My Train Wreck

Only recently have I ever understood those depression commercials where they have a cartoon character releasing teardrops into their morning cereals, fighting to find meaning to get up and go. This is probably the most notable reason for my lack of writing and updating, although there have been others.

I currently have a broken computer and wait daily for Dell to surprise me with my new best friend. Being without has made bed rest a lot less tolerable. One thing that has kept me going through this all is the new addition of my first niece, Marleigh Jane. She's a hoot and knows exactly how to make me smile without even opening her eyes.

As for my current medical status, I just found out yesterday that I will be having yet another surgery before this ordeal comes to an end. This will be, if anyone is keeping score, the 4th surgery since I became ill back in March. The difference between this surgery and the others that I have sustained is that they are filling holes this time rather than making them.

After a rather frustrating game of "Monkey in the Middle" with different Kaiser departments, it has been determined that the plastic surgery team will carry my case. I met with Dr. McDowell, the plastic surgeon, yesterday. He informed me that I am to have surgery in about a month, where they will take my right hamstring muscle and cut it off the knee in order to stretch it up to my buttocks area. This is an utter disappointment to me because of all of the work that I have done thus far with trying to regain muscle control in that area. By moving that muscle and the adjacent tissue, they will be able to successfully close the wound for good and I will lose any hope of ever using that muscle again.

Along with the wound closure, the plastic surgery team will be assessing my pelvic bone and hip. With any luck, they will only need to scrape it a bit to rid it of any infection. I have been warned, however, that the bone could be more extensively infected and need the care of the osteopaths to cut the diseased bone away. I am hoping for the slight scrape as opposed to the cut-it-out method, for obvious reasons.

In the meantime, I am modifying my bed rest schedule to include various activities that I enjoy: visiting my new baby niece, barbecuing with friends, attending weddings, etc. I need to do all that I can to prepare for another bout of serious bed rest (4-6 weeks), this time in a hospital setting.

All in all, it looks like (at the earliest) that I will be back into some sort of normalcy by mid-September. I have no clue what this means for teaching, coaching, triathloning, or any of it for that matter. BUT at least there is a light somewhere, ever so faint, at the end of the tunnel.