update:
yes tom, it is grotesque (and cool) - but when something's been causing you chronic pain for 8 years, you quite want to see what the hell it looks like!
1 week post-op and all is well: am resting up; have got a long cable so have the laptop connected to the DSL by my bed: am I a convalescent geek or what?
less thrilling reason for computer-next-to-bed is for re-drafting and touching up my dissertation, ioh, the excitement, I might expire with joy.
stitches out next week - it's still very sore and painful, but it eases a little every day, and the main thing with this pain is that there's an end in sight, when I'll hopefully be better, woot!
thanks for all the good wishes, will keep you posted...
am back home, operation was a success, am now bed-bound as the long process of convalescence and recovery begins, but the pain is manageable and the only way is up!
the big news is that when the surgeon removed my coccyx, he found that the bottom of my sacrum was broken and pointing the wrong way, probably caused by the accident I had when I was 13 - meaning that it now seems I've had a broken back for the last 8 years. no wonder I've had so much pain!
if you're curious (and aren't too squeamish) here are some photos of my freaky-tail for you to gaze in wonderment at (the doctor says it's the largest he's ever seen - it had all the nurses coming from different wards coming to have a look at it!) fyi, the metal thing is a pin he put through it once he'd removed it to hold the
segments together:
- the coccyx against a ruler for scale - picture 1
- in my hand, the other way up - picture 2
- another one with a ruler - picture 3
- blurry one, but hopefully you can see the sharp angle at the top, so you can get an idea how it was angled at 90 degrees to the rest of my spine! - picture 4
