Another sleepless night was had by all...

Well, to start from the beginning - the plastic surgeon dropped by around 8pm last night, and he explained that, following the surgery, there will still be two tubes from the wound, to drain any fluid that collects in the wound. The tubes will be connected to a bottle that will basically act as the collection point for any drainage. It is, apparently, small enough to just hook onto the bed, or pick up and carry - for example, when going to the toilet, or getting out of bed to sit on a chair and have a meal, etc. The tubes will remain in place for 2 - 3 days and then will be removed prior to Husband being discharged from the hospital.

In addition, he asked Husband to identify which part of the body he would like to take a skin graft FROM - and after discussion with him, the left thigh was identified. Apparently, in this process (split-thickness graft), a very fine (wafer thin) layer of skin is lifted OFF the top layer of skin. This thin layer is then going to be grafted onto the sealed wound - From what I have read up, new blood vessels begin to grow within the first 36 hours, followed by new skin cells which then begin to grow from the graft to cover the wound area with new skin.

The area from which the skin graft was taken will take approximately 10 days to heal up and will, apparently, be far more painful than the site which received the graft!

As you can imagine - getting all these details about the need for the tubes, the pain that he is still going to have, etc, did not sit well with Husband. All this news was followed by another completely sleepless night, as Husband just could not get comfortable in any position, could not lie down for more than 15 minutes at any one time, could not sit in comfort, and was too tired to keep walking all night! They took him down to the Operating Theatre at 9.00am, to start at 9.30am, and the surgeon said it could take about 3 hours. So, I am waiting in the room for Husband to come back after the op, and just praying that things go very smoothly.

Please continue to keep Husband in your thoughts and your prayers.

Till later, stay safe, stay HEALTHY!