I am a terrible blogger - a long overdue update

I almost feel too ashamed to write this post. I am a very bad blogger. When I was reading other people's blogs before my operation, I noticed that most of them stopped around six months, had the occasional entry after that if you were lucky, then stopped without notice.

I swore that would not be me.

And yet...the last time I wrote on this blog was six months after my operation and now it is well over a year since I had it done and I haven't updated since.

In mitigation, I have thought of you. I took pictures of my feet when I went on holiday last June, and of shoes I've bought, and I've composed posts in my head.

But you guys can't read my head. So I'm sorry. Especially as I see I have had 43,000 views and get around 2,000 a month and there has been nothing new for anyone to read.

No doubt you're all on tenterhooks wanting to know how my scars are, what shoes I'm wearing, and did the bokey nail ever get sorted?

I keep intending to do proper, backdated updates in chronological order, but I now realise that isn't going to happen, so what you're getting instead is a general update here, and then more detailed ones in no particular order as I find the time.

So, in general my feet are awesome! My scars are just thin silver lines that are barely visible. I am so incredibly pleased about this as for a long time they were still pink and looked like they might stay a dark purple, but they have completely faded now and look great.

My toes aren't straight. I did do a post where I was worried about this, but I think it's just my natural foot shape - either that or very strong muscles and tendons which insist on doing their own thing. So my big toes gently bend towards my other toes, but there is no bunion bump, the toes go a lot straighter when I'm standing on them than when they are in repose, and they look like totally normal feet, which was the aim after all.

I have no pain. None. My feet did used to get tired and sore but that hasn't happened for months now. I can be on them all day and they are completely OK. I did get my osteopath to massage them last time I went, but I think all feet need a little TLC occasionally, and it's nice to get a foot massage (the hubby hates feet so won't be offering this side of eternity).

As for shoes, this is the disappointing part. I will do a post on shoes, but in a nutshell, I can't wear high heels at all, I can wear low ones only for an hour or so and if they have a strap to hold my foot in and I walk really slowly, and I get a lot of pain under the balls of my feet if I try.

Currently I'm living in flats and flat boots (depending on the weather) and looking forward to getting my pretty sandals out in summer. I use my orthotics as much as I can (not in heels or sandals) and mostly I still wear the spacers, too, although I probably don't need to.

Any my toenail? Well, I got a treatment from the GP that you paint on your nail. I wasn't always great at remembering to do it, and expected it to take years to sort out, but by Christmas (so within six months of starting treatment) it was healed! I now have a totally normal toenail again. Which is a result.

So that's my whistlestop tour update. I will post better updates in more detail, with pictures, but at least this is something, huh?

I do read all your comments, even if I don't always reply (bad blogger, again) so do post me messages and I promise I will get better at blogging again. I was just too busy enjoying the freedom of happy, pain-free feet :)

Frustrated and achy at 9 weeks 6 days

Sorry for being a bit AWOL recently. I usually aim to write something every four days max, but I've been a bit busy and a bit miserable and so after posting my videos over a week ago I've been MIA.

I'm feeling quite down about my feet right now. Some of it is not really to do with my feet. Partly it's because it's winter and I get a bit of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) which you can read about here. I have had depression on and off since I was 13, and although I've been free of its worst ravages for a few years now, I do find winter a VERY hard time.

It's also partly because had I not lost my last pregnancy, I would have been a new mum with a two-week-old right now, and that is obviously a really difficult milestone to face. Especially as I have lost five babies in pregnancy, to first-trimester miscarriages caused by my Factor V Leiden, which you can read about in older posts here.

So it's been a tough time.

Add to that the fact that my feet ache all the time, and I often get some sharp throbbing along the incision sites, and you can see why posting hasn't been my top priority.

But I have promised this would be a no-holds-barred account, and so it's only right that I explain my absence.

Over the last week and a bit, my feet have definitely entered a new phase of recovery. Sadly, it's a really difficult and frustrating stage that brings with it new aches and pains.

I've gone from my feet being mostly OK, to them hurting pretty much all the time. In the main it's a dull ache in the big toes, and under the foot in the arch, as well as generally in the soles.

If you have a read of what makes up the arches of the feet, it's easy to see why this is happening.

My feet have been totally reshaped by the bunion removal. Bone has been cut, shaved and moved, tendons have been moved and adjusted, and now my entire leg needs to work in a new way, which puts strains on pretty much all the muscles in the legs and feet.

So my hips ache, my knees ache and click (because they always have clicked at times, it probably wont happen to you!), and my feet hurt as well.

Seriously, I'm trying to be upbeat but I am struggling because I feel so miserable!

I have managed to see my osteopath. Last weekend I had my first appointment with her since the surgery, and it was great!

She was amazed at the new shape of my feet, and also at how tight my entire body is! Clearly, all this inactivity and new ways of using my body have taken their toll - my back was so tight she couldn't finish it off in the session, and my head and jaw muscles (the reason I go to her in the first place) were so bad I need another session really soon.

But she was quite keen to get her hands on my feet! I said no because the thought of it made me go cold, but since then I've been thinking how nice a good massage that properly remvoes the tension in my feet would be, so next time I think I'll let her.

I definitely wouldn't let someone without her level of knowledge do it though - no massage therapists for sure. My osteopath is Jane Kaushal (see her website here) and she has good knowledge of anatomy and is highly skilled.

The main frustration is that I expected to be much more mobile by now. I thought I'd be able to walk about almost normally, so that a short trip into town or on the preschool run would be feasible, and while I thought I'd need to rest still I didn't expect a short baking session with the Little Lady to completely wipe me out.

But I'm nothing if not adaptable. So I've arranged for my lovely mum to come and stay next week (half-term!) to help out with the Little Lady, maybe do a little bit of cleaning for us, and generally ensure I'm not trying to do too much, which I definitely have been this last week and I'm suffering as a result.

And I'll probably be leaning a bit more on my fabulous friends again, to do school runs and help me entertain the Little Lady. I know I owe so many favours right now, but I'll happily pay them back because everyone has been so amazing.

This week I have a hospital appointment to get fitted for some orthotics, which are shaped insoles for my shoes. I had asked about those at my last appointment and the date came through really quickly, so hopefully they'll be made in the next few weeks.

My plan for the future is to wear orthotics and spacers as much as possible, to help maintain my foot shape and hold off recurral of the bunions.

So that's me at the moment. Little Miss Miserable! Let's hope I'm Little Miss Sunshine again soon.

Progress report 8 weeks 2 days, VIDEOS!

I was walking down the stairs yesterday when I had a bit of a revelation - that I was WALKING DOWN THE STAIRS!

