Have you had any surgery in recent years? How was your experience?

Do you advocate the policy of a stitch in time saves nine- and get treatment/ surgery when recommended or do you wait till you have no other options?

My last surgery was in December 2021 and it was a major surgery, in which I had to be put under deep sedation, in other words, it was lights out for me for quite a few hours and it turned out they only managed to complete half of the surgery and I ended up to had to complete the half in 2022. So really, my last surgery was in 2022.

I often feel like for someone my age, I’ve had a lot of surgeries, even though the number is still in the single digit.

My first surgery was in 2010 when I had to have the calcification along my left leg removed. I was looking forward to crutches but alas, I didn’t need them. I wouldn’t had been able to get upstairs to my room with them anyway.

Now, over a decade later, the calcification has returned. I want to get surgery to remove them again but my doctor isn’t convinced that it’s a good idea as it will no doubt come back and it will get bigger as it’s now.

My second and third surgeries involved my wrists. They were about four years apart and both had to do with carpal tunnel. Both surgeries were successful as my fingers are no longer in pain nor cramp up. I waited four years to complete the surgery on my right hand because I didn’t want to pay the bill. Anything involving medical is expensive in the U.S. and if I can avoid it, I would.

I did the surgery on my right hand when I could no longer tolerate the pain and the numbness in my fingers, especially when I was driving. It was the last straw. That surgery wasn’t too bad, although I did wake up in the middle from a bad dream. I didn’t linger at the hospital. I went home and worked with my right hand bandaged like a large sausage.

Finally, that major surgery I mentioned at the beginning of this post? That entailed extraction of teeth and some jaw reconstructive surgery. Very gnarly. I couldn’t sleep the night after the surgery, so I got up and went to work – thank goodness for working from home. I also experienced nose bleeds the entire day after the surgery and somehow ended up with a hole in the roof of the mouth. This actually led to more surgeries all the way up to my trip to London in 2023.

When I went to do an oral check-up recently, the dentist asked if I will finish the procedure with teeth implants. I told him, “I would but I don’t want to bring myself any more pain.”

So for now, I’m done with surgeries.

Sunday Poser