Crazy Thoughts, Part III (Plus Bonus Crazy Actions!!!)

Sorry I haven't blogged in a while, friends. It's been a busy few weeks here in my world and I'm broadcasting live from next to a stack of unread books, some stuff I keep meaning to take to Goodwill, and a highboy whose drawers I can't shut all the way without refolding their contents. The point is, my life has given in to entropy lately.

Anyway, my biggest nose news of this week involved a trip to Doc's office. I've already told Elle Woods this story and she warned me not to gross out my readers, and Peter made me stop telling it because we were sitting next to some people in a pizza parlour who were eavesdropping and he didn't want to spoil their appetites. So...how to put this as delicately as possible? Well, I noticed what turned out to be dissolvable stitches that weren't dissolving. Let's just say that I found out through some rather medieval means that, internally, my nose wasn't healing the way it should. And it was scary.

There is a hypochondriac gene in my family and I have it. I try to repress it and not be outwardly dramatic but, to my great embarrassment, I've been to the doctor thinking I had skin cancer when I really just had a wart. In this case, in my mind I was sure my nose was going to become gangrene. Abscesses. Perforated septum. Just plain fall off. I'd be some odious ghoul and would have to be sent away from society. And Doc was going to look at me, indignantly: What Did You Do? he'd ask. I'd immediately have to go in for emergency surgery, I was certain, costing thousands of dollars, and it would still be deformed. Oh, the shame and horror!

Oh, and I'd forgotten my cell phone that morning, so I didn't have anyone's number to call and ask them to pick me up after they operated on me, so I worried about that. You thought I was joking, didn't you? No, really, I'm not kidding about the hypochondriac thing.

I called Doc's office around one o'clock on Monday, told them what was up, and they asked me to come in at 3:15. Oh, well, this confirms it, then. They want me there, now! You're in Michael Jackson territory. I told my boss that I had to leave at three because the doctor wanted to see me, right away. No, no, nothing to be alarmed about, I said, trying to contain the theatrics.

At 3:15, the office was pretty empty--there was no one in the waiting room. One of the nurses called me in and I explained what happened, waiting for a reprimand and the emergency team to swing into action. She took a cursory glance up my nose and told me I'd popped a stitch and to swab some Neosporin over it. Nothing to worry about, it'll heal completely! She said.

So you all will be happy to know that my nose is intact and still healing nicely.

Monday was also the four-week point after my surgery. I have to say that I'd have thought my nose would stop hurting by now, but it still does. I still have to be gentle with it when washing my face. I saw stars after I whacked it with an apple while taking a bite. I put out the question on the MakeMeHeal.com boards--everyone else was pretty curious about this, also. I got one response from someone who was at the five-month mark who said that it finally stopped hurting around 3 1/2 months.

Oh well...I knew this was a tough row to hoe from the get-go (I didn't really mean that to rhyme), so no complaining.

And, by the by, sorry there are no photos here--will try to update this post later and hopefully Blogger photo upload will be working.


UPDATE--Ok, whatever Blogger's problem was is now fixed, so here are my Week 4 photos. My eye's much better here, you can't even see the red in the photos and there's really just a little spot left. Still a little swollen, and that comes and it goes.