Sounds dullsville but it was the first time I have managed the stairs without having to put my heel down first, and without needing to put one foot down, then put the next foot on the same stair, like a child does.

This was so exciting I felt that pictures just wouldn't cut it. No still picture could possibly convey the amazingness (yes, it's a word) of me walking down the stairs. So I did a video.

And then I got carried away and did a few videos for you, of my exercises and walking, and just a general look at my feet and scars.

So...all the words today are in the videos, here for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!

(By the way, don't my toes look fantabulously straight in that opening still!)








I'll tell you what, though, it takes at least half an hour for each one to upload to YouTube, so it's definitely not an option for a quick update. The third one took over 90 minutes to upload!

Let me know if you like them - leave me a comment here on the blog. If videos are popular, then I can do more. No weird requests please!

Toe spacers and pedicures

I noticed yesterday that the pink toe spacers that my surgeon made from putty for me, when he changed my casts in week 2, were feeling a little loose.

I especially felt that when I was standing my toes were spacing out wider than the spacer, leaving it floating between them.

My guess is that now I am putting weight on my feet, my toes are moving further apart due to that pressure, which is obviously a good thing, but it's making the gap between my toes bigger than the spacers.

So I wondered how useful they were really being?

My desire is to have toes that are as straight as possible, and while I don't know anything about the mechanics of the recovery, I assume that although the bones themselves are surely set in place now, the tendons and muscles are still learning their new positions and movements, so this might be a window of opportunity to continue to improve the positioning.

I could be completely wrong, in which case any medical people reading, please let me know!

Anyway, I wanted to replace the pink spacers with wider ones to help encourage my toes into the best possible position.

I had a Google to see if I could get some of the putty, as making my own custom spacers felt like the best option, but I couldn't find a source and I wasn't entirely sure what I was looking for.

So then I searched for "toe spacers" but soon found that some places call them "toe separators" which to me sounds more like those things you use when you paint your toenails, like these (note the slight bunion bump on the side of the foot and the tight spacing of the big and second toes! Even models have bunions!):

What I wanted was these:

Credit: Amazon

They come in different sizes, although they don't specify how wide they are so it's not easy to compare. Those ones are pretty good value, but I wanted some new ones asap, so I sent the hubby to Boots and he got me these:

Sorry, I took the spacers out before I took the picture. You can see them on the Boots website here.

They are more expensive than the ones on Amazon, but then Amazon doesn't pay for a retail unit, or even the right amount of tax, plus I wanted them today rather than having to wait. And hey, we get Advantage card points too!

So, hubby got them after church today, and I wasted no time in testing them out.

I think they are wider than the pink ones. They definitely feel it. I could handle them being wider, but I think I can probably wrap some lambswool or cotton wool around them to add a bit of width and customise them to suit me.

The observant among you will notice I did my pedicure last night - bubblegum pink base with a gold and dark pink dotted flower on each big toenail. I love nail art but am still a complete amateur so all I can manage are dots or tips.

Anyway, one thing I have noticed today with all this in-out-in-out-shake-it-all-about of spacers is that when I don't have them in, my big toes are noticeably closer to my second toe than when the spacers are there.

I'm not entirely happy about this, and am hoping I will be able to ask my surgeon about it when he comes back to me on my other questions.

Although I do remember reading an American surgeon's site where he said he never does women's toes totally straight as they then find it hard to wear fashionable shoes afterwards, because most shoes (men's or ladies' in my opinion) have an angled toe box.

So maybe that's applicable to me?

Anyway, I took some pictures to show the difference:

The top two pictures I did without moving my feet on the pouffe, so you can use how much paattern is visible as a guide to how much the toes have moved. I'm afraid the last one was a standalone picture but you can still see that they are definitely not as straight as when the spacers are there.

You can click on the pictures to see larger versions, and underneath you should get a tickertape of all the pictures in the post, so you can click on them to run through the sequence, and if you flick between the first two you should see the toe move!

In case you just want the pictures bigger, then here they are again, larger.

Right. In the interests of being thorough, I also took some while standing with my weight through my forefoot. I thought that might make a difference. Again, I kept my feet in the same position so you can use the pattern as a guide.

Standing didn't seem to make a difference. There is definitely movement once the spacers are taken out.

I've got to admit, I'm a bit disappointed. I thought the idea was to make my toes straight, and I'm concerned about the bunions coming back if my toes bend in a bit. It's definitely something I want to ask Mr Nugent about.

In case all this staring at my feet has made you forget what normal feet are supposed to look like, here is the Little Lady's adorable foot.

As you can see, her big toes almost tilt the opposite way to mine - her feet haven't yet been put under undue pressure by shoes (I always get her brand new shoes that have been fitted properly by a trained fitter).

I intend to write about natural foot shape another time, but as this post is all about spacers, I'll leave you with pictures of a couple of products that some people swear will help keep your toes in proper alignment.

I haven't any experience of them myself, nor do I know anyone who uses them, but I plan to investigate further once I'm fully recovered.

We have the toe stretchers (aka Yoga Toes TM):

Credit: Amazon


And these are the separator socks:

Credit: Amazon


And finally, the bunion splint:

Credit: Amazon

Ok, so those look a little like an instrument of torture, but I have read that some people think they are brilliant. Obviously, nothing can correct an existing bunion except surgery, but I think this splint and the other separator devices could probably help negate the pressures of shoes, if worn regularly and over a period of time.

Worth thinking about, anyway.

Progress at 7 weeks 5 days and some other updates

One of the reasons for writing this blog is so that people considering the surgery, or booked in for it, or who had their surgery after mine, can see my progress and get an idea of how they will progress.

Obviously, everyone is different, and as a result we will not only all have different experiences of the surgery but also of the progress afterwards.

But I hope that this will give at least some idea of how the pain and mobility might be at certain points along the journey.

I realised that I forgot to mention a few things in my previous report because there was so much else to say.

Importantly, I wanted to mention that it took about 48 hours (two days) after the casts were removed before I could put my foot and toes totally flat on the floor without any pain.

I was surprised at how even that simple action was sore and difficult, but by two days afterwards, I was able to place the whole foot flat on the floor without difficulty, and put my weight through the whole foot too.

The first day I could, with effort, put my toes down, but there was no way I was going to put my weight on them! But the day after, I could do that too.

Now, at five days after the casts came off - I'll call it C-Day - I'm able to put all my weight on them happily, but I'm still wary of bending them as I walk, so I have a tenative way of walking that is slow and laboured.

But it's all progress, which is great.

