The Surgery

Friday morning 5:30 am woke up to the alarm I had set on my mobile phone, finished my morning duties, noted down few phone #s on a piece of paper and the directions to the hospital. I was strictly instructed to dress easy so, I put on my PJs and a simple t-shirt. I was also asked not to carry anything not even my wallet but I decided to carry my cell phone. I become very restless without the cell phone in my hand particularly in situations where I have to depend on lot of folks for help. Vasu gave me a buzz at around 6:20 and told me that he would reach my home in 5 minutes. I slowly got out of my apartment an waited for him. The plans was for Vasu to drop me at the hospital and Ravi(another friend of mine) to drive me home after surgery. Vasu & Manju reached my apartment and we took off for the hospital, 6:30 am and I405 was overwhelmed with traffic, we didn't expect that kind of traffic so early in the day. I had to reach the hospital at 7:00 but we managed to reach only at 7:15. The hospital looked more like a 5 start Hotel, such was the ambience. The place had a neat reception and a waiting area for visitors also had few coffee shops and other small shops. I spoke to the lady at the reception about my surgery appointment, she asked for my last name and I started to spell, these folks pronounce my name differently, as in, Subramania ends like the English word mania, I was in no mood to correct her so, acknowledged that it was indeed me. Quickly got down to some paper work, including taking a photocopy of my insurance card. Soon, I was taken to a ward on the adjacent block, truly that was the first time I got a ride on a wheel chair, was a little queer but was fun, I played around with the chair trying to make some tricky maneuvers.

Again more paper work, in the last 3 weeks I've done more paper work than what our government officers would have done in their whole life. I was told that the surgery would start at 9:00 and would most likely be over by 10:30 and that I would be brought to the post operative care ward by 11:00. Vasu had some work at office so he had to leave but said that he would come back and take me home. Meanwhile Dr. Santoro made a visit to my bed autographed my knee, just to make sure that no else operates my knee :-). I was also asked to get into the patient attire. The gown was quite revealing, it's basically a piece of cloth that covered the front of my body upto a foot from my groin. The back of the gown was completely open, I was reminded of Jack Nicholson from the movie "Something's gotta Give". From 8 to 8:10, I helped myself scrubbing the disinfectant all over my right leg. I laid back on the bed with a bunch of papers in one hand and my cell phone on the other hand waiting for someone to come and talk to me, next 30 minutes felt like the longest 30 minutes of my life.

Nurse Lillia dropped by at 8:45, she had this kind of Swedish accent and had quite a tough time trying to pronounce my name, I saved her the trouble and asked her to call me "vaithee". She once again appraised me about the surgery the dos and don'ts after the surgery, ironically one of the information brochures stated that I might not remember things that were told to me few minutes before the anesthesia. I confirmed with her if this was true, she immediately handed over some papers with all those information she had told me. By this time the entire bed had papers strewn all over. I was given a small plastic pouch to put all my belongings; it was too small to take those truck load of papers, my spectacles and my cell phone. The anesthesian Earl Ricardo, if I remember right, told me that I would feel a little strange after the initial dose of sedation and quickly loose consciousness. While I was talking to the anesthesian, Lillia fixed the IV, I didn't know that I had been drugged at that time, while I was moved to the operation theatre, my hearing capacity was failing, though I was stationary I felt as if the ceiling above me was moving, I asked the docs if it was normal. They reassured me saying that I was doing good, then poof! I was switched off; all I remembered was waking up at the post operative care with a bit of pain in my knee. The nurse asked me how bad the pain was, with a lot of difficulty I told her 4/10, she did something and soon the pain subsided.

I could hear the nurse talking, she was telling someone details about my surgery, I corrected her twice: first when she said I was operated on my left knee and later she said a allograft ACL reconstruction was done. Actually my right knee was operated and it was an autograft ACL reconstruction. Anyways, at that point I was barely able to speak; felt a lump in my throat. The nurse told me that she had informed Vasu and that he is on his way to take me back home. Vasu also collected some pain medicines from the hospital pharmacy. I was semi-conscious and when I felt a little better the time was 1:00. I felt really weak. The nurse helped me to put my t-shirt and PJ back on. One of the volunteers(a 60 year man) wheel chaired me to the car. Getting into the car was quite a task; we reached home at around 2:00 had lunch (curd rice) and from then till now I've been doing great. I am just hoping and praying that I get into a position to move around myself as soon as possible. More in my next post; mostly likely after my first follow up visit with the doc. on the 27th.

Screwing your knee !

It was just another saturday Oct the 1st, I happened to go to this corporate picnic with the expectation of getting to know more people from my company and engaging in some fun activities. Some of my friends and myself we reached the place well ahead of time (by corporate standards), roughly about 10:00 am, the place was Carkeek park, one of seattle's many parks. The place was quite scenic on-looking the pacific back waters on one side, a decent beach and the Burlington santa fe rail running along the shore.

