The Operation.

After spending nearly 7 months from wearing a hanging cast to fitting a humorus brace and checking into VGH for my monthly x-rays to see my bone-regeneration progress (of lack thereof), the time had come for me to go under the knife and fix it for good.

Bones tend to fuse themselves naturally after a fracture over ninety-five percent of the time according to Dr. Guy, however, after months of observation I fell into the latter five percent where it didn’t fuse at all. Instead, calcium started to build up around the two fractured ends forming “an elephant’s leg” overtime. Yes, that was the technical term.

Jay accompanied me at the hospital before going into the OR and took some lovely pictures of me on the stretcher wearing nothing but a flimsy hospital gown that didn’t quite cover all. True to ourselves, we were joking with the RN on duty as she prepped me for surgery. I was injected with a nerve numbing solution known as “the block” and within minutes, my left arm was a deadweight. I couldn’t believe how heavy it really is when I tried lifting it with my right arm!

The operation took four hours if my memory serves me right and it was virtually painless. I was in a semi-conscious state throughout (as I was meant to me) so I heard the conversations that transpired around me as well as the sound of drills cutting, or perhaps more accurately, shaving off “the elephant legs” so that a stainless steel plate can me mounted on a flat surface. I kept drifting in and out of reality and found it hard to distinguish what I had imagined being done to me to what was actually being done. After getting sutured up, I was wheeled out of the OR to the outpatient room waiting to be processed and properly tagged.

I’d opted to spend the night in the ward and was fortunate to have a nurse with a sense of humour who made crude jokes about my Pakistani friend who accompanied me. After asking of his whereabouts and giving a description of him, she told me that she’ll be on a lookout for a terrorist in the waiting room!

Dinner was not so bad as far as hospital food goes. It was more than I can do for myself in the kitchen, that much is true. I was served the following:

1 each        Salt
1 each        Pepper
1 each        Sugar

1 each        Salmon Fillet

60 ml        Dill Sauce
120 ml        Spinach
120 ml        Mashed Potatoes
1 slice        Wheat Bread

120 ml        Vanilla Pudding

1 x                Tea

1 each        Apple Juice
1 each        2% Milk
1 each        Milker
1 each        Margarine

In the evening, two young adults who couldn’t have been any older than twenty made their rounds around the ward pushing a cart of magazines offering outpatients with periodicals. The young girl and boy who were probably volunteers were friendly and courteous and quickly had my respect for what they were doing.

The post-op pain was felt gradually as the block wore off. Morphine was given to me throughout the night in both pill form and injection to ease my discomfort by round-the-clock nurses. With every passing hour, I was able to extend my arm to a greater degree which made me happy.

When I was briefed about spending the night in a ward with five others, I had imagined something like a dorm at a cheap youth hostel or a homeless shelter with beds pushed together to maximise space. In reality, my experience was nothing like I had imagined. In my room with a south facing window, I shared with just one other who turned out to be an older Chinese gentleman, separated by a curtain. He kept to himself and was quiet through the night.

At sun-break, I was served the following for breakfast:

1 each        Grape Jelly
1 each        Brown Sugar
1 each        Salt
1 each        Pepper
1 each        Sugar

180 ml        Cream of Wheat

60 ml        Scrambled Eggs
2 slice        Bacon

1 slice        Wheat Toast + Marg

120 ml        Cantaloupe Cubes

1 x                Coffee

1 each        Apple Juice
1 each        2% Milk
1 x                Cold Water
1 each        Milker

I couldn’t have made breakfast any better myself.

Soon after eating, a nurse by the name of Brian came to check on my vitals and asked me how I was feeling. He too was funny and chipper. All things were looking good and I was ready to go. Jay came by again in the morning and fetched me in a Zip-car. Before I got discharged, I was given one last morphine injection. And that was that.

A stainless-steel place with six screws in me later, no nightmarish hospital stories to tell. On the contrary, I felt well looked after by the competent doctors who operated on me to the humourous nurses on duty, and to the courteous volunteers with the cart of magazines. And as a Canadian, I was covered by national healthcare with no hospital fees to pay.

Last but not least, thanks, Jay, for being a good friend. You went above and beyond.