I've labelled this post 7 weeks 5 days, which is actually yesterday, because I wanted to share yesterday's exercise pictures.

This one shows me pushing up on my toes on both feet. I have tried to hold a ruler so you can see how high I can get currently, but it's my black Filofax one and doesn't really show up well. I think I'll make a clearer one from cardboard for future pictures.

It's also not very accurate because the measurement doesn;t start at the edge of the ruler, but taking that into account you can see my heel comes up about 2.5inches.

This is just the left foot. I'm not sure if this one has more range of motion or if it's easier to push up on one foot at a time, but you might be able to see that this heel is around the 3-inch mark.

I promise I'll make a better ruler for next time!

The big reveal part 2. Doctor's verdict.

OK, I teased you a bit in that last post, but what's a little anticipation between friends?

Back at the orthopaedics department, we were called straight in and then waited for quite a while in a side room.

There were big signs everywhere saying "do not take pictures in here" I think mainly to stop you photographing your own X-rays, but laughably claiming it was to "protect your information". Right, not to encourage me to pay a fee to access my own information from you later, then. Of course not. Ahem.

So I took off the velcro shoes, and waited on the bed.

This was my view.

You can see how much of the steri strips I let the plaster lady pull off before I wimped out. My skin is still yellow from the stuff they paint on before surgery, and if you look closely you can see how dry and flaky my skin is.

At this point, I thought the worst dryness was on the top of my foot, near my ankle, and on the balls of my feet, where I could see it cracking.

After quite a while waiting a doctor came in to see me, but it wasn't Mr Nugent.

I have to say I wasn't happy about that. I had wanted to see my surgeon, and my dissatisfaction was exacerbated when this doctor - I didn't catch his name - said "Right, we'll get new casts on you then".

What?!

"Er," I said. "I've had them on for seven weeks, I thought they came off today."

"Oh yes," he said. "That's right, I thought you were at two weeks."

Really NOT confidence inspiring!

I was not happy. I asked him my questions about driving, exercises, shoes, and he told me "You can wear any shoes. You can drive on Monday. You don't need to do toe exercises. But don't exercise till you come back at 12 weeks."

Right.

So Mr Nugent told me to bring trainers, which I bought especially with money I don't really have, and now I'm told I can wear anything? And I don't need to do any exercises to improve my range of motion? And I can drive in six days' time?

I call BS on that, frankly.

I was, and am, really unhappy with that appointment. I feel that the doctor was not fully informed and I really wish I could have seen Mr Nugent.

Before I left, he got me to walk a little but I was SO SCARED that I couldn't really do it, and just put my weight on my heels. I was terrified of being in pain.

So I hobbled over to the computer and he showed me my X-rays. To be honest, I wouldn't know how good it was. I could see where the bone had been cut and moved, but without the old ones next to them, it was hard to tell anything really.

I want to know if Mr Nugent is happy with them, as he is my surgeon, but more of that later.

So, unsure about the shoes thing I put the velcro shoes on to go home and once we'd got the Little Lady to bed I ran myself a lovely warm bath so I could start de-flaking my feet.

If you want to see lots of pictures of that (my feet, not me nekkid in the bath) then look out for part 3 which is coming soon.

Let's get practical

I know that at the moment, most of my readers are friends and family, or people who 'know' me off various internet forums (hi everyone! *waves* and apologies to those who are disturbed that I have a real name! lol).

But I started this blog mainly with the intention of it being helpful to people planning to have bunion surgery, because a lot of what I knew in advance about the recovery period was gleaned from blogs.

So this post is probably only really of interest if you are going to have bunion surgery, or a friend or relative is. But of course, everyone is welcome to read!

I found that my surgeon and hospital did not give me any information on how the recovery process would go, or what I might need to make it easier. If you go private, or live in a country where you have to go private, you might get a better level of information, but if you are NHS, you may well find this really useful.

So here are the things I think you need to know, or need to get.


THINGS YOU NEED TO GET

* A beany lap tray (or two). These are so useful, for using a laptop in bed, eating meals in bed, writing things in bed, you get the picture. Or even as a kind of table to have next to you on the bed. You definitely need one. I borrowed two.

* A pouffe or high footstool. For elevating your foot when you're able to get out of bed. Get one as high as you can, or add pillows/folded blankets to make it high enough. Your feet should be higher than your hips ideally. This also has the advantage of marking you out as needing special care, and even small children seem to honour that (well, a bit, anyway).

* A wheelchair. Not absolutely vital, but if you'd like to be able to leave the house before you can walk on crutches, or if you'd like to go further than you can walk on crutches, then a wheelchair means you can be pushed places. I used mine to go to the Little Lady's nativity play, which I would otherwise have had to miss. I got mine from the Red Cross.

* A decent pair of ergonomially designed crutches. Another thing that's not absolutely necessary, but they are much more comfortable than the NHS ones. I imagine you can get them from the Red Cross, although I borrowed mine.

* A toilet frame. Another Red Cross item. I've already said in another post how much I have valued this piece of equipment. It has enabled me to go to the toilet by myself, which is vital for dignity. Without it I would have had to have someone lift me on and off the toilet.

* A large pair of soft socks. For keeping your toes warm when/if you go outside. You can buy fleece things on the LimbO website but they are a tenner (!) and of no use afterwards. You could always make a fleece toe cover, but socks are easier. I bought a supersoft thermal pair in a size larger than my usual one (6-11 when I am a 6).

* Lots of pillows. For elevating your feet and propping yourself up. I use three behind me and about four for my feet, plus a rolled-up duvet tied to keep it rolled. Yes, it is a lot!

* Lactulose. We covered this before but both anaesthetics and codeine cause constipation. Lactulose is a gentle way to resolve it. Nuff said.

* Help at home. There is no way you will manage on your own, even if you have batch-cooked and/or live on ready meals or takeaways. You will get tired easily, you have very limited mobility, it is not going to work. Try and organise someone to be with you 24/7 for at least four weeks (ideally more), or for someone to come in to do mealtimes and cleaning if that isn't possible. If all else fails, employ a cleaner and cook. Seriously. Do not try to do it yourself.

* A TV in your bedroom (if you don't have one already). I hooked up an old computer in our bedroom so I can watch catch-up TV. I haven't used it all that much, but I prefer it to watching TV on the laptop, and it's nice to have it available.

* Waterproof cast covers if you want to be able to shower (or you can strip wash at the sink instead). If you do want to shower, I suggest you might also want a waterproof chair to sit on while you do it. Personally, I haven't bothered with showering but am just washing at the sink. My surgeon recommended LimbO covers, but at £15 each, I decided to live without. YMMV.

