Wednesday, April 21, 2010

The Surgeon Says...

So, as some of you may know, I've been on the phone with a man who is not my husband an awful lot lately. His name is Dr. T, and he is my surgeon. I struggled for two days to convince him to see me, because my leg wound was turning black. He kept saying it was fine, that it wasn't really black. Actually, my description yesterday was "the middle is black, and the skin radiating out from the edges is mottled yellow and green and brown and black."

I've got a picture of what I was trying to describe. It's a bit... graphic. So if you're squeamish, do not click on the link below.

Click here to see what my leg looked like on April 20th

However, after my husband saw what it looked like, he called the surgeon himself and got me an appointment. Went in, had to wait 45 minutes, and the surgeon came in. He looked at it and I promise, he did a double take. He apparently really didn't think it was actually black. He thought that we were seeing blood clots or something of the sort. No, not so much.

He scraped away at the tissue he described as "dead" and then scraped some more. Then he got giddy, and called it a word I can't remember. And then the bomb got dropped - it was actually my fault. The cutting I did in January (haven't done any since before the last time I was hospitalized, by the way) has really hindered my superficial blood supply. The wound he made to treat the previous tissue death, inadvertently removed the blood supply for much of the surrounding skin/tissue as well.

Because of that, the skin, and the tissue beneath, has died. It looks gross. Smells worse than it looks. And it creeps me out. He said it's okay - that it will be self-limiting and should be about done progressing. On Friday, his plan is to keep me wide awake, use only a local anesthetic, and remove the tissue that has died. Time for a little baring of my soul, so to speak... that absolutely, thoroughly terrifies me. So if you pray for me, please, PLEASE pray for peace as I go in Friday morning. Once all of the dead tissue is removed, he will be putting a wound vac on. I haven't researched this yet, so if anybody has had one, or knows much about them, please share.

After all his scraping and carrying on, I don't think my leg looks any better at all. I think it looks worse, to be honest. But here is what it looks like today. Again, if you are squeamish, do NOT click the link below.

Click here to see what my leg looked like on April 21st

So, that's my update for those of you (and there have been quite a few) who have asked how my leg is.

Stumble Upon Toolbar

1 comment:

Amanda said...

i know wound vacs. They're very cool, you'll like it. it will help your leg heal MUCH quicker!! let me know if you have questions. I can try to answer them.