B +5

Saturday morning.
5 days since spinal fusion.

I am home at my parents house. Paul collected me from hospital yesterday lunch time and we drove the hellish 1 hours journey (broken up in the middle with a Costa) to their house and the children.

What a relief it is to be home. The children are noisy (Niamh in particular, knows and loves me again and it is delightful). The house is so comfortable. Paul and my sister are here. My parents are loving me and taking care of me as only parents can (and as you can only truly appreciate once you become a parent) and I am just so happy to be surrounded by my family.

I am physically uncomfortable. The pain I feared beforehand is very real. Walking is currently a slow shuffle with walking sticks. There is no getting away from it. I laid in bed last might and cried over the ache. But I still havent encountered the 'catch' from beforehand, so I am actually winning.

For posterity's sake, my current status of movement on day 5:

* Walking is a slow shuffle with sticks
* Getting to a sitting position (bending my back and legs simultaneously) hurts
* 'Log rolling' (literally rolling your body like a stiff log) into bed hurts like a very rude word
* Bending to pick something up (or to kiss the kidlets) is not an option, I am simply too stiff
* My hips ache like another rude word
* I can't lift my arms higher than my shoulders as my back isn't strong enough
* My wound ITCHES! (Obviously I shouldn't be scratching it, it is bandaged and too new, but the irony of not being able to reach round and scratch it even if I did want to is not lost on me!)
* my wound is swollen. If you look at yourself in the mirror, side on, your spine dips in and curves in from your shoulders, before coming out again to form your buttocks. Mine currently drops down to my buttocks in a straight line. Looks most odd.

Improvements I am already noticing:

* From day 3 to day 5 my core movement has already improved enough for me to shuffle my hips and 'wiggle' slowly into a better position in bed, rather than getting out and starting a 'log roll' again.
* I can get out of bed on my own and with less discomfort
* I can wiggle my foot vigorously enough to get my slippers on by myself

Ok, they are little things - but they feel monumental right now.

And so starts day 5. Thanks for reading - I leave you with a few poignant shots of last 36 hrs xxxx