Slowly Dying

Posted by Thomas J. Brown at 0926 hrs

Ouch. My neck is killing me. Not my throat (well, not right now anyway. That pain will come later as the meds start to wear off), my neck. Why is it I can't sleep normally anymore? Did my tonsils work to balance the way my head was positioned on my pillow? I expect my throat to hurt when I wake up in the morning, but not my damn neck. I can't really turn my head without this sharp, stabbing pain. If I want to look from side to side, I have to turn my whole body. I feel like a whale (in case you didn't know, whales can't rotate their eyes. If they want to see side to side they have to turn their entire bodies. Not that it matters much since their eyesight is pretty poor to begin with).

Well, here's how it's been lately. I take meds and feel okay for about an hour and a half to two hours, during which time I drink all the water I can manage. Then for the remaining two hours (since I can only take the stuff once every four hours) I sit around while the pain slowly increases. The last hour is usually quite bad. Swallowing hurts, moving tends to hurt, and sometimes even breathing can hurt. Sometimes I think it feels kind of raw back there, which I take to be a sign that the scabs are coming off. That damn well better be what's going on. The sooner this is over, the better. The post-op sheet they gave me said that when the scabs come off, there is an increase in throat and ear pain. I'll say. It says that it will hurt for a few days, then every day I should start feeling better and better until I heal completely. You know, I think I could stand not being healed by Saturday (I'm supposed to cook lunch for Morah and my family), as long as I'm healed by Christmas.

I suppose I should explain a little about the scabs. They're probably not what you think. You're probably thinking of a red, crusty scab like you get when you scrape your knee. These aren't like that. These are white and, I assume, soft and slimy. They look it, anyway. They're not all crusty and gross. Well, they're gross, but not crusty. I keep checking to see if they're coming off, but I can't tell. It doesn't look like it. The woman on the phone yesterday said they should come off a little bit at a time. So far, I haven't seen any real change in the way they look. I guess I'll just have to hope that everything is going as it should. In the meantime, I'd like to find something that will help my neck feel a bit less stiff.