"Useless, Useless"

Source:  HERE.

As I was in the recovery area at Geisinger Wyoming Valley surgery center, coming off 4+ hours under anesthesia, the first words out of my mouth, as I was looking at the IVs in both hands was "Useless, Useless".  Nurse Brittany, who was equal parts kind and exceptionally competent, wasn't sure what to make of it, other than to tell me "You still have them" (as in my hands, I think).

Edit:  I should have mentioned that I have no idea why, while waking up, I was thinking about John Wilkes Booth on his deathbed.  Welcome to my brain.

Note that going into surgery I just had one IV inserted.  In my preferred choice for such things, the top of my right hand.  Sure sign you are getting older:  You have a preferred IV location.  Anyway, I never got a good explanation as to why I ended up with two hands pierced, although it was clear that the second IV needle was about the size of something used for knitting, based on what I saw coming out and the pressure that needed to be applied to get the bleeding to stop.

Where does this all start?  Well one needs to go back to 2009 when I started to have some discomfort in my gut.  Over time said discomfort manifests itself in the form of a hernia, a type of which didn't require any immediate treatment (as noted by the passing of about 16 years).  My agreement with my doctors over the years was this would be treated if it caused me any problems.  Well, much like small squeaks in an older car eventually become loud squeaks, my gut issue got slowly worse over time.  While I could have tolerated the minor discomfort for longer, I also realized that I wasn't going to have an easier recovery from surgery if I waited longer, so I decided that this was the year.  Also not lost on me is the fact that I know two older people who waited too long to get hernias repaired.  Plans were made over the summer to do the deed on Wednesday, November 19th.

By the way, what I believed to be a single hernia ended up being three hernias.  Two of one type, the third being the largest and the original.

So yesterday was surgery day.  Everyone was prompt and the staff were exceptional, including my surgeon and the above-referenced Nurse Brittany.  Now I just need to heal and make some better life choices.  Fortunately, I have Ms. Rivers to help take care of me, which basically translates into preventing me from doing something stupid.  This is actually more time-consuming than one would think.

Speaking of healing, I am early into the process, so some on-going discomfort is to be expected.  By "discomfort" I mean something that ranges from a mild annoyance to it feeling like my abdomen is being used as Rocky's punching bag.  Not being able to cough is a bit of a drag as well.  

There are other gruesome details, but the point has been made.

This was, by the way, my 5th surgery (three as a child, one to fix my hand a few years ago and this).  Not having the need for a 6th would be pretty good in my book.

All things considered, I will be glad at some point in the not-too-distant future that I had this done now.  A sad fact of adulthood, as opposed to childhood, is that in the former, things almost never get better if you ignore them.  While I didn't ignore my little problem, well 3 little problems, now was the time.  I do have some time off from work, so I plan on not doing too much over the next few days.  Sometimes that's easier said than done, at least for me.

A final note:  As I was brought into the operating room, I saw the robotic device that was going to be intimate with my gut muscles.  My first question to the staff was "Do they call that the Hernia-nator 5000?"  I did get a laugh.  Speaking of laughter, that would hurt right about now, so I am going to quit while I am ahead.