Number FOUR

Good grief.  This is getting ridiculous, don't you think??

I had my fourth surgery on this foot last Thursday, again in Phenix City.  Larry snapped this pic of me sleeping hiding after we were done and back in my room.

I brought a pillow from home this time, old hand that I am nowadays.  Hospital pillows are awful. And a pretty silk pillowcase makes everything better, right??

The food is great at Hughston Memorial Hospital, as is the care.  No complaints there.  I just wanted to sleep, though.  I ate an Italian ice once I woke up and drank some juice and they brought me a chicken sandwich but I could only get two bites down. Friday morning, breakfast was toast, eggs and bacon.  Nope.  I couldn't eat that either. 

It took a while to sleep off that anesthesia.  I'm still sleepy, five days later.

Here's my foot now.  This time, Doc drained and flushed my ankle joint so I have two little stitched incisions on top of my foot and he removed the one remaining anchor and cleaned some scar tissue off my ankle joint.  He showed me pictures.  The joint was pretty much covered in scar tissue.  He had hoped that would stop the popping and snapping that I'm feeling in my ankle but as soon as I got home, they started back and now are pretty much constant when I'm walking.  The joint pain returned this morning so I don't know what's going on in there.   

My blood culture results will be in tomorrow or Thursday and we'll see if there's infection and then we'll deal with that as we have to, cross that bridge and all that.

I'm so ready to get on across this bridge!!!  Life is passing me by, the beach is still calling and my birthday is this month!  Come on, foot!!

True love, homegrown tomatoes and sunflowers

We had a nice, long Memorial Day weekend at home, in the AC, binge watching stuff on TV.  It was just too hot to get outside and do anything.

We're in the middle of a heatwave and I can't remember 100 degrees in May, ever.  But climate change is a joke.  Global warming is a hoax. Yeah, okay.  I'm not getting on my soapbox about it (but why not?  This is MY blog, right??) but climate change is real and global warming is real and I don't know exactly what we can do about it but doing virtually nothing sure isn't the fix.  Before I left Facebook, I used to see willful ignorance daily about this and that and climate change was one of the things I saw being made fun of, made light of.  And yet, tornadoes and hurricanes are getting stronger and coming more frequently, the seasons are pretty much nonexistent these days and it's 100 degrees in May in Georgia.  Kids graduated from college last week in Colorado in the snow and over 150 tornadoes hit the central part of our country.  And last night, three tornadoes hit Ohio.  This ain't just happening, y'all.  God gave us this beautiful planet to live on and we are destroying it.  And He knew we would all along.

We do what we can but we can do better.  No more plastic bags in this house!  There are shopping bags in the Jeep, bought specifically for that purpose.  We haven't used paper towels in over 10 years and we shop local when we can, pay our bills online, plant flowers to help the bees and the butterflies and y'all know we buy OLD and vintage whenever we can.  Instead of buying a new toaster, we just go get one at an estate sale.  We can still do better, though.  There's always more you can do.

I've been working really hard these past several days trying to keep everything hydrated outside.  Everything is looking good, despite the heat.

Larry planted these tomatoes, plants he bought from the local high school plant sale, at the end of March.  They are monsters now!  He had to extend the space they're in.  I cannot wait to have a sun-ripened, homegrown tomato on two slices of white bread with Duke's mayo and a little salt and pepper.  Shut yo' mouf.  That's what I lived on growing up in the summertime.  My daddy always planted the biggest gardens in the spring and we had tomatoes, squash, peas, okra and peppers all summer long.  I used to love to go out there first thing in the morning with the basket and pick everything that was ready.  I used to take baskets of squash down to Florida to Larry's folks when I'd go spend weeks with them in the summer.  Such wonderful memories...

We had to put netting over them to keep the birds and squirrels out because we feed them in the backyard, too, and they think anything you put out there is for them.

Georgia Peach Dianthus...

Squeeeee!!  My sunflowers, thanks to my amazing husband who planted these for me because I couldn't this year. 

And I'm working on two avocado trees, just to have a pretty little tree plant.  They won't make avocados for years, if at all.  I did this once before at the condo but it grew very spindly and died.  Hopefully, these two will do good! 

I'll be having surgery number four Thursday and I sure hope this is the last one.  I'm tired.  I know I have to do it because I can't walk without pain and the beach is calling my name SO loudly that I can't think sometimes.  This is my favorite picture of me and Larry, just a simple phone selfie at sunrise at Tybee.  

I need this girl back.

Y'all need to get you some of these sheets!

I am a sheet snob.  They either got to be high thread count or they got to be vintage.  I cannot just sleep on 200 TC sheets and be happy.  I'll fuss the whole time.

