Made it all the way out to VGH yesterday afternoon to visit with my surgeon again, to articulate my ongoing pain and sleep issues.

When I say “all the way” I mean the 40 minute drive from door to door, through something like a million construction zones and the corresponding traffic.

My wife is a real trooper – she hates driving, doesn’t do it much normally, and has had to pick up all the family transport duties for the foreseeable future. It’s a big task and I really appreciate it.

Yes, so 40 minutes each way, plus 45 minutes of waiting, for what amounted to a 5 minute conversation with the doctor. But it was worthwhile.

For the record, I don’t look forward to these conversations around ‘pain management.’ Of course the elephant in the room is prescription drugs – can I get more of them, or alternatively what else can I do, but please don’t send me home empty-handed. So I go into them in a relative state of duress, but trying to play it cool at the same time and not come across like a maniac.

A similar thing happened after my hernia surgery: post-operative pain that lingered well beyond the short course of medication and feeling unsupported and without recourse. In that situation, it was mainly severe nerve pain and a doctor who was much less approachable. At each follow-up he took a “I see nothing wrong” stance and just told me it would get better soon. In fact, he didn’t disclose the full extent of the surgery and generally couldn’t be bothered to think about patient care beyond the fact that the surgery was, in his mind, successful. So for about a month my skin was on fire and there was nothing I could do. I even started to doubt what I was experiencing and why. That’s what informs me this time.

This time, everyone seems much more sympathetic and civilized. The surgeon’s office has responded to my calls appropriately. The surgeon, while not exactly friendly or personable, is attentive. And I am better informed, leveraging AI to collect and frame my thoughts has been enlightening (“help me write a note to my surgeon; here’s a list of my symptoms and activities…”)

Anyway, I had my five minutes with him yesterday and laid it out as plainly as I could. Although he couldn’t explain what was going on (except that I might be overdoing it during the day), he matter-of-factly wrote up a new prescription for Tramacet and sent me on my way. And it was a pain-free, 9 hour sleep from the Gods.