by Roy Exum
posted January 8, 2009
 Roy Exum |
As some of you know, I have had the somewhat the same luck and while writing for Chatttanoogan.com fulfills my soul, the fog of anesthesia makes it hard for me to spell words, much less offer my view on what catches my fancy.
So to the hundreds who have sent me emails, who have wished me luck during the 29 surgeries during 2008, allow me to tell you a little about myself today because while I am determined to read each email, there is simply no way I have the one-handed ability to answer each note and tell you what you have done to make my heart soar as 2009 begins its run.
I always had hoped that each new surgery would get easier. That doesn’t happen. The day after Christmas two orthopedic surgeons in Nashville bored out the middle of the three biggest bones in my right arm and then inserted enough steel rods and screws to build a cruiser-class submarine. I nearly tilt when I walk.
This was done in a last-ditch effort to rid me of an endless stream of pretty exotic infections. There was a big chance there would be colossal nerve damage and since I already have a bone disease that flaunts both “staph” and “strep,” suffice it to say I’ve been back to Vanderbilt four times in the past seven days, including a day-long trial in the emergency room on New Year’s Day.
It doesn’t bother me my two new surgeons have the nicknames of “Painless” and “Thumbs.” The bigger thing is that some of you know I had tearfully begged two different surgeons to whack my right arm off within the last month and, as I write this, all five fingers on my battered wing still work perfectly.
That is huge for me. They had to “freeze” the position of my arm for the rest of my life, at about 45 degrees where my elbow used to be, and - because of the way the Lord made us - my right hand will forever be with the palm on top. This makes handwriting and using a computer mouse pretty tricky, but, brother, it isn’t lost on me that every finger on my right hand now points towards heaven.
I’ll admit that in the past 100-plus surgeries since 1990 I’ve lied when people have asked about my arm. I’ve told them it is “just great” and “doing fine” while I’ve been gullible enough to think they didn’t notice the bloody bandages, the days I would sneak off for another procedure, or the fact I am never without powerful anti-nausea drugs in my pocket.
I used to tell my closest friends “I’m tougher than polished granite” and that I was as salty as "three miles of a dirt road” when that wasn’t true at all. My upbringing was that you didn’t complain, you didn’t whine, you didn’t mourn your fate but instead you tightened your belt, got out of bed a little earlier and did whatever it took to be a winner by the end of the day.
I still think a lot that way, that nobody needs to know when I’m wide awake at 3:15 in the morning and desperately wishing I wouldn’t hurt so badly. I’d rather drape a rattlesnake around my neck than take a pain pill. I can’t stand the way they make you feel but, far more, the way some of my friends have abused them.
The exception to that is when the pain gets to such a gallop that I begin to come apart. If I go two days without any sleep I begin to lose my grip. Then I’ll go to the emergency room where a gentle medical doctor, understanding my phobia of drugs, administers so much “juice” than on two separate occasions I have forgotten to breathe.
Instead I use a mixture of Tylenol and my iPod to quell the demons. My iPod now has over 700 songs, with a heavy mix of hymns by country-music stars, Broadway anthems, a whole lot of rock-n-roll, and about an even blend of the Rolling Stones and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. The worse the pain, the softer the music – call me Einstein but it seems to help.
Today is just shy of two weeks since my last knifing and, while I’m a bit impatient to get my strength back and now bored by the tedium, allow me to be starkly candid in the belief I really think God has a big plan for me. In time He will guide me to where He wants me to be.
But in the meanwhile you’ll begin to see my writings back on Chattanoogan.com because, again in a very revealing way, it means a lot to me if I can make somebody laugh, give another guy a boost or smooth another’s journey.
Before I hop from such a personal pedestal, allow me a last request. The next time any of you get the urge to lift me up as your emails have done in such an unimaginable way, change the “To:” line to someone else who you know is floundering or struggling or hurting or sad. It will have a profound effect on their tomorrow. Trust me, I know.
royexum@aol.com
| Dining Out | Business | Movies | Focus | About Us |
| Church | Living Well | Memories | Outdoors | Real Estate | Student Scene | Travel |