We recently bought a new mattress.  A Sealy-plush-pillowtop-expensive-as-all-get-out one that is also over a FOOT high.  Almost none of our sheets fit it.  One of my biggest irks is sheets that won't stay on the bed.  Another is a dang bed skirt.  HATE. THEM.

Anyway, so I was poking around on Amazon as I do pretty much constantly, and I found these sheets.

This is what they said about them:

King Size Sheet Set - 4 Piece Set - Hotel Luxury Bed Sheets - Extra Soft - Deep Pockets - Easy Fit - Breathable & Cooling - Wrinkle Free - Comfy – Light Gray Bed Sheets - King Sheets – 4 PC 

I read the reviews and they were pretty good.  So I decided to give them a try.

Y'all.  These are the BEST sheets I have ever slept on!!  They ARE hotel quality and soft and luxurious!  They are made of brushed microfiber.  What TC is that?  I don't know and I don't care.  They feel like 800+.  And the best part??  They have DEEEEEP pockets and they fit our bed!

And the more you wash 'em, the softer they get.  

• They are only $34!!  
• I got light gray but they come in 11 colors.  
• And if you have Prime, you can have them Sunday!  

Here's the link!

Larry and I both agree that the best sheets we ever slept on were in that cabin we stayed at in Helen.  Until now.  These ones here are.  

Here they are, freshly washed and looking all soft and comfy on our bed (along with some standard pillowcases we already had that match just fine and dandy).

Disney Dooney Day!!

I have never in my life had a pocketbook that cost more than $25.  I had a Liz Claiborne years ago that I got for $13 at the outlet store outside Atlanta and I've picked up several Vera Bradley and Lilly Pulitzer bags for cheap here and there at estate sales.  In fact, my friend, Kim, gave me a VB for Easter.  

Lately, though, I've been eyeing Dooneys on QVC and I decided I was gonna get me one for my birthday next month.  Easy Pay and all that.  Less sting.

But then!  I saw the DISNEY Dooneys and fell head over freakin' heels in love with them.  I love Disney.  I've been to Disney World three times in my life, the last time almost three years ago when Larry and I went to Orlando for a week.  I was going back and forth from the It's A Small World bag (because that is my FAVORITE RIDE EVER OMG, from riding it with my mama and daddy and brother my very first time at Disney World the summer I turned 7) to the Sketch, which has just about everything about Disney on it, including that amazing Mickey Mouse chocolate-covered ice cream bar that is literally heaven on earth when you've walked 12 miles and you're about to pass out from the heat and being fat.  Oh, it's so good.  And now I hear they'll be in stores soon for a very limited time.  I will buy every box I see.

Anyway, I had to go to the doctor last week about my wrist pain and lo and behold, this lady sat down beside me in the waiting room with a Disney Dooney Sketch bag!!  I saw one!  In the wild!  In real life!  I said, "OMG, you have a Disney Dooney!" and she said she bought it SEVEN YEARS ago in Disney Springs and uses it every day (except during football season, she's got a UGA Dooney for then) and it still looked brand new.  No fraying of the handles, no wearing on the bottom.  What??  That made up my mind for me.  

Larry bought me one for Mother's Day!  We were a little late ordering it (because I couldn't MAKE UP MY MIND) and I got it today!  

Let's unbox, shall we??

Disney tissue paper!!  Squeeeee!  How many characters can you name??

There she is!!  Carefully wrapped in tissue and plastic.  

They do a GREAT job with shipping!

More tissue paper!  

Ta-da!!  Cute as a button and holding ALLLLL my stuff.  I love it!!  I also lovelovelove Spartina 449 and I got their market tote for the summer in their Moonglade pattern a couple weeks ago.

I've been through H-E-double-hockey-sticks the past six months with this foot and if I EVER get back to work, I'll be ready.  Bagwise, anyway.  Looks like surgery number FOUR will be next week.  The MRI showed fluid in my ankle joint that looked like infection so doc's gonna go in and draw it off, have it tested and then we'll treat it accordingly.  If it's infection, I may have to go on IV antibiotics with a PICC line to try and stop it from absessing and damaging the bone.  Please continue to pray for us.

When this is over and I can walk 12 miles, in the heat while being fat, we goin' to Disney World!

How y'all durrin'?

Me?  I'm still at home, six months now.  Never, in my wildest of dreams, would I have thought I'd still be home, healing, six months after my surgery.  

I had the MRI on the 29th, a week and two days ago.  Still haven't heard anything back from my doctor.  I called Monday to get an update as I still have bone pain and now it's starting to creep up my leg.  I was told he had to have the images.  Well, he ordered the MRI, he should get the images with the report.  They're really trying my patience these days.  My wound is still draining and that means it has NOT closed and is draining with a speck of blood every single day.  My home health nurse contract ended so they're not coming anymore and Larry and I are pretty much on our own now.  