* Mobility scooter I think I'm going to hire one of these when the hubby goes back to work. I can walk with crutches a little now but as I have the Little Lady, I'm concerned I won't be able to keep up with her or keep her safe. With a mobility scooter, she can sit on my lap while we ride into town or to preschool. I definitely think it will give me more freedom than I would otherwise have, and would enable me to go shopping.


WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

* You will need help washing your hair. If you don't want to be a greaseball for nearly two months, then you will need to get help to wash your hair. The way I have found works best for me is to sit on a chair next to the bath. I sit on the chair sideways with my back facing the bath and then lean back on the edge of the bath, which I pad with a folded-up towel. You will get wet! Get a friend or loved one to wash your hair for you. If you prefer (and I do) they can just wet and rinse it while you do the actual shampooing and conditioning. This does make the back of your neck hurt so sitting up at points throughout is helpful.

* You will have to strip wash. Before I had my casts changed, I sat on a chair at the sink, then washed with a flannel. I am lucky enough to have a tilting wall mirror so I could see my face to wash it, but you could use a standalone mirror, like a shaving mirror. Now I have the smaller casts, I am able to stand at the sink instead of sitting.

* You will have almost no concentration. Before I had the operation I thought I could spend my recovery time knitting, writing and generally catching up on things. But I have found that I can't concentrate on things for too long, so have spent most of my time surfing the net, reading magazines (even books are beyond me!) and doing only things that I can spend small amounts of time on. This is not the time to decide to write that novel, IMO.

There are probably more, and I'll edit and add to this post as they occur to me or as I encounter them. Feel free to add your own in the comments.

Stupidity, thy name is Emma

When I was reading other people's blogs about their recovery from bunion surgery, I scoffed at those that said things like "went to the gym after six weeks and now am in agony".

Ho ho! I laughed. What fools! I won't do anything like that. Oh no! Not me! I will be sensible and look after myself and not do anything that might affect my recovery.

So why, then, did I spend two hours last night sitting at my sewing machine making a Santa sack for the Little Lady?

Considering I know that I cannot sit with my feet on the floor for more than half an hour without them swelling and objecting, what exactly made me think that adding a sewing machine into the equation was going to somehow make it OK?

In my defence, I did think it would only take me an hour, max.

But it was so stupid!

Even before I had finished my feet were swelling, but by then I was committed. I'd decided I wanted to handmake this for my little girl and by golly! I was going to.

Lol.

At the end, I could barely get back upstairs. Despite having spent the last few nights sleeping without my feet elevated, I put them up on a pillow, hoping that my this morning they would be OK.

Nope.

My stupidity has left me in pain today as well. I can feel my swollen feet pushing against the insides of the casts, and my incisions keep throbbing, even through some painkillers.

So if you're reading this in preparation for having the operation, and you're thinking "ha! I will never do anything like that!", believe me, you will, my friend, you will.





But...it was kinda worth it. The bag is fab!

And if you'd like to make one of your own, check out my tutorial on my new craft blog. This link will take you to the tute, but do check out the rest of the blog, especially the post on what's coming soon.

Freedom is a new cast.

Ah! The sweet, sweet joy of being freed! The deep blue of the living room carpet! The brighter daylight through the front room windows! The smooth exapnse of the kitchen floor!

Yes, dear readers. I have been downstairs. T'was a momentous occasion.

Obviously, I had to go down the stairs in order to go to hospital yesterday. I didn't abseil out of the Little Lady's bedroom window.

But when I got home from hospital, I scuttled straight back upstairs again, to my cosy pit nest where I've been very happy hibernating from the cold this last fortnight.

See? It's all set up for me. Who wouldn't want to be there?

But today I had a friend come round for a cuppa and I thought 'why not entertain downstairs?'.

Why not indeed, verily and forsooth? (Sorry, I'm in a funny mood today. Must be all this freedom.)

Employing the 'puppet crab' method, I edged sideways down the stairs, clinging onto the bannister. Classy and graceful, as always.

I ditched the crutches because I have found that I can walk around as long as take weird high steps (because I can't bend my feet). It's a bit like powerwalking only it is very very slow. And hilarious to watch. Kudos to the hubby for not laughing.

My friend and I sat in the living room, my feet perched on a borrowed pouffe (thanks Hannah!) and it was nice to be out of the bedroom.

So nice that I had lunch at the kitchen table. I know! Living dangerously is my second hobby.

But sadly, after a couple of hours my feet were objecting. Despite the surgeon telling me to continue to elevate them, I forgot while I had lunch, and that short period - around half an hour - of them being down was enough for them to swell.

I could feel the casts getting tight, the incisions throbbing.

So I scuttled back upstairs to my lovely pit and took some paracetamol and ibuprofen. I also remembered to do my heparin injection and damn that stuff stings when you're not on codeine!

So freedom is great, for sure, but I think too much of a good thing can be dangerous. Maybe I'll ease myself back into the world slowly.

The big reveal! Sort of. With pictures.

So. You're all here for The Grand Unveiling, yes? The big reveal. The moment of "ta-daa".

Well, I'm sorry to disappoint, but the hospital visit wasn't quite what I expected.

Yes, the casts were removed, and yes, there are pictures of my feet, but they were quickly wrapped up again and put in new casts which I have to keep on for another four weeks. I know! I thought it was a long time too!

So, we get another Big Reveal in a months' time. Or actually, in five weeks' time because for some reason my next appointment is January 22, just the day before my birthday (hint, hint).

But you want to know all about today, no?

My lovely hubby drove me and the Little Lady to the drop-off point, then parked the car while I laboriously crutched my way through the hospital to the reception to meet him, and to catch the 'buggy bus' to the clinic.

It took me ages to get there - it's the longest I've 'walked' since the operation and I was pretty exhausted. I was glad to get on the buggy bus to go to the clinic.

I checked in, and was sent off to be irradiated.

As I went into the X-ray room, the technician, who looked younger than me, said "Oh you've had both done! I didn't think you could have both at the same time."

It turned out that she had had one bunion done in February this year, although not by Mr Nugent, and she needed the other one doing but "can't afford another six weeks off work".

That's one reason I had mine done together - the recovery is slightly more awkward because you don't have even one good foot, but once it's done, it's done.

The technician had metal screws in her foot, whereas my pins will dissolve, so we had slightly different procedures, but she showed me her foot and how straight her big toe is now, and I started to get a little bit excited about seeing mine.

She did two X-rays of each foot, sent them through to Mr Nugent, and I went back to the clinic where he was waiting to enact the reveal.

