The waiting is the hardest part

So it is 11:08 pm, 10 hours and 52 minutes before I report to the hospital for a relatively minor operation. I thought it would be funny to tweet earlier:

I just can't take this anymore. Tomorrow it will all be over with. Remember, across is just a plea for help, up and down is serious!

I have to laugh - because apparently lots of people asked my wife about it, but none at all asked me. Ok, so her friends care that I'm about to slit open my wrists, but my friends either get my sense of humor or don't care.

No, I'm not slitting my wrists. It is only the right one, and I'm having a doctor do it. Tomorrow at 10:00 am I check in for "Open Carpal Tunnel Release" surgery - where the doctor slices open my hand and wrist (ok, so only and inch or two) and snips the transverse carpal ligament in order to relieve the pressure on the median nerve and thus eliminate the tingling, numbness, weakness and pain in my right hand. The surgery should only take about half an hour, but I'll have a huge friggin bandage on my hand afterward and won't be able to use it for at least a few days (if for no other reason than there is a huge bandage on it). For reference check out this blog entry I came across : http://laslink.net/jody/2010/01/17/roys-carpal-tunnel-surgery/

My only experience with surgery so far (knock wood) has been a small lump of scar tissue removed from my finger when I was in high school, and my gall bladder removal about 8 years ago, so I'm not really sure how I'll respond afterward, though it does seem to take an awful lot to knock me down (consider that I'm taking 3 days off of work for this, which is the longest amount of consecutive (if not complete) sick time I've taken since the gall bladder surgery)) plus a three day weekend after it (I get January 3rd off since the 1st is a Saturday)).

I'm more worried about making it through the morning since I seem to always feel so dehydrated at night, and I'm not supposed to have anything after midnight - so that is 10+ hours. I remember with my gall bladder once I was on the pain medicine the biggest issues was I was so thirsty until after the surgery (I was even grateful for the barium sludge I had to drink for the tests simply because it was something to swallow).

I want to say that I'm not worried, just already feeling thirsty and wanting to get this over with. I always find it hard to sleep when I have something big and new the next day.

It will be nice to not have the pain, tingling and numbness anymore, and I figure that soon I'll have the left done as well (though it isn't nearly so bad as the right).

We'll see how long it takes to get back to it.