sing with your organs, it helps

Sometimes it feels so good to get into your own bed that you find yourself moaning and groaning loudly. That was me yesterday. And now I'm sitting in my gorgeous bed surrounded by pillows and TV remotes like a princess. I AM a pretty princess.

On Monday night, I remember slipping in and out of consciousness after the surgery. I was in the recovery room shaking with cold (which I had been expecting) and in agony. Apparently the tube from the catheter in my bladder was kinked and I needed desperately to wee. How unfair, to have a large incision in your belly and have the added insult of a desperate bladder.

Later, I was somewhere else. My cheek was being stroked by my beloved and people were talking. The room was dark. I cared little about what's going on, all I knew was there was something wrong. I heard the explanation but don't quite remember what it was. Apparently, according to my sources, "she bled and bled, and they had to go in to fix it, so the procedure took quite a bit longer than expected, and she's been left with a bikini line scar". It looks really good, my new scar, I have to say. I have a feeling it will be nearly undetectable when it's fully healed.

And over the course of the week, I got to ponder the atrocity of Irish daytime TV, cobble together the basis of yet another short film idea, and monitor my own progress.

It's kind of funny, really. When you are in a drug induced haze, fresh from theatre, you are gracious, thankful, baby-like, vulnerable and dependent. You are the perfect patient; a body with needs with no ability to think or take care of one's own self. That was me until Wednesday night. And then on Wednesday night I turned into a bad patient.

On Wednesday night I became aware of my situation and while my situation could have been far worse, of course, one doesn't much care about the what-if's but rather the reality of what's changed since Monday. I was suddenly annoyed, depressed and inconsolable all at once. My belly button isn't ever going to be the same. I have an abdomen full of scars. Simple, little things, I know, but it's just one of those things. I had no idea I was so attached to my navel.

Wednesday is sufficient time to realise you're at the beginning of being subjected to absence from your routine for a few weeks. Wednesday is the day when you know you're going to have to be patient. I consider myself patient, but on Wednesday I didn't want to know.

I made the nurses' night hell. I cried, I rang the bell and complained of pain, I wanted the lights off, the TV off, my roommate's visitors out. I was feeling spinny after my iron infusion and I complained mightily about that. I asked for more water. I huffed and puffed. And in the morning, I cried some more.

Ana, the nurse from Romania, wiped my tears and got me out of bed for a bath, since I was too weak to stand in the shower. She helped me out of my clothes, scrubbed my back, talked to me about the good things in my life and changed my dressings. I felt much better after that, clean at least (minus the hair... I hadn't predicted my extended stay and had no toiletries with me and my hair was getting pretty manky), fed, drugged, and the sun was shining.

And then the doctor came in and asked when I wanted to go home and I told him brightly that I would depart as soon as. And I was home a few hours later, sinking into my bed, moaning loudly.

"Aaaaauuuuuuuaauuuuauugghhhhhhaaarrrghhhhhhhh...."

You would, too, if every time you sat or laid down it felt like your insides were being slowly let down off a torture rack. It's like a release, like a whole-body sing-along.

Friday is better. Much better. I went walking outside... or shuffling, rather. I got really tired. But I went about 100 yards.

Neat, huh?