First, Mr Nugent cut off the bandages, and then he simply wiggled and slid the casts off my feet. I did brace myself for some pain but it was actually just really tickly! I'm not good with having my feet touched so it was hilarious.

I was pretty amazed by how my feet looked. They are so thin! Now the lump of the bunion has gone my whole foot shape has changed. Yes, I know that's the point but I just could not envisage it until I saw it. It's incredible.

There wasn't much time to take pictures, because as soon as they were uncovered, Mr Nugent was making some toe separators out of quick-hardening putty (which the Little Lady was pleased to note was pink) and then wrapping my feet up again in some fluffy padding, before putting a new cast on.

He then taped bandages over the cast, just like before, and there we were. Done.

"The X-rays look good," he said, almost as an aside. And that was it.

Actually, there was a teensy bit of gossip but I'll share that on another post. This one is all about me!

So here we go with the pictures. The initial rating on the Grimometer is zero.

In this first one, Mr Nugent has removed the cast from my right foot and is making the putty toe separator by moulding it between my toes and letting it harden. You can see that he has cut the bandage on my left foot, and it is hanging loose round my ankle.

In this next one, he has removed the cast from the left foot, and the toe separator on the right is hardening. This gives you a real idea of the new shape of my feet. They are amazeballs!

My left toes look like I'm holding them funny, but that's just how they were. I was too scared to wiggle them! I guess once I'm back in shoes and walking around they'll start to settle down.

So here are both feet with new toe separators. You can see the fading arrows on my feet from the surgery, and the slight tan I appear to have is the yellow antiseptic stuff they paint onto you prior to operating.


If you've been waiting for the grimometer warning, here it is. The next few pictures show my steri-strip stitches. I don't personally think it looks that grim, but I'll give it a 5/10 rating. If you want to avoid them, I suggest scrolling to the very bottom then slowly working back up till you see a picture of my feet wrapped in fluffy stuff. Stop there and read from that point.

Here's a small break so you don't unexpectedly see the pictures of the stitches. Off you go squeamish ones!

...


...


OK, those with strong stomaches still with me? Here we go!

So these are the steri-strip stitches on my right foot. The incision is getting on for three inches long. In this one, the new shape of my foot looks like it might be Roman (see this post) which is interesting. I guess the Greek shape had only appeared because of my bunions making the big toes look shorter, because of the angle they leant at. And it means the Little Lady does have my feet, so I'll have to make sure I look after them.

Another angle of the same foot. That's Mr Nugent lurking in the background.

The left foot's stitches. There's a bit more blood here, which might be why this one has been slightly more painful.


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The next photos are back to zero on the Grimometer scale. Squeamish people can rejoin the post here.

All wrapped up in fluffy padding and waiting for a new cast.

And here they are back at home in the new casts. They don't look much different, but actually the circumference of each cast is just over an inch less than the old ones, which shows how much swelling there was immediately after surgery.

I don't think my feet are swollen at all now. They certainly didn't look it today.

I think they looked amazing, and I am so excited to get them properly unwrapped in five weeks' time!

Tomorrow I meet my new feet!

Tomorrow afternoon I go back to hospital and will have the plaster casts removed from my feet. For the first time since my operation, I'll get to see my feet, and the incisions and stitching on them, which will give me an idea of what level of scarring I will have once it's all healed.

I'm actually quite nervous.

I've obviously had a lot of time to stare at the tips of eight of my toes peeking out of my casts, and the thing that has struck me is that the big toes don't look as straight as I expected them to.

Now, I can only see the very very tips of them, just the toenail in fact, but when I point my foot up at the ceiling my big toes don't point exactly up, they point just slightly towards the outsides of my feet.

See?

This was worrying me so much that the other day I started Googling images and I did find some pictures of feet have big toes where the end joint is not totally straight even though the rest of the toe is.

I'm really hoping these are the kind of feet that I have.

It seems odd not to know, but when I think back I cannot remember a time when I did not have bunions. When I was younger I didn't know they were called that, and I don't think I realised that my feet were technically deformed, but I honestly can't picture my feet ever having had straight toes.

So tomorrow will be exciting!

In a way, it's like giving birth. Something has been happening without me being able to see it, and tomorrow afternoon I'll finally get to see the result.

I just can't wait to meet my feet!

The view from my bed - picture post

I thought some of you might be wondering what it's like to be bedbound for a couple of weeks.

Being totally honest, I've quite enjoyed it! As a mum of a three-year-old, life tends to be lived at high-octane level, so the chance to kick back, relax, and just be at leisure has been nice.

I've acually done even less than I thought I would while I was in bed. I had planned to do some knitting, maybe some crafts, read loads of books, blog, write, and watch TV.

What I've done is go on the internet, blog, go on the internet, watch TV, go on the internet, read, go on the internet, sleep, go on the internet and, erm, go on the internet.

Maybe if I'd kept off the internet some of the other stuff might have got done!

I did paint the nails on my left hand today, trying out some paint effects so I can decide what to do on the toes that I can see out of my bandages. I am fed up of looking at bare toenails so was experimenting with two of my top coats - a gold glitter suspension in clear, and an iridescent flake glitter in clear - over bases of white, gold and a pale pinky-white that is used for French manicures.

Here's the result:

Feel free to leave a comment below and tell me which one is your favourite.

So, onto my view. I used the panoramic assist on my camera, but I can't get them to display side by side on the blog, and right now I can't be bothered to stick them in word and then save it as a whole picture, so you'll have to piece it together in your own head.

This one is of my table. It's one of those TV tables, with two legs that curve down and underneath so you can pull it over your lap. We bought it after we had the Little Lady, so I could breastfeed and eat/surf the net at the same time, but it's been pretty handy for this too, as it pulls over the bed like the tables in hospital.



And this next one is my bedside table. It looks cluttered, but that's because I have about three drinks on there - water, tea and a homemade smoothie from my lovely friend Ish. She made it with raspberries, watercress, orange and TOFU! It tasted amazing and was presumably really healthy.



The next one is what I look at most of the time, because it's directly in front of me - the TV! My lovely hubby set up our old computer in our room so I can use the internet to watch TV live, or on catch-up. We don't have televisions in bedrooms in our house, that's a house rule, but we made an exception for my recovery period. Today, the Little Lady and I watched The Little Mermaid together so she got some Mummy Time and it was lovely.

So there you are. I'll tell you what, it's going to be exciting going downstairs after a fortnight of being up here!

Two steps forward, one stumble back - day 13

Sub-titled Progress and A Cautionary Tale

Because I've read in so many other people's blogs that doing too much too soon causes pain and can even affect your overall recovery, I've been really erring on the side of caution, and doing everything I can to maximise my recovery.

