1 Month Post Op - Hammertoe Pin Removal

I'm going to tell you, the steristrips they put over the incisions when they remove the sutures? They get ICKY!! Their purpose is to help hold the skin closed, so the incision heals well, and we always tell our patients to leave them on until they start to peel off independently, but I couldn't wait. The juices that ooze out of a healing incision just mess them up. After a week, I peeled them off, and stuck some dressings of my own over them, until the weeping stopped. (even after bleeding stops and in the absence of infection, which would result in a greenish, icky discharge and smell, incisions can ooze a yellowish liquid for weeks...especially when the foot is swollen, which it will likely continue to get when I am up and about, until walking around like normal)

By 4 weeks, the weeping has pretty much stopped, and the scabs are about all gone, as is the bruising, but the peeling continues. See the wrinkly skin?? That's all going to peel off eventually: 

No-one tells you ahead of time that the swelling will cause the skin on your foot to start to flake and peel....I have been putting a coconut oil scrub on the parts between the incisions but until I can massage the entire foot, the dermabond around the incisions and the skin won't all peel off completely....so I delicately do what I can. Coconut oil is wonderful for moisturizing....I used it on my knee, which developed a sort of callus from the knee scooter the first week...now it's no longer sore and flaking, and the coconut oil keeps it moist. Sort of like elbow skin, if not moistened, it gets dry and Elephant-skin looking. 

And the swelling is dependent now....just when my foot is down. Like in the shower. I take a shower, then sit back down with my foot up to allow it to dry and the fluid drain back, before putting my boot on each day. 

Of course, sticking this foot into a pedicure tub and having a pedicurist scrub away at it is out of the question until it heals up a bit more (2 weeks after the pin is removed I should be able to get one....I'm counting the days!!), so I do what I can at home.

By now, I've been doing some weight bearing on my heel per MD orders for a week or so, and after a busy Memorial Day weekend which involved visiting family and a lot more moving around, up and down stairs, using crutches more. It took a day or so to recover from that!! I actually took a percocet each night on top of my Motrin, to be comfortable enough to sleep; mostly Motrin has been enough.

Yesterday, Dr. Ritchey removed the pin in my hammertoe.  A hammertoe is when a toe gets bent over years time into an unnatural position, usually because of the shoes worn (too small, etc, which has been my problem with size 11 feet since my teen years, and 20 years ago, there wasn't the internet to buy bigger shoes; I had to make do with what we could find in town. And our town had a lot of ladies with larger feet. O-kay, so many of them were related to me, but still....)

This particular hammer toe had become so warped that when I walked, it slid up under the toe next to it, and become very painful. (it's the fourth one, beside the pinky).

To straighten it, he had to break it and pin it in it's new position to allow it to heal back more straight. (the dark dot is the scab over the top of the pin on the end of my toe: that's where he'll have to cut to get to it. )

Now as this was the part of the foot that still gave me some pain from time to time since surgery, especially after the busy Memorial Day weekend. I knew, in part, this was because of the foreign body in it (the pin, holding the broken bone straight so it will set right), so I was glad to be getting rid of it, even as I dreaded the process.

Other than a couple of times at the end of the day that busy Memorial Day weekend, I hadn't been taking anything stronger than Motrin, but for this, in anticipation of the discomfort to come, I took 2 Percocet before going in for my appointment, knowing that this was going to be uncomfortable. I had Jeff drive me....I had already driven a bit, taking my boot off and strapping a sandal on over an ace bandage, so I COULD have driven myself, but as loopy as Percocet makes me, I wasn't taking that chance.

After x-rays verified that everything was healing nicely, the process began. Now a pin looks very much like a finishing nail without a head, very smooth, with a point, so that when the doctor places it in surgery, he could push it into the toe, stabilizing it in it's new position....It actually surprised me how thick it was. No WONDER that toe was so sore!!

