Work not giving a....

I was (officially) diagnosed with bilateral carpal tunnel syndrome in June. 

Work have been anything but supportive, 

Comments from my manager include: 

Can you take stronger painkillers to mask the pain? 

There is nothing wrong with your mouth so why can't you come in?

You can do your job with one hand. (I use a pc with a lot of typing) 

Lots of people come into work with one hand. 

You're putting pressure on your colleagues. 

Are you going to string this out over Christmas? Some people would be just looking for more time off. 

Technology

Bug has been learning about technology at nursery. On Tuesday he was given a disposable camera to take home and he was to take two pictures of his family. This was so they has a chance to use the camera but it also gives the nursery an opportunity to have a discussion about different families. I thought this was a lovely idea. 

Bug is good with technology. He can use my old iPhone and tablet to play various games (vast majority are education based) and has done confidently for a while now. All in moderation but I feel like it's a necessity to be comfortable with it when you think about how much some of us rely on technology every day. 

On Wednesday when I picked him up from nursery he was talking about Halloween. I've to get pumpkins for him and he would like to dress up as a fireman. My boy is obsessed with fire engines. I remember carving pumpkins for his first ever Halloween. Speaking of Halloween, I was visiting a friend last night and she's having a little party so has invited us over. 

I have loads more to write, including that we went up to the capital to be part of the rally for independence. I need to leave soon to go into work. It's only a catch up with my manager. I'm actually more stressed out about work than I am about the fact I'm having surgery in less than 7 weeks. Seriously. 

My clever boy

Bug was the only child at nursery today to get a sticker for being able to recite a nursery rhyme to his class. 

Very proud mummy. 

Orthopaedic appointment

This afternoon I had my follow up with orthopaedics. 

I will update more about it later but I'm booked in to have decompression surgery (left hand) on the 12th November. 7 weeks tomorrow. 

I'm not sure if it's a good or bad thing that I know what to expect this time!

Mummy, I'm a sick wee lamb

I suspect bug is getting the cold. I have the start of a cold myself and last night bug was up a few times and was really warm this morning. Once we were up and had breakfast (and some calpol for bug) his temperature was fine and he seemed back to his usual self. Since he hadn't been sick and felt fine I still took him to nursery this afternoon.

This evening he didn't eat much of his dinner and kept saying he was a sick wee lamb. Lots of cuddles and an early night. I've not long checked on him and his temperature is fine and he's happily sleeping. I hope he feels better in the morning, he looked so sad this evening. 

Yesterday at nursery when I picked him up he wasn't wearing the same top I dropped him off in. I asked what happened and one of the nursery staff said he was playing with the water and sand and got wet. I wonder if some parents give her a hard time because she kept saying how much fun he had and now much he was laughing. I'm not one to bother about wet or dirty clothes so it was fine. What I did find weird was that instead of using the change of clothes I pack for him they put him in the most horrible top ever. Of course, bug loved the top and wasn't too happy when I took it off him. So today bug got his top soaked again (and I got another explanation about how happy he was) but this time he was wearing his own extra top I packed. Bug declared that he told his nursery teacher that he had his own clothes. Well done little man! I asked bug in the car why he was wet for the second day in a row and he said the apron was a bit rubbish. 

Sometimes I worry that bug doesn't get as much attention because he is confident, excellent talker etc. 

Up until today the routine when I drop him off has been change into indoor shoes and hang up jacket and bag, go to the table to take his name and then put his name into the blue basket. Today this routine had changed to just taking him to the door (once in his indoor shoes) and letting him do the rest himself. I think bug was a bit surprised at first because his little hand was still out for mine and he was looking at me. The nursery teacher helped him choose his name but he was still looking at me. I wasn't sure what was best to do so I walked around to the window to wave and mouth "bye, love you" to bug. He was happy with this and ran into one of the play areas. 

When I picked him up he ran to me and took my hand. Lately he's been pulling up my sleeve to check what hand is my good hand before taking it. The majority of the time he remembers which one but he does like to check. 

