.

Imagine this to be someone's back and that's how they used to do it.

I was put out for two hours and when I wake up I have a transparent tube sticking out of the side of me. I can see blood dripping through as it transfers to a plastic box attached to the tube. For the rest of my time at the hospital the box goes where I go. Its purpose is to be hooked up to a suction machine to help suck out any remaining blood and stuff from the operation and to store said fluids.

I share a room with a friendly old man who has cancer. I can't remember what kind of cancer but it prevents him from eating so he gets nutrients from other sources. My parents have brought me books to keep me occupied and my girlfriend Theresa has brought flowers. I didn't look at either very much because my hospital experience consisted mostly of me sleeping, only waking up to eat (and fall asleep mid-bite), interact with visitors (and fall asleep mid-speech), go for check-ups, or take painkillers.

I'm guessing this is what it's like to live in a Senior's home.

Did I mention how much I loved the painkillers? They helped me sleep, they took away the pain in my chest and I felt so relaxed afterwards. They started me off with Tylenol-3's. I've had them before and they were awesome. However, my body is kind of weird. And soon the Tylenol-3's stopped working after a day or two.

I'm guessing it's because my body gains a tolerance to things very quickly. They upgrade me to morphine which is amazing and I love it. I don't care that they're stabbing me in the arm every few hours and now my arm is all bruised and sore. I sleep like a baby, I can breathe, and I asked for it as often as possible.

But to my dismay the morphine suddenly stopped working. They decided to try something inbetween morphine and Tylenol 3 and gave me Oxycontin. It sort of worked but it never gave me the same feeling as the morphine did. And who knows how long it would take until my body no longer was affected by the Oxycontin.

I'm an addict and I don't care!

Fortunately the x-rays showed that I was healing just fine. The tube was removed, the hole where the tube used to be was patched up and I was sent home. They told me there was a 95% chance that they got all the cysts and my lungs would be fine from then on.

And I'll conclude this little arc in my next post. Comments and critique is appreciated as always.