Of course, as the pin had shifted a bit, or rather, in his words, the end 2 segments of the toe had slid on the pin, so it was good it was being removed, before it slid down any further. But this meant that he was going to have to use a scalpel to cut in a bit to grab hold of the pin.

He used a numbing spray on the surface, but that couldn't numb deep down where he was injecting the lidocaine to numb the toe, and that was excruciating for about 30 seconds. I'm a nurse, I know that when you inject something, even if you numb the surface, the medication being injected under than numb skin hurts. It just does. Doesn't mean I was going to like it. I gritted my teeth, squeezed the heck out of the armrests of the table, then it was done.

But I didn't watch. If it were anyone else, as a nurse, I'd be watching the procedure, but I can't even watch when I get my own blood drawn (something I've done to other people many times), there was no way I was going to be able to watch him slice into my toe and grab hold of a pin and pull it out....so I closed my eyes while he sliced and gripped, and VOILA!! Dr. Ritchey handed me a hemostat with the finishing-nail looking pin on it. Weird!!


Of course, I've been taking Motrin for weeks, which can thin the blood, so I bled like a stuck pig...after holding pressure on it for a few minutes, he slapped some bandaids on it as a make-shift pressure dressing.  (12 hours later I took them off, and guess what....more bleeding!! If anyone ever needs my DNA, there's blood on my carpet....more bandaids. By the next day it had stopped, though)

He then told me to park the scooter and start walking with the boot on. Hallelujah!!! Freedom!!!

I pushed the scooter out to the waiting room, walking on my boot, and Jeff was like "Uh oh, she's free!!"....of course, with the Percocet in my system, it felt pretty good, so I happily walked to the car.

I went home and slept off the Percocet.

Later that night, after waking up from my Percocet-induced nap, I cleaned bathrooms, but with the lidocaine worn off and the Percocet effects done, I discovered, no surprise, it was going to be a bit more uncomfortable than it was at first....but dangit, my bathrooms hadn't been cleaned properly since right before my surgery, if I had to do it in stages, I was going to clean them!! (and for those who say "Why can't your honey clean the bathrooms?", I point out the obvious....bachelor cleaning and MY cleaning are 2 different things!! :) )

Aside from the soreness, and needing frequent breaks, not having to use crutches or a scooter for the first time in a month felt amazing. And getting rid of that pin did decrease the discomfort I had been having at the base of that toe, discomfort probably related to the foreign body in my foot. Why you ask? Well, have you ever had a sliver? If you have, then you know that if you don't get it out pretty quickly, it starts to get red and inflamed; the effects of your body attacking the foreign body in it, trying to get rid of it.

But the boot takes some getting used to walking in. Hit an uneven spot wrong, your knee tries to go backwards. And I'm walking on a lightly padded hard boot...these first few days I need frequent breaks to rest the foot, decrease the pain. By the end of the day, I'm watching TV with the boot off, my foot up, as I have since surgery.

There are numb spots in my foot still...near the incisions, as nerves that were cut or abused during the surgery take time to heal;  the inside of the hammer toe that has the incision on it, the inside of the toe next to it....some of this is just because of surgery, some is because he rooted around inside my foot, trying to find that danged neuroma that was thought to be the cause of all the pain in the ball of my foot, and sorting out the tangle of nerves that were in there...some nerve damage was to be expected. And some of it will heal, as the body finds other ways to get nerve signals to those areas; but I might still have some numb spots permanently. But thanks to the fact that there WASN'T a neuroma in there that he had to remove, I've got a whole lot less numbness than I could have had.

Addendum: a week after I was told to start walking in the boot more, I added an insole. I'm sorry, I guess my tender tootsie status is going to continue...yeah, it might get better once everything is healed up...but my heel is killing me in that boot!! I happened to have a bunch of insoles I had tried over the years, so I stuck one in there...we'll see if it helps. Well, off to clean the house!! 

