I had surgery on my hand the other day. It was the second
time for the same surgery on the same hand in the past five years. I’ve been
told (twice now) that there’s no guarantee of success and that recurrence is
not uncommon (I like the double negative assurance). Again this time, the
surgery went without complication. I went through the procedure like a widget
through a factory, a widget that’s gone through the same processing before, a
mulligan as it were. I knew the routine and was appropriately stoic in the
early morning prep, the interminable wait with nothing to do but watch CNN and
check my email, and finally the march to the operating theater (they actually
call it that, as if our performances will all be reviewed the next morning in
the New York Times). I was of course
out for the next two hours of the operation itself. I awoke vaguely over an
hour or so in post-op, being asked about pain (“I’ll take some more drugs,
thank you very much”) and generally what planet I thought I was on (“Uh . . . the
round one?”) before being taken to final recovery where I was given a snack bar
and water and pain pills (“thank you very much”). After a brief bout of nausea
while trying to get dressed (with my wife’s necessary help), I finally was
discharged into the snow and frigid temperatures of an Iowa January.
When confronted by others who can’t miss the prominent bloody
bandage on my right hand, the first question is always, “What happened to you?”
The first day or two I’d answer truthfully, “right little finger fasciectomy.”
But after puzzled expressions, I changed my response to the more intrepid, “Bar
fight.” The next question is inevitably, “Is it painful?” And the simple answer
is, no, I haven’t had much pain at all since I left the hospital, I didn’t fill
the prescription for pain meds the surgeon gave me because I don’t need them, I
have an apparently high threshold of pain, and the real question you should be
asking is, “Is it maddening to have limited use of your right hand?” Yes, it
sure as fuck is. My right hand is my dominant hand and unless you’ve lost most
use of your dominant hand you don’t realize that your life morphs into some bizarro
universe where your right hand is useless and you have to rely on your left
hand to do an amazing number of things that you’ve never thought twice about
before – taking a shower (particularly shampooing), brushing your teeth, wiping
your butt, making coffee, putting on your socks, tying your shoes, buttoning your
shirt (or pulling it over the bandaged hand), getting dressed generally – it goes
on, added to surprisingly as each day progresses, actions you have taken for
granted that suddenly become frustrating, painful, strenuous, or comical. The presumption
going in is pain. The reality is bother.