Poor Larry has been stricken with gout in his big toe and has been in excruciating pain.  Just one more thing to add to his laundry list of issues.  Afib, COPD, pituitary gland tumor (or enlargement that looks like a tumor and since his mama had two, yeah, it's a tumor), osteoarthritis in his lower back from an injury 30 years ago (and probably a little bit of jumping out of planes for Uncle Sam when he was 18), a completely blocked carotid artery that we cannot do anything about...bless his heart, he does not need this new thing that's going on.  He goes to work EVERY day, though, determined to provide for us and our little family.  

Speaking of our little family, we rehomed Kizzi a couple of weeks ago.  He had started peeing on everything and we'd taken him to the vet to check him out for a UTI and our doctor told us that he was "marking his territory" (even though we'd had him fixed) and was telling Tabbie Hoffman that he was the alpha male.  She put him on Valium but it didn't help much.  He just passed out for a couple hours and then he was hell on wheels again.  Tabbie is so sweet, gentle and laidback, he didn't care that Kizzi was running around being alpha.  He did care, however, when Kizzi attacked him in the hallway or jumped on him when he was napping or ran to eat his food or tried to keep him from using the CatGenie.  THAT'S why Tabbie was going on our bathroom rug.  Lightbulb moment!  Well, it got to the point that Kizzi was terrorizing Tabbie relentlessly and Tabbie was miserable.  He stopped eating (even though we separated them at mealtimes) and had started losing weight.  I named Tabbie after Abbie Hoffman and I could not have picked a better name for that sweet baby.  He's a lover, not a fighter.  He's all peace and love and leave me alone, let me sleep.  I loved that little booger, Kizzi, but Tabbie Hoffman is my heart.  He's my baby.  We found each other in a prison parking lot and we have been inseparable ever since.  He had to come first.  Larry had done some work for a couple who own a horse rescue farm and they also rescue and rehome cats.  And bunny rabbits.  So we took him there.  We had planned to get him healthy, neutered and then try to find him a home but I had surgery after surgery and we were so busy with my healing that we just kept him. These folks have about 20 cats who roam the farm and have 85 acres of barns and sheds to explore and lots of mice to catch.  The animals are fed and loved and since Kizzi has been neutered, I'm sure somebody will scoop him up.  Things have returned to normal and Tabbie is his chatty, playful self again.  

I went to another ortho doctor yesterday here in town because of pain I'm having in both my wrists.  It started in March but I've been so preoccupied with my foot that I just ignored it.  Well, I took my last pain meds last Friday and purposely did not get a refill and by Saturday, the pain in my wrists was almost unbearable. I guess the pain meds I was taking for my foot masked the pain in my wrists.  Anyway, I made an appointment and got in and saw somebody.  Tendonitis in both wrists.  He said he'd never seen this in both wrists at the same time.  I am totally not surprised.  It's me, after all.  I got cortisone shots in both hands and today, I can tell such a difference.  They still hurt but not nearly as bad.  I don't know what caused it but I'm sure it has something to do with working with computers for 20 years. 

I told Larry we need to check ourselves into the nursing home.  A place where we can take Tabbie and Banjo and get round-the-clock care.  Ha! 

So that's us today.  Thanks for coming to see us!

More of the neverending tragedy that is my foot

I saw my doctor again yesterday for a follow-up from my most recent surgery.  I've still got some drainage and bleeding that my nurse was concerned about (still, at three weeks and three days post-op) but I wasn't as worried about that as I was the pain I'm still having at the spot where my foot lifts across the top and the constant popping and snapping that I'm feeling.  

Well, I got worried when he started pressing on my wound and there was pain I didn't even know about hiding in there.  He pressed out a lot of drainage and immediately had three x-rays done right then and there.  The results showed no fractures or problems with the one remaining tendon anchor (but the rubber-band-like snapping I'm feeling MAY be from the one anchor that is not there anymore, the one he took out in January...makes perfect sense to me) or even arthritis, which is what my nurse suggested might be going on.  Nope.  None of that showed up.  What's going on is there's infection in there, either deep tissue or bone.  Since I had staph in the hospital in January, I'm more than a little worried about this.  He took out the one remaining stitch that was holding the graft on and I'm on antibiotics for a week.  We're watching the wound very closely, changing bandages every day.  If there's still drainage after a week, I'll have an MRI to see if the infection is in the bone.

The skin graft has healed over the hole and my thigh has healed as well, I just have a bright pink 2x2 square on the side of my leg, that's all.  But, hey, pink is my signature colah.  I've started working on that scar and it'll be lighter and smaller in no time.

