Making Peace With My Surgeon
Disclaimer: Squeamish readers, move along to the next blog entry. Sorry.
You know how my breast has been leaking fluid since my surgery ? Well, now icky stuff has started come out of my incision. Ew, ew, ew! I have to sit down and take deep breaths with my head between my knees when I just think about it.
Last night I had to call the surgeon to ask her what to do. She told me to meet her at the clinic at 10 am the next morning when she would...last chance to skip this entry, folks...open my incision more and put a Q-tip in me to clean out the icky stuff.
Omigod!
Just the idea of this sent me into a panic attack. A cancer diagnosis didn't freak me out so much...but saying your going to put a Q-tip in part of my body that's not supposed to open up? YUCK! GROSS! Can I leave my body for a week or two?
I said to her (only half-joking, obviously) that perhaps I should take anti-anxiety medication beforehand. Misunderstanding my point, she said, "No, I want you to take Vicodin instead. Take it when you get here so that you don't drive with it." Oh, great, it's gonna hurt, too. Wait. If I take it when I get there...don't I have to drive home with it in my system? Okay, whatever.
So, this morning I drove to the Breast Care Center (took two hours to get there again) and as I approached the parking garage, I took one Vicodin and half a Xanax. Woo! For someone who avoids prescription medications whenever she can, I'm being quite the reckless girl, aren't I? I told you, this reeeeeeeaaaaallly freaks me out. (And just so you know, I looked up drug interactions for Xanax and Vicodin the night before, to be sure I wasn't endangering myself. Which, by the way, makes this premeditated.)
Once a procedure room was available, they took me in back and the surgeon came in. She must have been operating today as she was dressed in surgical garb with the hair cap. Seeing no point in watching her work, I looked at the ceiling tiles a lot while chatting away with her about anything I could think of. Our conversation led me to an interesting understanding.
I mentioned something that I read in Dr. Susan Love's book and she frowned, saying, "She's very blunt. She scares people." I could tell immediately that she would not recommend this book to her patients, and that told me a lot about her style. Dr. Love is all about information and she tells it like it is. From everything I can see, my surgeon favors a different approach. She approaches patients with the message, "It's going to be just fine, I'll take care of it, I'll let you know if you need to do anything..." I see now that she is, in her own way, very protective of her patients. She doesn't want them frightened.
When it comes to a cancer diagnosis, this is not a good style for me. I want to know everything and I do not want anything sugar-coated. My attitude is that I'll ask the doctor's opinion, but I'm making all the decisions.
However, it turns out that I'm quite different when it comes to icky wounds. In this case, I want exactly what my surgeon offers. I don't want to look at it or know too much about it. I want her to soothe me and tell me it will be fine. And so today, she was perfect. Yet nothing had changed about her-all that changed was what I needed. It's a relief to me to feel the shift in how I view her, because I don't like to be cranky about people. I'd rather understand where they are coming from, even if I don't agree.
Back to my breast. (I don't believe I type things like this in an open site!) She said that everything looks okay, keep taking the antibiotic, and don't go getting' all physical-like. She gave me pads that they use for abdominal incisions so that I could tape one over my breast at night. I just have to let it do what it wants to do. She explained that large-breasted women often have a problem with this, but it resolves eventually.
So I'm putting on my big girl panties and acting like I can handle this. My current approach is to pretend I am an operative in the field with an injury an infected injury. Because it's hostile territory, I can't get medical help. Must...handle...myself.... I'll let you know how it goes.
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