Post 15: Holiday Snaps

Here's a few snaps from my holiday in Birmingham, thought you might want to see them?

Basically, I've had the area on my chest removed entirely, right down to the ribs, I'm told. The sarcoma lump, plus a 3cm margin around it, and possibly a bit more, too, as the area was where the radiotherapy had been blasted, so it was knackered anyway.

Muscles from my back have been added, not that you/I can see at present, by will hopefully start working as a chest muscle in the future, but we'll see.

Then a section of skin has been removed from back to back-fill it, affectionately referred to as my 'flap'. Underneath, the original blood supply for that area of skin has been moved too, and tucked in and through under my armpit.

Some of the pipes that I mentioned last time were:

• 1x epidural into my spine.
• 1x oxygen supply under my nose (works alongside the epidural)
• 2x canulars into my hand, for fluids and instant morphine control (click button delivery)
• 3x bottle drains (catching unneeded fluid in the wounds) - pipes come from under my skin in detergent areas and lead to 3x glass bottles on the floor!!
• 1x catheter, coming out of my willy and stuck to my leg, into a bag on the side of the bed.

Genuinely, this is all magic to me. Moving skin and blood supplies, and stuff. It's crazy clever. (Plus, weeing without even getting out of bed was amazing!)