So I've been elevating all the time, even overnight, and only walking around to go to the bathroom.

But pride comes before a fall. In my case, literally.

To get around, I'm using the hospital-issue crutches. I do have some lovely ergonomic-handled ones my friend George has lent me, but I'm saving those for downstairs. It's like an incentive to graduate!

Anyway, when I first came hom from hospital I was properly crippled. I could hardly bear to put weight on my feet, and really bore my weight through the crutches. It took me ages to shuffle slowly and painstakingly to the bathroom.

In fact, I borrowed a toilet frame from the Red Cross so that I have help to get onto the toilet by myself. Here it is:

It just sits around the toilet and has handles at just below hip height, which means I can hobble in on crutches, lean the crutches against the wall while leaning my weight on the frame, and then use both frame handles to lower myself. They're also extremely useful to get back up again.

I honestly think that without this frame I'd have needed physical help to sit down on the loo and get back off it again, so it's really saved my dignity (which presumably I've just lost through telling you all this).

I have borrowed a few things from the Red Cross: the toilet frame, a wheelchair for when I go outside further than I can hobble (pretty much everywhere for a while) and I did also borrow a commode chair, as I'd read from another blogger that their pain was so bad they couldn't do anything more than slide from bed to commode.

Thankfully, I haven't needed it so it will be returned unused.

The Red Cross is amazing. They are a charity, so they lend you the equipment for just a small £5 deposit. And then you just pay what you can afford for the hire. Obviously, we will be giving a reasonable donation because we're not poor, but how fabulous for those people who don't have much money, because the hospital won't help at all - they refused to lend me a wheelchair.

I found out about it accidentally while Googling, but if you want to know more then have a look at their website here, and if you are able, please consider giving them a donation in recognition of their incredible work.

Back to my progress report.

So at first I could hardly move, it hurt and was difficult and I really NEEDED those crutches.

About three or four days ago, so on day nine or ten after surgery, I realised that I wasn't leaning on the crutches so much, In fact, I was able to walk a few steps just holding the crutches.

I experimented a bit, and discovered that I could stand without the crutches or any other support, so suddenly I was able to turn the light on for myself, or open my curtains, instead of having to call for help.

And that was my problem. I got a bit cocky on the crutches. And yesterday, I was speeding back to the bedroom when I lost my balance. I stumbled, which is fine if your feet haven't been sliced and diced, but was not great for me.

I banged my left foot on the floor trying to catch my balance. I didn't get shooting agonising pain or anything like that; in fact at first I thought I'd got away with it.

But since then, my left foot has been unhappy with me. It aches and twinges at the place where I knocked it, which just happened to be the exact spot where it's been cut open.

It's obviously not very happy. And I feel so stupid for rushing around and not taking it easy. After all, I'm not in any kind of hurry at the moment.

So this is my cautionary tale. If you're having this surgery, make sure you take all parts of your recovery slowly. Don't rush, don't push yourself too far too fast.

From now on, I'm staying like a little old lady and leaving the speeding to Lewis Hamilton.

Thoughts on pain (or lack of it). Day 7

I know that many people reading this will be considering having bunion surgery themselves. And I also know that the main thing you hear or read when you start to look into surgical correction of bunions is pain. Lots of it.

Pretty much everything I read before I had my surgery said it would be "the worst pain ever", that I might pass out from it, that it would be so awful I wouldn't want to have to go through it again (see my surgeon's comments from the pre-op appointment).

And yet, as I said the other day, I'm just not experiencing that.

Now, I know I have quite literally a whole army of people praying that I will have an easy, complete and pain-free recovery, and I believe wholeheartedly in the awesome power of prayer, so yeah, it could be that.

But I'm also wondering if, maybe, it actually isn't necessarily all that painful?

I don't want to negate anyone else's experience. If they have been through the surgery, and found it excruiating, then that is their truth, and I'm not trying to call bullshit on them at all. Everyone experiences pain differently, and what's bearable to one person is bring-you-to-your-knees awful for someone else. I get that.

After all, ask any mother her experience of childbirth and you will get a different story each time. Some people need the full panoply of pain relief to get through it and others don't even want a sniff of the gas and air.

I guess what I want to do is talk about how it isn't necessarily really painful to have your bunions done.

I do know that I am on a veritable cocktail of drugs. I take 60mg of codeine, 1,000mg of paracetamol and 400mg of ibuprofen four times a day. That's a lot of medication. And I know that that might well be making a huge difference.

In fact, it must be, because at night, when I have to go from 10pm till 10am without any drugs, I do feel it. But I only feel it in a five out of ten kind of way. It hurts, for sure, and it is a sharp kind of pain, both right inside the joint and along the incision site, that pulses in an unignore-able (sic) way.

And yet, it's really not that bad.

Bad enough that I'm not prepared to stop taking the meds in day, for sure. I'm pretty certain that that would be utter foolishness. The doctors gave me the drugs and I intend to take them. I've even got another prescription of codeine from my GP of 100 tablets to keep me going for a few more weeks, till I get my dressings changed.

But all the blogs that I read while waiting to have my surgery told tales of agony, of passing out in toilets from the sheer awfulness of having hobbled to have a wee, of not being able to sleep while painful incisions throbbed all night long. And I'm going to take a punt here, that all of those people were also on medication. And yet they found it painful.

Maybe I'm just being a very good patient. Some of those bloggers did talk about "doing lots of housework" or even exercising in these early days after surgery.

I think that's plain insane.

The instructions from the hospital are to elevate your feet about 90 per cent of the time for the first two weeks. To rest your feet and allow them to heal without loads of blood flowing down into them, which can increase swelling and, as a result, pain.

So maybe the lack of intense pain is because I'm resting, I'm elevating and I'm staying in bed.

I'm not the only person to come out this side of bunion surgery with a bewildered 'what happened to the agony?' feeling.

A few people talk about it in the comments of this blog post. WARNING: the post begins with a reaonably graphic picture of a post-op foot, with Frankenstein-style stitching. There's no blood, but if you're squeamish you might want to click and scroll.

And this rather encouraging thread on a foot health forum has a number of posts where people talk about having had less pain than they expected.

In fact, one of them even says exactly the same as me - that obeying doctor's orders really does make a difference in both your pain and your recovery.

So if you're considering bunion surgery, or even on the waiting list to have it done, take heart. It really might not be as bad as you think. It isn't for me.


*Caveat: I gave birth naturally, at home, with gas and air for only the last hour. It is entirely possible that I have a very high pain threshold.

Tales from hospital part the third: day 2

So, I knew it was all going too well, despite the utter lack of sleep.