Two weeks post-op: Suture removal

Unlike many other surgeries, where doctors have moved to staples or glue to close the incisions they create during surgery, Podiatrists usually use sutures to close the skin; the logic is that the bony structures are so close under the surface, they require the extra support of sutures, rather than glue, and staples...well, metal and bone, ugh!! Kinda seems not really flexible enough. 

Anyway, as a nurse of a certain era, I've done my fair share of suture removals over the years, so I gave a fleeting thought to taking them out myself, but one look at the S-shaped incision from my 4th toe to the top of my foot, and the scabbing and all that...well, let's just say, the thought of doing it myself was rapidly filed away for "I'll let the pro do it!"...the pro being Dr. Ritchey's nurse in the office.

Again relying on friends, since driving is still not an option, I toyed with taking a Percocet before going, but I know the small pain from the tugging on sutures compared to the in general much harsher pain I had already gone through, for such a short period of time, really didn't warrant the itching that results. 

And I was right. Mere minutes it took her to remove the suture, even the wonky incision on my fourth toe. There were a few cringes, but ultimately she had them out and steristrips over the incisions lickety-split. 

The end result: not bad. The toes are still bruised, as is around the heel and the arch, where all of the blood pooled from the surgery...but it's looking much better. And Motrin is all that's really needed, when they get sore.

One thing that continues to be uncomfortable is if I let the foot dangle, don't keep it elevated continuously, it swells. It just takes time....and I knew about the discoloration that can happen when the foot is dependent, not elevated, for example, when you are walking around on crutches or a knee scooter. Even forewarned, though, it's disconcerting to look down and see a purple, swollen foot....but elevate it for a while and it goes back down. Best thing to do is to wear your boot as much as possible when you are up and around, the compression can help decrease the swelling.

Comparing feet when foot is elevated...both the same color, not much swelling:



And when I've been around the house a bit, on my knee scooter, without putting my boot on tightly; that discoloration. It's quite common in limbs that have been operated on for a few weeks afterwards, but still not pretty.

All in all, healing well. First trip out of town this weekend, and because I tend towards motion sickness in the back seat of a car, I'll probably just sit up front...and my almost 6 foot tall frame means no foot up on the dash for me. We'll see how that goes.

Post-Op Day 11

Mom and a family friend, Annice, have been here for a few days, so we've been getting out of the house...Wednesday was dressing removal and boot receipt day, so after the reveal of Frankenfoot (see that day's post) we drove around Knoxville a bit....We had iced tea on Calhoun's patio, where I camped out while Mom and Annice took a walk down the waterfront...I tell you, the knee scooter makes things MUCH easier, but still is hard to get around, and after shopping a bit the day before, Wednesday I was a bit worn out....thank you the the lovely waitress on Calhoun's patio who didn't charge us for our iced tea, what a lovely girl.  (my view from the most easily accessed part of Calhoun's on the River's deck...yes, the river IS out there somewhere!!)

Mom, Annice and I did Dollywood yesterday, and although it was fun as always (the train was not running, though. :( ) it WORE ME OUT...talk about a new perspective, being stuck in a wheelchair/scooter all day, having to THINK if able to go to certain places, or find a bathroom...I was exhausted by day's end. I am every SO thankful that for me, this is a temporary thing. This experience is really opening up my eyes.



BTW, if they read this by some weird coincidence, Dollywood REALLY needs some automatic doors on their family/handicapped bathroom doors, I tell you...I didn't have my crutches with me, so had to drive the scooter right into the bathroom, and getting in and out of manual doors in one of those scooters is almost impossible without help. 

Today we opted to skip the Biscuit Boulevard downtown Knoxville...Missing it again this year, but I just wasn't up to the logistics of getting around downtown on my knee scooter or crutches, and in those crowds, nonetheless...and did the simple, tasty breakfast at Horn of Plenty...then we braved the rain showers to Crab Orchard so, on their last day here, Mom and Annice could see Ozone falls, one of our favorite sights to show people who visit....I had my books, and camped out in the back seat with my foot up while they hiked a bit.....finally finished a book I started several months ago!!

