Well, I made it through the second surgery, although things didn’t go as smoothly as I would have hoped. I had a different anesthesiologist this time (because you don’t get to choose) and for whatever reason, this guy thought general anesthesia would be the best way to go…he was WRONG! He gave me general anesthesia with some local anesthesia injected around the ankle. Unfortunately that was woefully inadequate and I was in terrible pain when I woke up. I had a short period of time during day two in the hospital in which I was somewhat comfortable (the pics where I’m smiling) but the vast majority of the time I was in quite a bit of pain. The anesthesiologist I had with the first surgery was right when he said it would be difficult to control the pain without a nerve block. So…if you have a choice, I would recommend spinal anesthesia with a femoral nerve block….having tried both ways, I can assure you that this way is the one that provides the most reliable pain control. The general anesthesia also made it very difficult for me to wake up afterwards and I have quite a bit of memory loss from the time shortly before and after surgery. For example, I don’t remember kissing my husband goodbye or being wheeled into surgery. But he says we kissed goodbye twice and he walked down the hall with me towards surgery; unfortunately I don’t remember any of that. I also had a very hard time waking up afterwards; below are pics of Rex unsuccessfully trying to talk to me about 3 hours after surgery.
I had quite a difficult time with nausea because pain meds just don’t agree with my system and since I didn’t have the nerve block, I had to take a lot more pain meds. I spent the evening feeling very bad and throwing up every hour or so until approximately 4am when they finally found a medicine that helped me stop vomiting. It was not a very pleasant night, to say the least.
About 1pm the next day I was feeling pretty good. I’m not sure why but I had a period of time of about 3 hours in which I didn’t feel too nauseous and my pain was under control. I don’t know what we did differently but during this 3 hour period I actually felt quite human and was able to smile and enjoy spending time with my husband.
Now that we’ve gotten home, I’ve found the secret to pain control, at least for me. It’s as simple as changing position. For whatever reason, I can only remain comfortable (and relatively pain free) for about an hour. At the hour point I will start experiencing a lot of shooting pain and burning. But if I just change my position, I can be comfortable again. It’s really strange. I’m taking my Oxycodone every 3 hours (as prescribed) and then I just change position from left side to right side every hour (or vice versus). For whatever reason, I can’t get comfortable on my back for more than 10-15 mins so I only eat in that position. Perhaps that’s why I was so uncomfortable in the hospital, because you spend the vast majority of your time in the hospital bed on your back.
My foot looks a bit better this time, you’ll notice there’s no blood seeping from the big toe and soaking through the bandage this time. But it looks like they put a stitch in the end of the big toe this time so that must be why. 
I want to thank everyone for their prayers and well wishes…I really appreciate it!
I’ll update again soon.
Dana
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