The day after surgery the physio came round to see me. Up to this point I'd been on bed rest, not allowed to get up at all, even to go to the toilet. I'll gloss over the details but suffice to say I'm glad I have good core body and upper arm strength. How elderly people manage to use bedpans without spillage is beyond me.

Anyway, I'd been lying down for hours, my feet raised above my hips, maybe sitting up a bit assisted by the rather whizzy electric bed.

And then the physio gets me up, out and walking around.

Does anyone sense disaster?

Using a walker frame, I edged gingerly and painfully around the corner of my bed, and then thought: "While I'm up, I might as well use the toilet instead of the bedpan."

In a demonstration of complete lack of judgment by both the physio and me (although she's the professional so I'd have thought she might have said no) I got her to wheel me on a chair to the toilet.

And there she left me.

I managed the business part fine. Washed my hands, then realised the world was going a bit grey, my stomach was feeling rather nauseous, my limbs were going heavy...

I pulled the help cord and heard the alarm go off.

After a while (probably not that long but it felt it) I was unable to support myself any more and getting panicky. The nausea was so bad I felt I was going to throw up all over the floor, I couldn't keep my eyes open, my head was swimming, my body was just. so. heavy.

Somehow, I managed to open the tricky bi-fold toilet door a bit.

"Please help me! Someone help me!" I called out. I felt like I was shouting but it might have been just a whisper. I recall the frightened face of a woman lying in bed in my sightline as I began to collapse.

Suddenly a nurse appeared with a wheelchair.

"Get in the chair!" she barked at me.

"I can't," I gasped. "I feel so ill. I need to lie down."

"You can't lie there! Get up! Get in the chair!"

"I can't..."

The next thing I knew I was slumped in a chair next to my bed, with another nurse slapping my face.

"Emma, Emma, focus, open your eyes. We need you to get on the bed."

Like a sullen teen, I replied: "I can't."

"But if you won't, then we will have to get the hoist."

"Get the hoist."

The world went black again.

Slap, slap.

"Emma! We're getting the hoist. Focus! You need oxygen."

An oxygen mask was put on my face, blasting air into my nose and mouth at hurricane speeds, suffocating me.

I pulled it off. "Don't like it!" (there's that sulky teenager again).

They turned it down and put it back then hoisted me onto the bed.

I passed out again.

...

Later, I gradually came round and lay for a while breathing the oxygen before I felt well enough to pull the mask off.

"Welcome back," my fellow patients chorused.

"You were grey! You were the colour of the sheets! We thought you were dying! It was so scary!"

Yeah, me too. In fact, I ended up crying while a lovely nurse gave me a hug.

It wasn't so much the faint; I've been there before. It was the fact that I was left in a toilet, with no-one answering the alarm call, and then being almost shouted at as though I were an inconvenience.

The physio came back later and apologised, which I appreciated. For while I shouldn't have suggested going to the loo, it was up to her to say that it was too much too soon. She's the professional after all.

Later, I indulged my time obsession by asking my neighbour how long I'd been out for. I was expecting her to say about 15 minutes. She looked at the clock, calculating. "Oh, about an hour and a quarter," she said. Crikey. no wonder everyone was so worried.

The rest of the day was uneventful. I was supposed to go home but it was decided I had to stay in another night after that episode, and there was much checking of my obs because my blood pressure is naturally low and they were worried.

The only other excitement was learning to inject my heparin that evening. I'm such a wuss I actually cried while Queen of Hunter called over: "I do it every night! It's easy! Just do it! Stop working yourself up!"

And actually she was right. The needle didn't hurt going in at all. The heparin stings afterwards but by then it's all over. I can do this!

Tales from hospital part the second

"What time is it?"

For some reason, that is always the first thing I ask when I come round from surgery. I seem to be obsessed with how long I've been in theatre.

For this surgery, I'd gone in at 1.45pm and woke up at 3.20pm, which was pretty quick as I'd read it was around an hour each foot for bunions. Either Mr Nugent is a genius or a total butcher. I'm hoping it's the former.

Forewarned as they were about my fainting episodes, the staff on Recovery kept me lying down, checked my obs almost obsessively, and only moved me towards being upright very slowly over a long period.

For once, I felt fine. No fainting, no passing out or feeling sick, just chatting away and wondering why the room looked ever so slightly like a morgue.

Just before 5pm, they decided I was fully recovered, and I was wheeled away into Hunter Ward, where I ended up in Bay B, bed 4, next to the cruciate ligament lady and opposite a lovely girl who was in having her second hip replacement despite being under 40.

I dubbed her Queen of Hunter, because she knew all the staff, and how everything worked, and wasn't afraid to ask for what she wanted: "Get me some oral morph please!"

Luckily I was out of theatre and onto the ward in time for tea, so I did get my fishcakes, mash and beans after all. They tasted like school dinners, which I've always liked, and while Michel Roux Junior won't be asking the hospital cooks onto Masterchef anytime it was perfectly OK and I'd even go so far as to say I liked it.

Here it is:

That first evening was uneventful. I got given drugs, injected (quite roughly) with my first dose of heparin and then spent the night wide awake listening to people snoring and the doctors and nurses apparently having a small rave in the corridor. I can't get no sleep..do,do,do,do,da,do,do...

Tales from hospital part the first

So here we are, it is done.

I did mean to blog before I went into hospital, but time ran away with me and I was still packing my hospital bag at bedtime the night before. If I had posted, it would have been full of fear, because all of a sudden I got really scared and nervous about having it done. Even on the morning of the surgery I briefly considered not going through with it, and had to give myself a stern talking-to.

So on Monday morning I was up at Unacceptable O'clock and ready to get in my taxi at 6.30am. It was still pitch dark and felt like the middle of the night. The driver did attempt some conversation but soon gathered from my incoherent grunts that I was attempting to pretend I was still asleep in bed, and that this taxi ride was just a bad dream, so he gave me up as a bad job and instead silently delivered me to the door of the Royal Berkshire Hospital.

I dragged myself through the hospital, pausing briefly to to breathe deeply the tantalising smell off coffee from the AMT kiosk, before hauling myself through the corridors to the far end of the hospital, past the plush bit and into the section that looks like it belongs in Calcutta.

After wandering about wondering exactly how much it would cost to put some signs up so people would actually know where to go, I found the Chesterman Suite, where people go to wait to be cut up.

I had been too keen. Almost no-one else was there, but it did mean I could bag myself a comfy seat on the burnt orange sofa near the television, and opposite the fish tank.