He is so wonderful and amazing and I love him more than words. 

My big nursery boy

I'm seriously in denial at times that my little boy is 3.5 years old. It has been a truly wonderful 3.5 years. Difficult at times but I wouldn't change a thing. Sleepy cuddles from my sweet boy are amazing. It's a true blessing to have grown this little miracle and watching him grow into a wonderful little boy. I'm so, so blessed to be his mother and I'm forever in debt to the universe for having my son in my life. 

In the last two weeks since my hand surgery he has been so thoughtful and patient. I've been getting extra cuddles and kisses. My hand has been getting little kisses too. Bug has also been telling everyone "mummy has a sore handy." Bug reminds me to be careful. My sweet boy. 

Bug has been delighted with getting back into the routine of seeing his childminder and going to nursery. He absolutely loves nursery. Even though I had my worries he is so happy and doing brilliant. It's awesome when I pick bug up and he tells me about his class on the walk to the car. I love getting paintings home with him. Bug is very friendly and confident so has naturally made lots of friends. It's lovely hearing about them. I'm so proud of him. Even with going to the childminders from quite young (13 months old) he has been excellent at adapting and welcoming new people into his life. He helped make that transition of going back to work all that more smooth. We did have some wobbles with nursery but from the second week all has been well. 

The nursery staff tell me his speech is amazing. Some of the things he comes out with blow me away. They are also impressed with how he starts conversations. He knows all his colours and shapes. A few weeks ago he knew what a hexagon was. I'm a very proud mummy. 

Bug has always loved drawing and painting. Recently he's started trying to write and it's really picking up. At this point he's not actually writing but he's getting very close. It must have been a few months he started drawing lots of lines which I was told was the beginning of writing. Sure enough the lines have gotten smaller and closer together over the last few weeks. Today, he has drawn what looked like pretend writing. Rows of what looked like illegible writing. At the top he had drawn what looked like the first two letters of his name. The attempt at his name was sort of a diagonal line, so different to the rows. Very exciting. 

So my title of this post from bug reminding me often that he's a big nursery boy. Sometimes he's a big, strong, nursery boy. This morning he was telling me that he's growing tall like mummy. Yes you are sweetheart, too quickly, right before my eyes. 

Suture removal day

10 days post op. 

This is the last in my series of daily pics. I will post one on Tuesday to show recovery weekly. Once I'm able to be seriously online I'm going to move all my carpal tunnel entries onto their own blog. If I don't then I'll need to rename this carpal tunnel tantrums! 

Anyway, today was suture removal day.

How much better does the incision look? That picture was less than 10 minutes after them being removed. I came home, washed my hands and thought it looked amazing. It also felt incredible to be able to properly wash my right hand. 

So suture removal wasn't too bad. I didn't like the sensation of the stitches being pulled out through my skin. I'm shuddering at the thought. One of the stitches also caught on removal so that was lovely. 

Around the incision still feels very swollen (and looks it). My skin around the incision still feels very tight but I imagine that will improve now stitches are out. I still have limited grip. Using the door handle example, I still can't open doors. I also cannot write which I found out today when seeing my manager. I really have loads to say about work but it will need to wait. 

Bug has been so wonderful while I'm recovering. He tells everyone I was in hospital and have a sore handy. I'm getting lots of cuddles. I love him so much. My sweet boy. 

9 days post op [carpal tunnel]

This will be my last stitches picture. 

Tomorrow is suture removal day. I don't even care if it's going to hurt, I just want them out. 

Still painful. Skin is very tight and swollen around the incision and the incision itself is still raised. I'm still getting a deep pain on either side of the incision. It's still painful to use any pressure. For example, I can hold a door handle but I can't turn or open it. I still have very limited use of my right hand. 

8 days post op [carpal tunnel]

No real difference. The incision is still swollen and raised. 

sore leg

Since I've not yet been cleared to drive I decided to get the bus into town and then walk up to the childminders. Bug has been asking for her all week and was so excited about seeing her and going to nursery. I text the childminder on Monday night to let her know we'd be a bit later than usual yesterday. 

