Good Bye Pain Ball - I Am Woman Hear Me Roar

A few weeks ago while chatting with one of my Dr.'s nurses on the phone she casually mentioned that I would wake up after surgery with 2 drains sewn to my sides that would drain excess fluids away from the wounds, allowing me to heal quickly without all that fluid surrounding the incisions from the inside. The drains would only be in place for a week or two and the Dr. would take them out during a followup visit.

Gross, but I'd read about this seemier side of this surgery before. Drains happen. Standard faire, get over it, move on.

Then the nurse mentioned that I would also wake up with a numbing medicine pain ball hooked around my waist to be used for about 5 days. The pain ball which would send medicine to the inserted site in preprogrammed increments was attached to me via two very skinny tubes that had been inserted below my chest subcutaneously. At the end of 5 days the medicines would run out and the pain ball could be unattached from me and be tossed in the trash. If I felt up to it I could simply pull off the dressing and gently pull the pain ball tubes out of myself. If I was squeamish, I could travel to the Dr.'s office and a nurse would do the honors liberating me from the pain ball. If I could tolerate this surgery in the first place I sure as heck wasn't going to give the honors of tube pulling to some nurse I hardly know.

No nurse needed. I was determined that I could suck it up, and pull the tubing out from under my skin. The nurse said something about it not being painful, famous last words lady. I was at 7:30 am this morning very motivated to ditch the pain ball, it's tubing and carryall fanny pack. There was no way to discreetly hide the darn thing under a layer of drains. Dressing was a bit complicated and the contraption, although I am grateful for it's ability to deliver numbing medication and keep me in a stage of perpetual word slurs, had worn out it's welcome strapped to my waist.

I did it all by myself! There was a high creep out factor as I felt the several inches of tubing freeing it self from under my skin, but there really wasn't any pain. Who knew, listen to those nurses.


So there she is, RIP, little pain ball. Thanks for the memories.

If I can single-handedly liberate myself from the pain ball...I surely can continue on for drainage evacuations, and foob fills.

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