updates.

After 11 days of hell waiting; I showered and flossed. Heaven.

I'm feeling much much better. The swelling continues to decrease...I look less and less like Franken-Mommy every day and more like me; which is such a good.

Eating has improved to foods I don't actually have to chew but can just swallow. Being that my jeans fit so well I am not concerned about this.


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It seems that there is actually a perfectly good reason to lick a baby.

As long as it's your baby....

...and she is arm deep in a bowl of mashed pears that got away from you.

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I had an awful dream last night.

Phoebe from Friends (not Lisa Kudrow...Phoebe) had Riley overnight while I was in the hospital for Lumpy.

My baby was not only not a baby when she was returned to me but she was Haley Joel Osment.




...And that is me off the pain killers.

the perfect diet.

I think I've finally figured out. After years of struggling with my body....the perfect diet.

I call it the Anti-Salivate diet and it's sorta based on Pavlov's Dog theory.

Think about food- make food- attempt to eat food.

Blinding searing pain. Radiating from my inner ear and pulsing through my whole head...certainly more effective than a bell.

If the food actually enters my mouth watch out, that is where the real punishment begins.

There's not a number on the pain scale for what I feel; and that's with copious amounts of percoset acetaminophen coursing in my veins.

My liver is loving it I'm sure.

Drugs I have to take (obviously) on an empty stomach. So if the cutting head pain wasn't enough to deter nutrition in any form entering my system the belly pains are a great follow up.

Psychologically it's really doing a number on me. Water seems to be the only thing I can have; but not too much. If I indulge a dull ache begins.

So the upside of having one of your main salivary glands partially removed is weight loss.

Take that Hollywood.

Because there has to be an upside; I'm really a glass is half full sort of girl.

all of those years of art school and I finally have something in common with Van Gogh.

This morning while talking to Spouse....

"It's been almost a week and I don't feel at this point that it's the stitches primarily holding my ear on..."

Really...I said that. In my kitchen. No one should ever have occasion to say that.

I think I have turned a corner this morning. Not because I can mock my predicament. Ok a little because I can mock my predicament. But because I woke up this morning and felt like me again.

Not the drugged up, sliced open version of me that was totally incapable of caring for either herself, her husband or her baby.

I completely underestimated the surgery and the recovery. For some reason I never really thought about it; I was too busy focusing on my smile.

I just figured a little slice here and there, Lumpy would pop out and that would be that.

Not so much.

They took my ear off.

Yeah you read that right.

They cut it and flipped it back and lord only knows what else.

I was F'ed up! Ask BF, she was here (out of the never ending goodness of her heart) and she took wonderful care of me. But she can support me here without me having to post really gross pictures (which I am happy to do if you guys want to see them). I was F'ed up.

I still cant feel my ear, but after cleaning out all the crusted yuck from it this morning I can hear again. So there's that.

The stitches come out Thursday and then I can actually shower.

I haven't washed my hair in a week.

So lets recap....Crust, stitches, sliced ear and neck, goo, yuck, no shower.

Go one...line up and who gets to be friends with me!

lump no more.

I can't really see straight to type right now.

Pain killers.

I have no hope that what I would write would be remotely coherent.

So I will just say this.

Seeing all of your loving comments this morning made me smile really BIG.

Because I can. Everything is ok.

Now...I am going to go make with the passing out in my bed.

there's no way out now.

My bag is packed (mostly), all the phone calls have been made. My Auntie is here to take care of Riley.


On the surface it looks like I'm ready.


Beneath the surface?


I am not OK.


I talk to Spouse about it and he tries to calm me. The baby will be OK, she will not starve, she may be mad...but she will be OK. People are here to care for her; he will be here with her at night. She will be OK.


But what he doesn't get is that it's not the baby I'm worried about. It's me.


I am not OK.


Yes, I am frightened about the results of the surgery; the side effects to both my face and the chance of aggravating my MS. But what bothers me most?


Being away from my baby. My sweet little girl. For the first time in our life together we will be separate.


Sure, I have had the occasional night out and pedicure appointment. But 48 hours apart? I can't imagine how much I will miss her. My breath catches in my throat when I think about it.


My surgery is at 11 AM today.


So here is to everything going swimmingly.


I am talking Micheal Phelps insanely successful- swimmingly.

Lumpy's day out.

I was in Boston today for my second consolation with the surgeon who is taking Lumpy out a week from Monday.

I have touched on Lumpy before on this blog but never really explained him.

He (because everything in my life has to have a name and personality; the car, the camera, the tumors...) is a benign Parotid Gland Tumor located at the end of my left jaw line below my ear lobe. He is about the size of a shooter marble or a slightly undersized golf ball (if there even is such a thing).

While the news of him being benign caused me great relief I am still focused on the surgery itself.

I am freaking!

First, I will be away from my daughter for at least 48 hours if not more, I am praying it will be less.

Second, I am going under. All the way out. While this has the bonus of not having to "hold really still" it also comes with violent vomiting upon waking up.

What fun.

Oh and third, the surgery carries a small and the surgeon says he doesn't anticipate a problem but he won't really know until he gets in there risk of paralysis on the left side of my face.

You see the facial nerve runs right through/on/beneath Lumpy.

So when the surgeon starts talking about minimal scarring and pain I could really give two craps.

I will take a scar. I will take pain.

I will even take the promised numbness of my left ear.

I just want to be able to smile normally when it is all over. I want to be able to close my eye just like I closed it the day before. I want to puff out my cheek and suck it back in again.


Normal.


With in reason of course.

I am after all. Me.

Lessons

I learned three very important things yesterday.

The first; That Lumpy is benign.

The second; The place I mentally send myself to stay calm during painful medical procedures has changed. It is no longer the rolling hills of my childhood in Vermont.

I now find myself in a soft rocking chair in the solace of Riley's room. Just the two of us, quietly nursing.

That is where I am at peace and where I draw the strength I need to fight the battles my body insists on putting me through.

Finally; There is actually a much better route to Trader Joe's then going through downtown Worcester. (For the record it's pronounced Wusta).

...well thank goodness for that.