Even after an afternoon riding around I'm the car, foot down, in my boot--well, we DID stop at Riverside Grill in Oak Ridge, TN, enjoy some of the rowing from their patio with a cold beverage:
 

a couple of hours elevated and a bit of ice, and I have to admit, it's looking better. 



That long, bruised, second toe sticks out furthest in my boot, and when it gets shiny and swollen, I know it's time to get my foot elevated a bit!! Looking good now.

Pain-wise, Motrin is enough. Oh, it throbs a bit when I put it down, but really I don't need anything else. 

Will post a pic without dressings tomorrow. Dr. Ritchie just put gauze over the stitches with an ace bandage loose over it, saying he knows anything tight can be uncomfortable, but I've found that, even loosely wrapped just to hold Gauze on over the stitches, it feels like the ace bandage makes my foot joints lightly but constantly grind together. So I dug into my first aid kit, and this is what I've come up with. Still did the ace bandage loosely inside the boot today, but taking it off to relax and sleep.

I can still see the faint outline of Dr. Ritchey's Happy face foot. :)

Post Op Day #8 - It's free!! Frankenfoot, it's free!!!

I have never been so afraid and so glad to get dressings off at the same time. Try living and sleeping with a boot on your foot, never taking it off, for days on end. Extremely uncomfortable, even as it protected my foot. 

Actually the whole process, getting the dressings off and viewing the stitches, the bruising, and the happy foot that Dr. Ritchey had drawn on my foot to mark it as the one they were doing surgery on that morning,  the straightness, was so liberating, yet at the same time I was afraid. Without the splint and any dressings, my foot felt so..delicate. I immediately nicknamed it Frankenfoot...for obvious reasons:

BEFORE:

AFTER DRESSINGS OFF:

Dr. Ritchey's nurse had me scoot into the other room for x-rays (putting my foot down flat on ground, although not bearing any weight on it, since the surgery...weird) to make sure everything was healing well.

The whole process took 30 minutes, and he wrapped me up in my splint with just an ace bandage and just gauze over my dressings...after brunch at Crackerbarrel, Mom, Annice and I made a trip to Hanger's, the place that distributes boots for those of us with Humana insurance. Anther $120 (danged deductibles) out of my pocket. For the next few months my foot will spend much of my awake time in a boot, one of those big, black boots that braces a broken or otherwise operated on foot...eventually it is what I will bear weight on my foot in for the first time, but for now it protects my foot and allows me to use my heel to move around...up and down stairs, I can bear weight on my heel.

And I can wash it!! Not the boot, my foot!!!  Oh, I'll still be sitting in the shower, and I won't be submerging it in water (no swimming for me the next month or 2), but I can lather up and wash between my toes...and remove that Happy face foot Dr. Ritchie drew on it. Hallelujah!

My second day straight of running around outside on my knee scooter (went shopping the day before) had my leg muscles and knee protesting, so we drove down to Calhoun's on the river and had cold tea there...I relaxed on the part of the deck it was easy for me to access,

while Mom and Annice took a walk down the river...Annice has never been to Knoxville before, so it was nice for her, but I was tired. Yes, the Tennessee River is out there. Somewhere. But the chair was comfortable and the iced tea was cold!

Pain-wise, I took a Percocet before my doctor's appointment, just in case, but really Motrin is enough. Ice, elevation....the bunions themselves hurt the least...the most painful is at the base of the incision on the top of my foot, extending from the hammer toe he broke, straightened and pinned, that was for exploration and possible removal of the tentatively diagnosed Morton's Neuroma in my foot (diagnosed based on symptoms, only way to confirm the diagnosis: surgery), and I think maybe that it is just bruised...

