Journal entry from Dec. 25th, 2006:
Note: After the surgery you need to heal. After a month, your processor/device is turned on. This is during the surgery healing stage.
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Is additional pain worth decreasing the pain of the IV? My last surgery, they gave me pills, but this time they stuck a needle between the skin of the IV because I said it hurt. Thanks! What is it about hospitals that strikes fear and turns me into a beast? My father and boyfriend weren't allowed in the prep area so I had to try my best in reading strangers' lips . The normal questions were easy to predict, but there were a few things I had to stare at them blankly about.
I was in the hospital from 6am until 1pm. I woke up around 10:30am, but I'm not sure how long the actual surgery took. I was told it was 3 hours long, but unless I woke up 5 minutes after surgery, they finished up earlier than expected. It was boring to wait 2 1/2 hours but I wasn't about to complain when mike and dad had been waiting 7 hours total. They prescribed vicodin but no antibiotics (said I didn't need any).
I arrived home around 4pm and felt fine aside from weakness and a swimmer's ear sensation. I was glued to the couch watching all the Judge shows and playing my DS lite for 6 days--WHY? Because a couple of days after the surgery, I caught the cold everyone else in the family already had. My head would throb more with every cough, sneeze, or blowing of the nose. I should be healed up from the cold in the next couple of days. My tonsillectomy was 100xs more painful, so healing from the implant is a breeze in comparison.
One week after surgery: For the fun of it, i wanted to test out my hearing of the implanted ear. I listened to my ipod for about 30 seconds and was shocked to learn I can still hear out of it**. The sound is lower, but workable with earbuds. I hope remaining hearing doesn't mean they messed it up, but all this time I thought the rest of my hearing would be destroyed and I could never listen to music with an earbud (without the processor) and never wear a hearing aid again. So what gives?
One month: On January 17th, I'll receive the processor and my first MAPPing. It's supposed to be a 3-hour long appointment with three additional appointments at 2 hours each. oh boy, that sounds like fun...
** The general rule was: once you receive the CI implant, your residual hearing is completely destroyed. This was not the case for me and is no longer a common occurrence today as it was 25 years ago.
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