I filled in a form, and a menu for what I'd like to eat on the ward when I came round. I remembered the advice I'd been given by people who have experienced the gastro-offerings of the RBH, and chose the simplest thing on the menu, which turned out to be fishcakes, mash and baked beans, with orange jelly to follow. More of that later.

After a while, the room had filled up and I got chatting to a couple of other ladies. One was having her shoulder replaced, the other surgery on her cruciate ligament in her knee.

Then Mr Nugent started having chats with us. He drew two fetching arrows on my legs - "So I remember to operate on both" - and told me what he'd be doing. I was surprised to hear that I was going to have not metal pins but some made of something dissolvable, so that ultimately I won't have foreign bodies in me, which I hadn't thought much about but still felt pleased on hearing.

After Mr Nugent, a lovely anaesthetist came round. I didn't catch her name, but as Paul the Doctor had advised, I mentioned wanting a Des and Remi, and ankle blocks.

"I always do ankle blocks," she said. "And I can do you a Des, but I'm not sure about the Remi. I always use Des though, the hospital would like me to use something cheaper but I only use something that I'd want used on myself if I were having surgery."

Reassuring! I warmed to her and was glad that if anyone were in charge of me not dying or feeling any pain on the operating table, it was her. She had fab hair too, all pre-Raphaelite.

Then we waited.

The anaesthetist came back after a while, and let me know that she'd worked out her list and I would have surgery probably about 12.45.

"So have a cup of tea now," she said. "You must be gasping. And then only water till 10.45 after which nothing."

A cup of tea! Fantastic.

Sadly, I was too lazy to walk to the cafe and instead went to the League of Friends kiosk nearby which, while friendly and helpful, made possibly the worst cup of tea I've ever had. Still, it was wet.

I did get so bored waiting that in the end I lay down on the sofa and went to sleep. At which point, naturally, they called me in.

I had to walk to the operating theatre, and then the lovely anaesthetist chatted to me while she put me out. Next stop, Recovery.

Another call from the hospital

The other day I got an unexpected call from the hospital.

A young-sounding girl called Cassandra told me it was a courtesy call to make sure I was OK about my forthcoming operation.

Which sounded positive.

Until she started asking me for my name and address, and whether I'd been to a post-op assessment, and when was my operation, and what time, and when was I nil by mouth from.

Don't they already know this stuff? Why phone me up to ask me?

She then asked me if I had any questions. Why yes, I do. I asked about anticoagulants, and where I am on the list, but sadly Cassandra was unable to help me.

"She probably just expected you to ask if you could take your slippers," said my Mum. "And to check you're going to turn up."

Ah, well, if that's the case, why not just ask that? I get that missed appointments cost the NHS hundreds of thousands of pounds each year, but calling me up and asking me basic questions they know the answers to is a waste of everyone's time and an insult.

I'm sorry to sound so down on a system that was once the envy of the world, but I do think the NHS needs to sort out its processes and stop wasting money with this kind of nonsense.

I really do hope they are more efficient at the actual surgery and care end of this!

A chat with the anaesthetist

I had a call this week from the anaesthetist at the hospital. I'm not sure if it is the one I'll have next Monday, or just one of the team, but she called because of what I'd told them at the pre-op assessment, about how I always end up passed out on oxygen after a general. (OK, 'always' sounds a bit OTT, I know. It's true but it has only been twice.)

At first, she was threatening not to anaesthetise me at all! Eek! So I explained what usually happens - I come round OK, then I suddenly go tingly, see flashing lights, I feel incredibly heavy, then I come round with an oxygen mask on my face. It's pretty dramatic and the nurses always look worried.

The anaesthetist was unimpressed.

"Oh," she said. "That's just a faint."

Just a faint? I dine out on this story!

She explained that as I have low blood pressure, and a GA lowers it even more, I'm fine when horizontal but put me upright and pow! Blood 'rushes out of my head' (her phrase) and into my feet, and I pass out.

Suddenly it's not such a great story, but the plus side is that I can still have my surgery, and all I have to do is make sure I'm kept horizontal for longer when I'm on the recovery ward.

So Thunderbirds are still go.

I did decide not to talk to her about wanting, as my anaesthetist friend told me, a Des and Remi. I'm saving that for the day itself. I want to see their faces when I ask.

Pre-op down, two weeks to go!

This is the first chance I've had to update since I had my pre-op assessment on Friday. Sadly, since it was the NHS, I didn't get to ask my questions as it was clear that the person I was seeing had absolutely no knowledge of my procedure at all.

The assessment block at the Royal Berkshire Hospital (RBH) is actually a Portacabin in one of its car parks. So far so very NHS. To be fair, once the staff had stopped arranging their Christmas night out and actually paid me some attention, I did only have to wait 20 minutes to be seen, which is surely some kind of NHS record.

And the people I saw were very nice. And obtained the information from me that THEY need. It's just that I didn't get the information that I need. Which was more than disappointing.

I did manage to get a leaflet out of them once I'd a) asked for one and b) insisted that they really ought to find one as telling me 'we don't have one, sorry' wasn't cutting it.

But I have learned far more on the internet than I did from the hospital and that's a poor state of affairs.

I was hoping to get a lot more detail about my expected recovery and to discuss the anticoagulants I will need post-op because of my Factor V Leiden inherited clotting disorder.

But the nurse simply assured me that I will be walking within days (er, really? Not according to the many blogs I've read from people who have actually had this done. Not to mention that for nearly two weeks I'm supposed to keep both feet elevated above my pelvis level for 90 per cent of the time. If you know a way of walking around like that, let me know.) And assured me that, I quote, "If you need drugs then they will give them to you."

Yes, I would hope that would be the case, but actually, I KNOW I will need them, my consultant at St Mary's tells me so, my common sense tells me so, and so, ya know, I'd really like to discuss them with someone BEFORE the day of surgery. Not least because as a breastfeeding mama I need to make sure anything I take is not going to adversely affect the Little Lady. Although a quick look at the excellent resource that is the Breastfeeding Network tells me it should be OK. See here.

Sigh. It's obvious the nurse had NO knowledge of a bilateral scarf osteotomy which is really annoying although not surprising, sadly.

So now I'll have to try and contact my surgeon and get a chat with him before the operation, which I can't imagine is going to be easy.

But I don't want to leave these conversations until the day itself, especially if I need heparin afterwards and will have to inject myself as I will need to learn how to do that when I am not groggy from anaesthetic and in pain from major surgery!

I do sometimes wonder when the NHS is going to finally implode from its arrogance and incompetence combined, but I guess there are just enough decent staff to keep its head above water at the moment. Let's hope I encounter lots of them over the next few weeks.