But about the neuroma, I almost forgot the GREAT news Dr. Ritchie gave me today: he got in there and found NO NEUROMA!! This is good news...he said the nerves to the toes feeling so much pain were smooshed and tangled and basically all wrapped up amongst the tendons and structures of my mal-formed feet...he just lysed a bunch of adhesions, tried to free everything up, basically unstuck everything, and stitched me back up. What does this mean?? The numbness I might have had in those toes, and the possibility of different pain in the ball/arch of my foot related the nerve stump he left after the neuroma (nerve tumor) was removed, the risk of those are gone. And hopefully, with fixing the main problems in my feet, the pain will resolve. I'm so relieved at THAT little turn of events. 

Tomorrow, we'll do Dollywood, and I will pay the $40 to rent an electric scooter....I want to do Dollywood, but my leg will fall off at the knee if I have to roll around there on my knee scooter, and crutches...fuggedabout it!!

Post Op day 7 - Surprising pain

Well, I'm pretty much down to one Percocet in the morning and one in the evening, just Motrin through the day. However, despite the horror stories about how painful bunion surgery is, it's not my bunions that are hurting so much as the incision from my hammer toe to the top of my foot, where he removed the Neuroma. I don't know if the dressings are just rubbing wrong on that, or what, but I'll be ever so glad to get rid of the dressings tomorrow morning, see if that helps the pain.

The knee scooter ended up being the best investment....I use that daily, and the crutches rarely....but my knee, where I bear the brunt of my weight, has become inflamed and almost abraded. I have ordered a knee pad to see if that will help protect that knee. Thanks to Amazon, it should be in tomorrow, so I can try it out around town tomorrow.  Thursday we'll do Dollywood, and the hardest part of that will be not having my foot elevated on the scooter I plan to rent for the day. 

Post Op Day 5.....ARRRRGH!

Have you EVER worn a shoe for a week, without taking it off, not even for a second, not even just to scratch your foot? That's what I feel like with these dressings/splint/ace bandages on...they feel like they are sliding down, the splint shifts, and it feels like I have a shoe on in bed. And my foot is just ANNOYED. It's irritating...Can't WAIT until he takes it all off on Wednesday: no matter how Frankensteiny my foot looks, it'll be a relief to have it off and wiggle my toes.

No one told me the pain wouldn't be the worst part....it would be the DRESSING/SPLINT!!



Oh, and stop reading here if you don't want to know about the on-going GI issues that Omnicef and other antibiotics can cause.

The diarrhea is gone...which has me paranoid that I'm working on getting constipated from the Percocet. Which I've only taken one this morning, and one last night to get to sleep, because the foot was throbbing so much, but still....but let me just say, if there were a windmill in our bedroom, I could generate our own electricity!! The gas WOKE ME UP THIS MORNING! Not that stinky (IBS, remember, I've HAD smellier)...just copious amounts!! And I've NEVER made such disgustingly LOUD noises on the toilet!!

Only 3 more doses of the antibiotics, then hopefully I'll go back down to my regular level of gaseousness.

O-kay, enough on that.  

Post Op Day #4: 7am.

So this is what 7am looks like when you haven't been up all night?? I threw Jeff for a loop when I woke up around the same time as his day-shift butt. But that's what happens when you take a Percocet at 10pm and doze off.

Foot's not bad at all, now, just a bit sore in the bunion areas....I think I'll just try Motrin this morning. AFTER some food...Motrin's actually harder on the stomach than Percocet.

What to do today?? Probably laundry....after 4 days in bed, the sheets DEFINITELY need to be washed... Jeff's Honey Do list is to get the ceiling fan installed in the guest bedroom before Mom and Annice arrive tomorrow, to help circulate air in there...it's the dampest room in the house, so the dehumidifier I have set up in there runs almost continuously....and warms the room up almost 10 degrees warmer than the rest of the house, even with the A/C running.  We keep the door shut when Bongo is here, as she traditionally considers that bedroom hers, so that adds to the heat....thankfully, the dehumidifier has a timer, and since I'm thinking of it, I'll go now and set it to turn off in 12 hours, so it will cool down in the evenings for them to sleep. 

