And surgery it was...

Well, Thursday came and I was scheduled to be at SMH by 8:30am. They took us into a prep area, where I needed to put on the ever-cool backless jammies and the classic light-blue cotton robe. And don't forget those sweet-looking grey booties with the non-slip soles. Did I mention that this stylish ensemble was sans under garments (I thought I felt a draft).

I then got a real nice IV setup installed. And after a brief wait (~1 hour) and about 30 people asking me my name and date of birth, we were off for the pre-op area. I sat in there for another hour or so. I chatted with my anesthesiologist (Jeff), several other attending individuals, and then finally Dr. Cass. The plan was still to just plate the fibula and not the tibia (unless he saw something once he was in there.

After a short bit I was wheeled into the OR, where there was a small army of people all busy doing stuff in different corners of the room. A quick hop from one rolling bed to another (remembering to keep the luxurious jammies in place, as best I could), Jeff was ready to do his stuff. They started by asking how I had broken my ankle and as I was explaining, they placed an oxygen mask next to my mouth and told me to take some deep breathes. A few more short stories about my heroic tales on the bike and I heard Jeff say, "Goodnight". I think he was getting bored...

Anyway, I don't remember much about the dream. But I think it had something to do with me winning the "Tour da France" eight times (take that Lance).

I woke up in post-op with a serious case of dry mouth. As they hovered around monitoring my pulse, breathing, heart-rate and my rippling muscles (I made the last one up), they asked lots of "how are you feeling" questions. Dr. Cass stopped by and explained that he only needed to plate the fibula, like he expected and that he would chat with me later. They had put another plaster half cast on the leg and wrapped the whole thing in an Ace bandage. After about another 1 1/2 hour waking-up period, I was shipped up to my private room on the eighth floor.

Kathy was already up in the room waiting for me. Once settled in, I was given my ol' favorite, Fentinal (sp) with the magic, little button. I started pushing the button right away. It was now about 2:30pm or so. I had some ice chips for my dry throat. It wasn't long before the nausea started to show up, so they gave some stuff for the nausea and it seemed to help.

Kathy and the kids were there for awhile and a bit later a couple of guys from work stopped up. Right around 6:00pm, I starting feeling really tired, Kathy and Bill headed home and I was left with my liquid supper (apple juice, raspberrie sherbert, chicken broth, and hot tea). I only felt like a small sampling of the sherbert, but I did drank all my apple juice (smily face for me). I didn't feel much like the soup or the tea. The rest of the night was interrupted by lots of visits from various nurses (all asking for my name and date of birth).

The first night nurse kept bugging me to go to the bathroom (number one). But, peeing while laying down is not my thing. After giving it the ol' college try, I had squeeked out about 200ml. This apparently wasn't enough for her though, and she brought in an ultrasound device to see how much was remaining in my bladder. She said that the ultrasound indicated there was another 600ml or so in there (who are you going to believe, me or a machine). So anyway, she said I could try once more or it was catheter time. It didn't take me long to get the remaining 600ml into the jug (I didn't want the alternative).

They put this little air-bag thing on my left leg, it would puff up with air every minute or so to help prevent blood clots. But it wasn't very conducive to getting very restful sleep. So, I was getting about 15 minute catnaps all night long. About 4:00am, I had had enough. I asked the night nurse if I could take it off, she said that it would be OK. And after she took it off, I took one more hit of my favorite fetinal and went right to sleep. I sleep until 6:30am, when two guys came in to take the plaster cast off and they gave me a nice new plastic boot cast. It is the new Nike-Aire model with the little pumper thing on each side of the boot to make it nice and firm around the ankle. It may be made out of carbon fiber and I'm pretty sure I can attach a Look cleat to the bottom. So I'm all set now.

Dr. Cass (and his roadies) came in and said that I could go home today, but he would schedule me to meet with him in two weeks. He went over some details about taking care of the incision, that I still need to stay off of my right leg, and to keep it elevated as much as possible.

About 8:30am, Kathy came in and shortly after that they brought in my breakfast of grape juice, hot tea, and oatmeal. It tasted OK, and best of all it stayed down.
After a light lunch, they came in with all the paperwork and by 2:00pm we were on our way home.

My leg feels much better and now "let the healing begin"...