cuttin' the chunkies out

I had surgery today. That word makes it all sound so grave: surrrrgery.

Really, it was quite nice.

I have to admit that I was a little nervous. You see, there was this chunky, silver-dollar-sized lump on my arm. Had it biopsied a few months ago, went to see an oncologist and a dermatologist, sought a surgeon. They said it wasn't cancerous, wasn't malignant... but other than that, they didn't know what it was. Speculation rests on some sort of bug bite or other "trauma" that just started going wacko and forming all this dense, fibrous scar tissue.

Wow. A part of my body overreacting? UNHEARD OF.

Anyway, they decided it was best to take it out. And it kept getting itchy and worrying me, that maybe it was the colonization of a distant planet, a new race of life starting in my upper left arm. I mean, I'm all for the birth of civilization, but not in my left arm. Sorry. I wanted it out, too.

I went in today, filled in a few forms, signed my life and a significant part of our savings account away, and in return, I received a huge, 1980's mauve hospital gown that naturally did not close in the back, paper booties, a stick in my hand, and a heart monitor screen, where I was delighted to see my heart occasionally skipping beats and making weird squiggly lines on the screen. Fantastic. The anesthesiologist said that those squigglies were probably the result of my nerves. "Once I give you these drugs, they should disappear." Well, then, give them to me!

Ahhhh, drugs. Most days, I resist taking a Tylenol for even the worst headache. However, being on the wrong end of a scalpel makes you reconsider the whole just-say-no policy you've clung to all this time. So, I got one drug that took away pain, another one that made me forget anything that happened to me, and yet another that had me blissfully asleep. One moment, I was telling the nurse I felt a little woozy; the next, I was waking up with a big honkin' bandage on my arm. I felt pretty relaxed. Hungry, but relaxed.

The nurse said not to eat anything too heavy. I left the surgery center starving. We ate hot dogs and fries and washed it down with some soda. It was freakin' fantastic.

And then I got to go home and have my husband take care of me and sleep a lot.

Incidentally, the drugs they gave me were the exact same drugs (minus one) that I give to my burn patients when I go to do dressing changes. I thought they were delicious (the drugs, not the patients). So the next time one of my patients wonders what the drugs will feel like, I can totally start humming some Pink Floyd and say, "Enjoy the ride, man." Because I'm all trippy like that.