If you've been following me throughout this nightmare of mine, please continue to pray for my foot to heal.  Once and for all, to HEAL.  Every time I think I'm getting better, something else crops up.  

Today is Holy Saturday, the day we remember Jesus' full day in the tomb.  The day all those years ago when all hope was lost because Jesus was dead.  They all saw Him die, right there on that cross.  If you're living what seems like an endless Saturday like that one was, where all hope is lost and you can't see daylight, and sometimes, I do feel like I am, then let me remind you that Sunday is coming!  It's not done yet.  God has a plan for your life and mine, too.  My foot will heal and there will be unbelievable joy for me on that day.  

Just like there will be for ALL of us tomorrow morning.  

Surgery number three

Y'all, I'm becoming quite the expert on this whole surgery thing.  Had number three March 26th.  The skin graft.  We were told to get there at 7:30 so we did and when we arrived, we found out that I was the only one scheduled for surgery that day.  I felt so special.  (Not really.  Not even.  I'm prettttty much done with this whole surgery thing.)  It was nice and quiet and dark back there and we had lots of privacy.  I don't even remember going back to the OR this time.  I remember being wheeled out of there but I was asleep before we got to the operating room.  Didn't miss that cold table.  Or that cold room.  Or having to scoot my fanny off my warm bed onto that cold table in that cold room.  

I woke up back in my holding room and Larry was there, taking pics of my blood pressure and O2 monitors.  And me, bless him.  Doc had shown Larry a pic of my graft and he told me it looked like a football.  With waffle marks on it.  After I was able to drink some Sprite and sit up some, they sent me home.  Since I was the only one there for surgery that day, as soon as I was gone, the sooner they could get on with their slack day, I'm guessing.  They gave us our post-op instructions, threw me in the backseat of the Jeep where my favorite soft pillow and blanket were waiting and we were out of there before noon.

I slept all the way home, with a huge bandage around my left thigh and another one, yet another one, on my ankle.  I was supposed to have a xeroform bandage on my thigh.  That's a thin little yellow Vaseline-type bandage that prevents air from getting to the wound and keeps it nice and moist while it heals.  Yeah.  I was supposed to have that on my donor site.  As soon as I stepped out of the car and walked into the garage, the whole thing fell down my leg and just pooled around my ankle.  On top of my already huge ankle dressing.  My thigh, with SKIN MISSING, was just hanging out, all bloody and naked and stuff.  In the garage.  I fixed it back best I could, noticing right away that the xeroform was rolled up like tight greasy Vaseline paper inside the cotton and bandage, nowhere near the wound.  Oy. 

Since my nurse was coming in two days, we just kept it covered with gauze and Vaseline.  It looked great then.  Two days later, this whole thing was bloody and angry-looking and deep.  She cleaned it, slapped another xeroform on it and we ain't touched it again.  I do keep a thick gauze taped to it at all times because it is extremely sensitive and it makes me extremely cussy when I bump it on something.  This wound has BY FAR been the worst.  The worsttttttt.  And now that it's healing, it's starting to pull and feel tight.  The worsttttttt I say.  It makes me talk ugly and cry.  So we ain't messing with it no more. 

We went back for my first post-op appointment Monday and this is what the recipient site looks like.  Lord, Jesus.  Bless it.  

The cast caused me to have dry, scaly skin so I sloughed all that off and rubbed some lotion on it so it looks better than that now.  The skin around it anyway.  The wound?  Yeah, it's still JUST LIKE THAT.  That little tiny piece in the middle is what used to be my thigh.  Sigh.

I go back April 19th and we'll see how everything looks then.  I seriously doubt I'll ever have my pretty, pink, carefree foot again.

We left the doctor's office and went in search of some junk therapy, ending up at River Market Antiques on Hamilton Road.  There are some really cool, junky things in there!  They have a lunch box museum, too, but once I saw my old Hardy Boys one in a display case in the store, that was all I needed to see.  They also have plenty of sit down places for crippled girls, too, you know, in case you'd be in need of something like that. 

I did find this amazing lamp that I want to go back and get next time.  The guy there didn't know how much to charge (insert eye roll here) and he'd have to find out and let us know.  Sounds like they don't want to sell it.  Anyway, it was all the way in the back, collecting dust and feeling most unloved.  I think it's gorgeous and I'm planning to put it on a table in my antique booth and maybe not sell it.  

There were lots of cool displays in this store and it's well worth stopping if you're ever in Columbus!

There's this beautiful collection of amberina glass!

Lots of interesting stuff!  And two of the cutest little kitty cats who peek at you from underneath a 60's station wagon out back.  We were super impressed!

That's the latest!  Friday will be FIVE MONTHS since I've been at work.  I don't even know if I remember my password.