[Things get a little graphic towards the end here.. skip to the end if you are easily offended or grossed out..]

....so I check into the Hospital or "House of Pain" as I like to call it.. at around 3pm last wed. After some paperwork and basic instructions, I signed off, saying basically that I wouldn't blame them too much if things didn't go my way... Anyway, it wasn't long before I was undressed and laying in a gown on a bed in a room.. My wife was there with me. After a short wait, they came and hooked up my first IV.. This just started pumping some inert fluid into me - just to get me in the mood, I guess. After a bit, they came along and added some drugs into the mix "to help me relax".

I sure did relax.. it was almost fun, that short time in that room.. I felt pretty damn good and got a little silly.. I wasn't thinking about tumors or kidneys or anything nasty at all. Boy, hospitals sure have some pretty good dope! [break]

...Soon enough though, they were carting me off to "the room". I remember being wheeled in and seeing the big lights like you see on TV... and then I woke up and "They" were saying, "all done" and I had this huge pain in my side.. Huge but not very important.. hard to explain. My wife was there and someone said that all was well and that Dr. Khaw had, "got it all" I think my son, AKA the "Blogwagon Mystery Guest" was there also. Possibly my Mom.. The next few days, oh, call it 24 to 36 hours were mostly a haze of heavy narcotics, pain and sleep.

I remember a nurse asking me to get out of bed and sit in the chair for a while. Sure, I thought.. no problem. Whats the big deal? It took everything I had to rise out of bed, take those two steps to the chair.. and I mean everything. It was incredible. Thats when I knew that this thing was in fact far worse than I ever imagined. I had no idea that I would be that weak.. even though I was told. You don't truly understand something like that till you feel it for yourself. [break]

[ahh.. a nice shower/lunch/BIG NAP combo.. ]... as I stopped using the really heavy stuff and moved to the pills, my mind sort of came back to itself.. these days were filled with naps, hallway walking adventures and the unholy combo of jello, broth and tea.. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to eat those things again. For 4 days, thats all I ate.. until my bowels started showing some signs of working again, thats all I could have. It took a bit longer than is ideal.. By sunday, I had passed these hurtles and was on to what they called "mechanical soft" which was mostly normal foods ground to smithereeens like baby food. Actually, after 4 days of the above, everything I ate there after that point was like a fine gormet meal.. simply wonderful.

It was the potty that kept me in the House of Pain for an extra day or two. First, I had to learn to pee again. That took a day or so and even though I was, at one tim, nearly in tears over the effort, once I did it was off to the races.. Getting that hose off my peepee was a major milestone for me. It was around that time though that my bowels began to act up. I became so gassy and bloated, my belly actually grew several inches.. visibly distended. It hurt like blazes - far more so than the actual incision. There was about 36 hours there that were truly nightmarish for me. I had no idea that this would prove to be the worst part of the whole thing. I'm a pretty big, tough guy but there were times when the cramps hurt so bad, I was literally in tears. I'll never forget that pain.. never had ANYTHING hurt like that and for so long.

.. and that brings me to the "tears" part... In the worst part of this, two of my best friends chose a bad moment to visit me. It happened to be during what was possibly the worst hour of the worst day. Just bad timing on their part, not their fault to be sure. They arrived, we talked a bit as I writhed on the bed, trying to act normal.. I had to run to the bathroom to try yet again to pass something.. anything, a peep of gas.. ANYTHING from my aching bowels. As I sat there on the pot, I sort of entered some sort of emotional blow-out - self pity - crying jag..

As I sat there in a life struggle with the damn toilet, desperately trying to squeese out one tiny turd, one squeeky fart just to ease the incredible pressure I had.. I could hear them in the room, discussing the merits of Warren Haynes as the new guitarist for the Dead, trying for my sake to pretend that everything was hunky dory and I thought to myself, "I can't do this any more..." the out loud.., "I want to go home!" and that did it.. I burst into tears like I haven't had since the worst moments of childhood.. I cried and cried.. I eventually had to get up (still unproductive, by the way) and go out and my wife, who could tell something was wrong, had to ask the guys to cut the visit short. God, I love that woman. She then held me while I shook and cried for a good 30 minutes.

You see, I wanted to be out there, in the conversation.. I'm normally a big, brash, in-your-face kind of guy, dominating most conversations I enter into (or trying to.. nasty habit, that..) .. and instead, there I was, a pitiful, sweating figure purched on a toilet, cursing his pain... I just lost it...

I'll blame this in part on all the pills and other drugs I had been doing.. I had been high as a junkie in a DEA evidence locker for 5 days.. But I'll tell you, I felt the better for it.. My Doc agreed and threw out some silly statistic (Docs love those..) that said that people in my situations (or similar) that had an "emotional blowout" soon after surgery, healed faster and better...

Anyway, sorry guys. I'll make it up to you. We WILL get by...

So, now I'm home and though there is plenty of pain and healing ahead, I feel pretty damn good again, considering. Thanks for reading if you got this far... See you next time!