Bug loves the bus. Loves. He loves waiting on it, he loves sitting up on the high seats at the back, he loves being able to see lots from the windows, he loves seeing all the other people getting on and off the bus and he absolutely loves pressing the red button when it's our stop and time to get off. 

Bug done so well with the walk to his childminder. It's all uphill and up so many stairs. Every now and again he would stop to tell me that's he's walked up all the stairs with more to go. I did get stuck with his fireman Sam bag... 

After I dropped him off at the childminders and caught up a bit with her I just headed back into the town. I'm still limited in what I can do at the moment so I opted for buying a bottle of water and getting the bus home. 

[Why are buses so expensive? Where is the incentive to use public transport?!]

I was only home for a few hours when it was time to leave again. Luckily, my sister said she'd meet me and walk up to nursery with me. So we done that. 

On the walk back into the town bug had a fall but seemed ok and kept walking. 

Fast forward to last night and by bedtime he was upset and was sort of limping. My poor boy so he had a bit of an early night. 

This morning he wasn't as bad but still sore. I was going to phone doctors but them decided just to try resting today since he is ok sitting and generally not putting weight on his (right) leg. I filled a bath for him and he was happily playing for about half an hour. He does had a little bruise right on the joint of his knee so I'm thinking that's what is making it sore. 

I've phoned his nursery to let them know he won't be in today. I explained why and they were fine with it. 

Lots of cuddles and lazing on the sofa today. 

One week post op [carpal tunnel]

My patient wee bug

I feel like such a shitty mummy. Even though it's temporary it's frustrating not having full use of my right hand. My wee bug has been on the patient side. Today he had a wobble at bedtime. I know he'll be finding it hard and different that I'm not playing with him as much. I'm not sitting down on the floor with him building Lego towers or pulling out his playmobil. 

Bug now reminds me that I have a sore hand, that I was in hospital and had an operation. He takes everything in. 

Today I did take him into the town. It was quick but he loves the bus so it meant two bus journeys for him. On the way home he fell asleep and just cuddled into me. It was lovely just having him snuggled in and just cuddling him. That's one perk that the bus has. There are no sleepy cuddles in the car. 

6 days post op [carpal tunnel]

5 days post op [carpal tunnel]

My right hand is now at five days post open release/decompression surgery. It's still painful. I still don't have any grip in my hand. I can move my fingers ok but I still feel a lot of pain in my incision and my thumb.

The dressing is a nightmare. It keeps coming up around the edges and eventually into the cushioned, non sticky part so I have no choice but to change it. I only changed it yesterday morning but I had to change it again this evening. Roll on Friday when I get these stitches out. Once the stitches are out I no longer have to wear any dressing over the incision. 

Since I was changing the dressing I took another picture. 

The carpal tunnel syndrome symptoms are worse in my left hand. I know this is because I'm using my left hand more. I have absolutely no carpal tunnel symptoms in my right hand. 

It's very frustrating trying to do trivial things with just my left hand. Being a mother for example. Also, brushing my teeth, washing my face, getting dressed, eating and everything else. I also miss driving.

4 days post op [carpal tunnel]

While getting washed this morning I must have got the dressing wet. It was starting to come up at the base of my hand so I decided to change it. Wishing I hadn't seen the incision now. It didn't look as good as when I seen it at 2 days post op...

New dressing on. 

This morning I received my letter to see my orthopaedic consultant on the 23rd September. I knew I had an appointment that day, the nurse told me, but now it's all officially booked in which saves me from phoning appointments at the hospital. 

3 days post op [carpal tunnel]

I'm still in so much pain. I'm still taking paracetamol and codeine (30/500) and ibuprofen (400mg). Absolute agony. Yesterday I was able to take the outer bandage and sling off. I also got to change the dressing. Since my wound/stitches was exposed I snapped a picture, as you can see in my last post.

