The morning after

Well it is done, I have now joined the ranks of people who have to tick yes to those 'dicky ticker' options on those medical forms you see. The operation took quite a lot longer than they had hoped for some reason, I think they had a problem getting the ICD (as those of us in the know refer to it) to bed down properly. As Jenny has already said, I am fine but pretty bloody stiff and it does feel strange having an extra bit in your chest. You can just about make out the lump in this pic.


Yesterday was a pretty weird day, I was feeling quite apprehensive about the operation anyway and then suddenly the eyesight in my left eye went blurry. An opthamologist was called and he immediately started muttering about embolisms and "muy suerte" etc. Needless to say I found that pretty bloody worrying. Anyway my eyesight came back shortly afterwards and the eye chap had a good old look around (after putting some drops in which blinded me for about two hours!), declared all was well and disappeared. I am taking that as a good sign!

Shortly after that I was wheeled into theatre for the implant, it was done under local but I was pretty heavily sedated so most of it passed me by. I do remember a hell of a lot of pulling and pushing on my chest while they put the ICD in place but other than that was pretty painless and anyway I had a pretty nurse to look at. (One of the nurses later explained that because I'm skinny they didn't have anything to hide the ICD under and it was a bit of a job to get it in place.)

The rest is pretty much as Jenny has described it below, the leg shaking thing freaked me out a fair bit but apparently it is fairly normal.

My consultant Dr Montagne came around for a chat in the evening after I was feeling a bit more with it. That enormous folder contains my notes from the past 7 days!



And that was followed by a bloody good feed as promised, still hanging out for a decent steak and a glass of wine though.



This morning I have been for an X-ray to check the ICD is in the right place (went in a wheel chair, made a huge change from being wheeled everywhere in my bed), this is the first time I have not been plugged into a machine since I left the Falklands.



I then had another sponge bath from the nutty nurse who insisted that I would be unable to wash myself despite being able to get up and go to the toilet (or "pee pee" as she so fetchingly calls it).


Hoping that I am going to be moved to a new room this aftenoon, away from the "close observation" rooms I am in now. Which is nice.