Day Zero

Surgery.

I slept well last night thanks to the Ambien and I woke at 5:57, three minutes prior to the three different alarms I had set for 6 am. I showered and shaved my knee one last time. My wife, who has become the core of my support system, drove me to the surgery center and stayed with me until I went into the OR. In pre-op we met with the nurse, the assistant surgeon, Dr. Stone, and finally, the anesthesiologist. All of them were overwhelmingly compassionate and positive, just as everyone associated with Dr. Stone has been. After meeting with everyone I decided to have them install a “pain pump”, a device that feeds a constant dose of marcain and zylocaine directly into the knee for four days after surgery. It seems like an ideal supplement, even possibly an alternative to the oral narcotic options that are otherwise sure to make a temporary mess of my mind and my stomach.

I successfully fought off my nerves during the nearly two hours between arrival and surgery by reading through the random assortment of available magazines. In particular, I read the Sports Illustrated article on Kevin Everett, the former Buffalo Bills football player who was paralyzed early in the 2007 season on defense during a kickoff return. He was immediately treated with a new and controversial deep freeze approach to reduce the effects of his spinal cord injury. Today he is learning to walk again. It is an amazing story of physical triumph and yet another strong bit of perspective adjustment for my own situation.

When I had been sufficiently scrubbed, prep’d, and hooked up to the IV, the nurse wrote “YES” on my right leg and led me into the operating room. Before I even got through the door I could tell that the OR was significantly colder than in the rest of the surgery center. I got up onto the table and took a deep breath. Most of the crew was already there awaiting my arrival – two nurses, the assistant surgeon, and the anesthesiologist, the last of which wasted no time in hooking up something to my IV that he said would “mellow” me out a bit. The last thing I remember was him saying, “Ok, now you should start to feel that a bit”, while I thought to myself, “That’s strange, I don’t think I feel anything at all”…


In the next instant I was waking up in post-op. My “nap” had felt extremely restful and although I was aware that there was of a lot of vibrant dream activity, I was surprised by the fact that I had immediately forgotten any of the content. My leg was fully wrapped and a thin line of plastic tubing from the pain pump snaked its way around the new brace and under the dressings. Dr. Stone came in to explain that the surgery went well and in addition to the ACL reconstruction, there was in fact a substantial tear in the lateral meniscus that he sutured together with high hopes of successfully repairing. After about twenty minutes the nurses came back to get me dressed and on my way. They sat me up on the table and gingerly swung my feet to the floor to get my shoes on. “I’m not ready”, I said with certainty as the room started spinning around me, so they let me lay down again for another hour or so before we tried again. The second time went better and I was dressed and then carefully wheeled to the elevator and down to the car. I was in pain, for certain, but it was entirely tolerable. The twenty blocks across the city were about as much as I could take and I was happy to crutch my way into the house and onto the hide-a-bed. For the next few hours the ache fluctuated from moderate to severe before it settled back into a very tolerable range. The ice machine ran constantly, keeping my knee cold, and the pain pump did its job wonderfully, keeping the pain mostly down to a dull ache.

And so it is done. I have traded nervousness for discomfort, and especially given the reasonable pain levels, it is a very welcomed exchange. I have spent the afternoon between naps calling people to let them know I am alive and well and I feel very good about the way things have gone. The assistant surgeon and Dr. Stone have both called to check up on me tonight and to re-emphasize how well the surgery went. I know the next few days will be challenging, but it is quite relieving to have the surgical aspect of this journey finally behind me. I have been very lucky to have been surrounded by wonderfully positive and capable people for the past few days now – my wife, who has made me laugh a dozen times today, my brother-in-law and his wife, everyone on the medical staffs, all of the people who have called to wish me well, even the guys in the valet parking garage at the surgery center. And I am more than thankful to everyone for their part in getting me through this. I am truly fortunate to be in such company.