Not much exciting to report today. Day 4, I'll still be taking it easy, but the foot's feeling pretty good. Itchy, but healing itchy, not pain medication itchy. Intestines, well, they'll recover...only a couple more days of antibiotics. 

One fun point today...learning to use crutches...had to have Jeff adjust them a bit higher after I got on them, tried to go forward, and fell backwards...the arm rests were a good 4 inches below where they needed to be....thankfully I've got lots of padding on my butt, because it cushioned me. I HAD thought Jeff was right behind me, and just missed catching me, so my sarcastic "Nice catch, Jeff!" was a bit misdirected...he wasn't there, so down I went, unhindered. We both learned quickly that until I get used to the crutches,  he needs to stay yearby.

Off to Kroger, and what I have been looking forward to ever since it became apparent I was going to need surgery....driving those electric grocery carts that the handicapped can use.

Of course, NOT ONE handicapped parking spot was available....and I was the most handicapped of any who actually had placards and were parked in those spots...but we parked down the row, and Jeff retrieved the cart for me.

Time for the Kroger 500!! I put the "pedal" to the metal....and Jeff walked away from me. Not too much power in these things. They ARE, however, pretty maneuverable, and I was able to zip in and out around other shoppers without causing anyone injury, so it was fun.

I came out with more fresh fruit and yogurt to replace that which I had eaten since my surgery...Jeff came out with chips and cookies. This is why I seldom take him grocery shopping with me.

Next exciting day: dressing removal day. Ugh...I'm both looking forward to it, and dreading it. Wednesday morning....photos to come.

I plan to post here as long-term effects, and results, become apparent...when I'm allowed to weight bear (with an orthopedic boot on, I expect), how long I need the scooter/crutches around, any affects I note from removal of the neuroma, something I'm told can have some unexpected after-effects, at least, if any of the stories you read on-line are true. 

Post Op Day #3 - SSDD

I'll let you figure out "SSDD", in light of the first topic of yesterdays' entry. Yup; Thank God for Immodium. Gonna have to stock up, I've got 4 more days of antibiotics.

My night owl tendencies haven't changed....after Jeff went to bed last night, I took the broom and rolled around on my knee scooter, sweeping dirt out of corners so my little buddy, Robbie the Robovac
(a Neato robotic vacuum I invested in because I HATE vacuuming, and knew it would get neglected when I had my surgery. I schedule Robbie to run twice a week, and other than the fact that he doesn't get into the corners that well, my house has never been cleaner...and I'm not having to nag Jeff to get the vacuum out. :) ) could do his job. I love Robbie!!

Bongo the cat comes for a visit this afternoon...a friend's cat, in reality she's part-time ours as we cat sit several times a year when they are out of town or, like this week, when their eldest daughter is graduating and all of their family is staying at their house, she needs to be somewhere where she won't get lost track of. Mohka likes the company (that is, Mohka TOLERATES the company!!), and what's one more litter pan??

Speaking of Mohka, she curled up next to ME in bed last night, hurting Jeff's feelings...he's used to her curling up next to him at bedtime, as she's HIS baby...but I know it's just because she knows I'm injured. Animals are good about that....she keeps an eye on me during the day, too, staying beside me while I sleep...once I'm up and around, she gets up and around, too.

How's my foot today?? The incisions for the bunions were pretty sore/sharp pain, and over all the foot throbs/sore, but not excruciating...I was able to get up, use the facilities, get some food and fresh ice, and get back to bed without severe pain, so I'd say that it's improving. 

And if it weren't for Dr. Richey's admonition to leave the dressings alone, I would be unwrapping and re-wrapping the ace bandage....it's gotten kind of loose. But I'll be a good girl....I may have to tighten up the top part, but I'll leave it alone.