Today there's bruising up my arm and in the palm of my hand. I tried to take a picture but you can't really see the bruising so much. 

I'm impressed at how good it looks at just three days post op. When I looked up the surgery online some of the pictures were scary. Lots of bruising and gaping wounds. As I said, impressed. 

I phoned to make an appointment with my GP for two weeks time. I decided to make it with my own GP rather than the one I was seeing. So, I'm seeing her on the 17th. I also made an appointment to see the nurse to have my stitches taken out on Friday 13th. 

I'm also due an appointment with the orthopaedic surgeon on the 23rd. Lots of appointments. 

The carpal tunnel syndrome symptoms in my right hand have pretty much vanished. I'm still having symptoms in my left hand and it's making me realise how bad the carpal tunnel was now that my right hand doesn't have it. 

2 days (or 44 hours) post op [carpal tunnel]

ouch

The local anaesthetic started to wear off about 4.30pm yesterday so I took some painkillers once I felt that tingling feeling in my fingers. It seriously started wearing off around 8pm and oh wow was it painful. I've been in agony every since, despite taking strong painkillers. As well as pain, when the local s wearing off, I could feel a very strange bubbling sensation in the palm of my hand. I also keep forgetting and keep moving my hand. My right hand is my dominant hand so it's just out of habit. 

My friend, S, came to pick me up from the hospital. I couldn't thank her enough. She's also said if I need anything just to let her know. How lovely is that? We're going to do lunch again once I get my stitches out. 

So I woke up about 20 minutes ago in pain so thought I'd do a little bit of left handed updating. There is loads I want to write but for now I'm going try getting back to sleep. (It's 3.08am!)

Open release/decompression surgery // carpal tunnel syndrome

I'm not sure if I should be concerned the surgeon had to draw an arrow pointing to the incision site.

Surgery today for carpal tunnel release

Today is the day of my open release/ decompression surgery. I have been awake since 5am because I'm feeling very nauseated at the thought of it.

Last night I went out with S so that I wasn't sitting stressing over tomorrow (today). Our regular coffee place closes early last night so we just went a drive to Costa. It was nice just sitting by the window chilling for a while, watching the motorway traffic zoom passed us. 

S also picked up a furby for L. They were £40 down from £60 so when you're buying two that's quite a saving! 

Yesterday, because it was my last day driving for a while, I went out during the day to pick up some last minute things. I got lentils and veggies to make a big batch of lentil soup. I made the lentil soup yesterday afternoon and it's awesome. I also went up to Next to get bug some more bits and pieces. Ended up getting him a new pair of jeans that are all lined inside, two more long sleeved tops and a thicker hooded zipper. I love the clothes in Next. I also got myself a loose t-shirt for after surgery. I needed something easy to wear. 

For today, as well as the loose t-shirt, I'm going to wear my jeans going to hospital but I'm packing sporty trackies too wear on the way home. They are just plain ones with no buttons or fastenings so better to be prepared since doing my jeans up might be an issue with one hand bandaged up. I also have to pack a dressing gown. I'll need to remember my book so I'm not bored waiting on surgery once I'm admitted. 

I'm just finishing off a cup of tea. I was allowed tea before 7am! Then it's nothing but water until 11am. Then I can no longer drink water. 

I need to check the times of buses to the hospital. What's frustrating is that the bus from home to the hospital direct either gets me there 53 minutes early or 7 minutes late. Since I can't be late and don't fancy being that early I'll need to get two buses. Getting the bus should be an experience in itself. I can count on one hand how many times I've gotten the bus since I learned to drive over 6 years ago! 

I'll update on the other side, when I'll hopefully have unilateral carpal tunnel as opposed to bilateral carpal tunnel! 

The day before

My surgery is tomorrow and anxiety has kicked in. I'm feeling sick about it. My hands, particularly my right hand, have been very painful. I just hope all goes well. 

6 months

It's the first of September. 

It's now been six months since I stopped taking antidepressants.