I'm not myself today...

Perhaps I'll be me another day.

Sorry, feeling a little out of sorts. I have neglected this a bit. I have some many more happy things to share, but right now I really need to get this one thing off of my chest.

Many things have changed in the last 24 hours. I received a couple of phone calls yesterday. Do to a lingering injury to my neck from my accident in December I am going in for surgery. Do to my need for a light duty set up at work I was let go from my job that I love so much, they do not have anything light duty. Surgical date is set for June 11th at 7:15 am. I will be having a double ACDF or Anterior Cervical Discectomy and Fusion with anterior internal instrumentation. What does this mean? A surgeon is going to remove 2 discs from my neck, fuse 3 vertebrae together sealing the deal with a titanium plate via a 3 inch incision in the front of my neck.

I was stupid enough to go looking on the internet today for a video of this operation. I am a firm believe that knowledge is not only power but also empowering. So with the sincere hopes of bolstering myself and relieving some anxiety, I watched this horrendous thing. OK... so now I don't know how to feel. I am scared, but I was OK before I watched that damned thing. It was fine when they were showing graphs and charts and an intelligent sounding man was explaining the case history of Patient X. Same situation as me. Same procedure. Even the same discs and everything.

I was OK when they started cutting. I think the retractors are what did me in. This evil looking metal device that they place into that smallish incision and forced all that delicate tissue around with. It was awful. I have a pretty healthy constitution and can handle almost anything. But knowing that this is in my immediate future freaked me out. I panicked. I couldn't catch my breath. My chest hurt. I began to sob. I'm an idiot.

Again thinking that knowing exactly what was going to happen would lessen my fears. I gave myself a panic attack.

So now I've had some time to calm down and think about things only to come to the decision that I'm still way freaked out, but there's nothing I can do about it. This is what needs to happen. I have an excellent doctor. The guy that works on the Astros & RR Express. I'm going to be in a brand new hospital. State of the art and low chance of contamination infection. Family and friends are already making plans on how to take care of me. And a great rep from a great agency finding me a new "desk" job. So all in all, I guess I'm OK.


In the meantime... sleep. Updates to be posted as they are needed or I am able.