It took a while for people to flow in, but around 11:30 we were around 150 people. Lots of inane games were organized, Initially I stayed away considering the fact that they were way below my standards :-) But, I didn't want to put of the general enthusiasm in the air so decided to participate. Slowly I found myself participating in almost all the games. Some of the games were embarassingly inane that I prefer not to mention them. Anyways, the point was to get together and make friends. I must say that the day went really well and really enjoyed the time. All was well until I played this game of tug-of-war(u can guess the other games). The wistle was blown and our opponents beat us pretty comprehensively, all of us slid to the other side and in one quick motion I slipped on my side and couple of folks landed on to the side of my knee bending it rather forcibly in the wrong direction.

Hmmm.., now when I try to think of it I am unable to recall what exactly happened. All I thought at that time was that I had screwed up my knee, I heard few funny pops and a strange humming sound from my knee. I quickly tried to stretch the knee and laid it flat. Didn't feel much pain but was painfully pre-occupied thinking about the consequences. I just stay put like that for about 5 minutes by which time there was a sizeable crowd surrounding me, you can imagine, a scene similar to a classic indian road accident. When I laid down flat I could see innumerable faces inquisitively looking at me and my knee, each one suggesting doing different things like applying ice, calling for emergency help and some comforting me saying that I will be all right that it is just a sprain. While one of them was a doc. (gen. physician) and he just asked to me lay still and not move the knee. After about 15 mins. I tried to bend my knee slowly and guess what nothing happened no pain nothing. So I decided to slowly stand and see how bad my leg was. I put my entire weight on my left knee and stood up. I slowly transfered weight on to my right leg and that's when I realised how badly I had hurt my knee. It was horribly painful and my knee just gave way and went to the right. I immediately asked the folks holding me to ground me again and decided not to try anythign until help arrived.

Someone called 911 and the Fire service with a small para medics team arrived in less than 15 mins. Wonder what would have happened if it was India. The para medic team inspected my toe and the lower half of my leg for senses, took my BP and waited for the ambulance and the stretcher to arrive. By this time it started pouring badly. Just immagine an open ground, roughly 5:00 PM and a thunder storm forecast, trust me, was not a pleasant scene. I just laid on the grass with most part of my body covered with a plastic sheet. The Ambulance arrived in about 15 mins. The para medic team ripped my Jeans apart in an attempt to inspect my knee, there was little bit of swelling so, the team decided to wrap my leg in a ice wrapper that served the purpose of both restricting my leg from any movements and chilled it to check the swelling.

It was quite an experience, taking the ambulance to the ER. Much like what you must have seen in all those ER tv shows :-). They took me to an ER room and put me on a bed, of all the things they first gave me a TV remote and asked me to watch TV. I was a little surprised, some of my friends had followed the ambulance upto the hostpital. I was put through a huge pile of paper work, which was quite annoying but seems that's how it works here. The ER doc. arrived and he inspected my knee, they also took an X-ray and said that I hadn't dislocated anything and that the bones were fine too. They put a knee immobilizer around my knee and gave me a pair of crutches. The doc. prescribed some pain killer, asked me to wait for couple of days and then go to a doctor if swelling increased. One of my friend voluntarily accepted to take me to his place and I couldn't ask for more at that time. Since I was living alone there wasn't any sense in going to my place. We reached home around 9:00 pm and the phone calls started pouring, I was happy initially that so many people cared about me :-) a little later it became a little annoying for I had to explain everything over again to everyone.

Couple of days later I went to an Orthopedic, he did the physical examination and said I had hurt both my Medial Collateral Ligament (MCL) and the Anterior Collateral Ligament (ACL). He also said that I will have to have my ACL surgically recontructed, but to confirm what he thought he asked me to go for a MRI. I was really positive and told to myself that I wouldn't need a surgery. We took the MRI and it turned to be positive, I was a little upset but still wasn't convinced. All this took like 4 days since the incident. I had not informed home about it so decided to inform them and ask for suggestions. Everyone asked me to go for a second opinion. I fixed up an appointment with another Orthopedic at the Overlake Hospital in Bellevue for the 13th. The condition of my knee had improved a lot in the two weeks. The doc. inspected my condition, saw the MRI and confirmed that I had torn my ACL completely. He too recommended a reconstruction surgery. Once again I was a little dissapointed for things were not working out the way I wanted.

Anyways, I have my surgery scheduled for the 21st. The reconstruction of the ACL is done essentially, by removing a tendon from another part of my body, drilling few holes on the femur & tibia(bones) and fixing the tendon graft across them. The graft is kept in place using couple of screws. That's funny, screws are part of the solution when you screw your knee. I have been reading a lot about this surgery and the rehab. part. This is going to be one of the toughest challenge of my life but I am confident that I will be fine. I experience this epiphany, the spiritual flash particularly during the time of crisis that gives me the much needed moral strength. I am also blessed to have have so many friends here to help me, I am really grateful to everyone and hope I can do something in return. Well, that's it for now, more coming after the surgery....stay tuned ;-)

Googlage !

"Googlage" a term, I guess originally coined by Gayle Laakmann. However, I see many references on the internet with different meanigs.

"Googlage" for my blog is "~ythee~ blog"