The High Dive
I was eleven years old when I gave in to my younger brother’s jeers to climb all the stairs to the top height diving board at our local pool. Not one to be told I was too scared to try a little courage I climbed reluctantly. Every step upward I could feel myself pulling back. It was like a dance between ego and fear. One step up and closer to the 10-meter board and the anxiety made my legs feel like lead. I stood at the top and overlooked the pool. Staring out from the ceiling height of the Olympic pool I could feel myself coming undone. Creeping to the edge of the platform I could barely dare to look out never mind down. I was frozen. My brother having ascended the stairs for the second time, he emerges beside me soaking wet and ready to dare me to jump. “I can’t,” I say to him. No amount of convincing will move me. The anxiety won. The ego slumps into the background as I trepidatiously back up from the edge, retreating down the stairs as I pass all the others on the narrow stairs back down to safety.
As I board the plane to see Dr. Schwartz in California I am hit the same internal battle. The fear of what lies ahead and the ego that cheers me toward getting my mobility and life back. Every step is painful and heavy. I am at the edge of the platform now. I know I have to leap, the fear grips me. The plane takes off. It feels like looking straight down off the platform of the high dive.
The lights of California
We land in California in the dark illuminated by the endless haze of the city lights to the horizon. It’s New Years Day and the warm air in L.A makes it feel like 6 months have passed since we left Canada. I keep moving through the motions of the plan. Get the bags and head for the car rental place. Stand in lines, and eventually make our way to the hotel we will call home for the next 11 days. My Love joins me on this journey, he is a constant source of love and support. Neither of us thought we’d find ourselves in our 30’s in the role of caregiver and convalescent. He approaches with grace and kindness. We are in this together.
Claustrophobic
The city in the daylight is claustrophobic. Loud and busy with an anxiety all its own. Drivers that rival the maniacs in Montreal and the freeways of Calgary. I beg him to drive me out to the beach where I can ground myself with the unencumbered horizon. With the Santa Monica pier in the distance, we wander the paved path that lines the beach. Each step is painful but purposeful. We are witness to an incidental sunset as I take my first deep breath since we left Winnipeg. The exhaustion and stress of the entire situation weigh down my eyelids. I need sleep.
Meeting Dr. Schwartz
The day comes that I’ll meet Dr. Schwartz in person. The tension in my body is palpable. I imagine a world where I walk into a doctor’s office and they know more about my disease than I do. I picture the relief that I will feel. It brings me to tears just thinking of it. My emotions are the most intense rollercoaster in the whole state of California right now. Dr. Schwartz’s office is welcoming and his staff greet me by name. Ushered into a room where they have me change out of my compression, take photos, measurements, and do a digital scanning of my lipedemic legs. The doctor enters and smiles behind his mask. He is so welcoming and happy to see me. I realize that as we meet I am still treading the line between nurse and patient. I haven’t been the patient yet. It’s as if I have been acting as my own advocate for so long that I can’t let it go. I can’t allow the trust that is required to feel safe and assured in the hands of a medical team.
I list off my questions and concerns at a rapid pace trying to hold myself back. Realizing that I must be failing at holding any semblance of composure as I chatter nervously with the doctor. He sits calmly and assures me that I should trust the process and he has done this many times before. His assurance urges me closer to the edge of the platform in my mind. The one where I know I must leap and let him take care of my broken body.
Control
My fear and anxiety are all about control. Who will protect me from pain and injury while I am under general anesthesia? Giving myself over to this process might have been the hardest part of the journey so far. With my surgery only 12 hours away I listen endlessly to my playlist trying to calm my nerves. Through the sleepless night before surgery, I question how I will manage the recovery under such stress. Sunrise comes anyway.
My fear and anxiety are all about control
Consent
The anesthesiologist greets me in the hour before my surgery and she agrees to play my playlist for me while I go under. She talks to me about picturing a place I love when I go under to help me find internal calm. Somehow my feet are carrying me into the operating room. While my mind clawed the walls in protest. I lay on the table and hear my music start to play. My nurse brain carried me in here, but my patient brain is on fire with fear. I breathe calmly, try to centre myself and the anesthesiologist asks me to picture my calm place. She asks my consent to put me under, a measure I greatly appreciate as both a patient and a nurse.
Waking Up
I wake up unable to open my eyes. All I can feel is pain. I am sorry to say for those that fear the post-op reality, but for me, it was intense pain. I cry out barely conscious for pain management. I feel my nurse holding my hand and assuring me that she is here and they are helping me. The meds aren’t helping and I am shaking in pain. I have no idea how they got me up and into a wheelchair but the next thing I know I am being whisked away to the aftercare facility. On my way out I feel arms wrap around the back of my shoulders. It’s Dr. Schwartz offering me a comforting hug and telling me that my lipedema was “really bad” but I am gonna be okay.
Aftercare
The next few hours are a haze of feeling sedated and begging for pain meds to work. My nurse (Diamond) at Prestige takes expert care of me. I can sense her capability and let myself fall into the role of patient. I am so vulnerable now. I need the care. My Love meets me at aftercare, he looks worn out and unusually concerned. In a fluster, he brings my bags to my room. I ask if he’s okay and he tells me that my operation went much longer than expected; with no word from the clinic he was left to ruminate and worry. I truly wish this surgery was available in Manitoba where we could have our support network in times like these. In a foreign county and with just the two of us we are facing uncertainty, it all feels like too much. I tell Diamond I want to walk. She gets me up with all my tubes and wires. With the help of a walker, I take my first walk in the hallway. I make it to the end of the hall and my Love remarks that I have walked without my limp. The limp from left ankle pain that prevents me from walking more than 50 feet is now totally gone. I was assured by Dr. Schwartz that often these types of pains are directly related to fibrotic tissue holding onto nerves and tendons. These are my first pain-free steps in over a year. Sure I have post-op pain… but I also have hope. The first sense that it might all be worth it wraps my battered body and mind in a type of comfort that I haven’t felt before. Hope is powerful healing.
Early Days
The next few days are a blur of sleeplessness, pain, walking, swelling, complications, and severe allergic reaction that lands me in the hospital for the day. The first 3 days are surely the worst of it. By post-op day 4 I feel like a new person. Able to move and walk with less pain. The anxiety is lessening and I am starting to see bits of the old me coming back. We head for the beach to walk along the path in Santa Monica. I am unsure how far I will be able to walk. I apologize in advance to my Love if we wasted the trip. He urges me onwards and reminds me no apology is ever needed.
Big Steps
Post-op day 4: Stepping out into the sunshine in January I feel the warmth and glow that I have sorely missed being so trapped indoors by my disease. The first steps are always agony but as the post-op soreness releases its grip on me I feel free. I am free. I am walking. I can’t hold back my smile. We walk together down the path all the way to the Santa Monica pier. I take breaks to sit where needed. We grab a coffee at the beach stand and continue on our way. I feel amazing. Elated by the distance I have walked without pain I can hardly slow myself down. Painless. In the end, we walked 3 kilometres. A week ago I wouldn’t have made it out of the parking lot. I might pay for this tomorrow, but today I am gloriously happy.
3 Responses
My beautiful Emma;
I am so thrilled for you, that you are on your way to a normal life.How disappointing that we don’t have such health care in Canada.Please keep fighting for your rights, with the gov’t. You go, girl!!!!
Les.xxx
I’m in tears reading your journey you have been on and your forward strength.
I was so privileged to be with you each day in our back & forth FB “chats”.
You were so open to suggestions & were so authentic!
I got to experience your day to day shifts.
Now you have been in the pool.
Aren’t our Bodies amazing?
HUGS!!
“Mommoa T”