Woosh, you never realize how tiring taking a shower can be until you have to get down and up on one leg (ditto, using the toilet) and have to juggle shampoo and a hand-held shower head, as well as keep one leg outside the shower, dry and protected....time for a nap!

By the end of the day, I went about 9 hours between pain pills, and didn't really need them...sat on the deck for a few hours, enjoying the summer weather, even made potato packets with hamburgers in them to cook on the grill, and enjoyed a couple of cold beers...and aside from the ice on the foot, I didn't really need the pain pills. BUT when the pain catches up to you, watch out...it's like when my bunions are grinding against too narrow a pair of shoes....that's the pain I feel when it kicks in. That and throbbing/sore....Now I'm drowsy. Time to tuck in for the night. 

Post-op Day #2: The Intestines have it.

No-one ever wants to talk about bowels. Well, no-one but nurses....we talk about them daily, with our patients. Indeed, as a labor and delivery nurse, I see much more of the bowel's products than most. So it doesn't bother me. Hang on to your hats, folks, yes, we are going there. If discussing such things grosses you out, you might want to scroll down a bit. 

A little back story....I have irritable bowel syndrome. Anyone who has this can tell you, it either leans one way - constipation - or the other - diarrhea. Also, it can be predictable...you know what will trigger it, stress, medications, certain foods...or unpredictable, if you are in new situations. My IBS leans towards diarrhea, but I can be prone to constipation, too, so just in case, I started taking Colace, a stool softener, right after surgery, knowing that narcotic pain medications and lack of movement can make the bowels sluggish. Also, I wasn't sure how easy it would be to strain when I can't plant my right foot for leverage, and I don't really want to find out. Know your medications, and their possible side effects, to anticipate which you might need.

Now, remember I mentioned some antibiotics can cause diarrhea? It would be nice if the side effects of the narcotics and the side effects of the antibiotics would balance each other out, wouldn't it?? Nope, doesn't work that way...one will win out over the other.

Guess what I woke up to today?? Yup, you got it...one trip to the kitchen to get some food so I could take my pain medication (we'll talk about the pain in a bit), and suddenly what had started last night before I fell asleep (it sounded like gas bubbles were racing the Daytona 500 through my intestines...come on, you KNEW I would get some NASCAR references in there!!) came to fruition. I ended up zipping off to the bathroom as fast as my little scooter's wheels could take me.

Who knew the quinoa I ate 2 nights ago would come through with such a splash...and like corn, it doesn't fully digest. Ugh, TMI, I know. Sorry!!

And this continued for a bit. I took my Immodium...my go-to for when this happens to me...but sometimes these things just have to clear through.

I waited until I ate to take my pain pills (Motrin and Percocet), then until my bowels stopped rumbling and I was pretty sure I wasn't going to have to zip off to the bathroom any time soon before taking my antibiotics. Dr. Ritchie ordered me Omnicef, which had fallen out of favor due to the high incidence of nausea/vomiting/diarrhea in patients, but in this era of superbugs, bacteria that are basically resistant the go-to antibiotics like Penicillin, and some antibiotics being basically useless, it has come back into favor. People just have to live with the side effects.

So check that off...as long as I'm taking that, I won't likely need my Colace....and after a week, judging by how my foot feels today, I won't likely be taking the percocet regularly, so hopefully once the antibiotics are done (7 days), things will go back to normal. Meanwhile, I still hear Harvick doing some burnouts in there...and Carl Edwards' occasional backflips.....o-kay, o-kay, I'll stop. 

FOR THOSE WHO WANTED TO SKIP THE BOWEL DISCUSSION, IT'S OVER!!

Now the pain. I fell asleep around 3 am again last night, about 2 hours after I took my Percocet and Motrin, which I found is about routine...the drowsiness Percocet brings on for me peaks at about 2 hours after I take it. Also the itching had gotten bad enough I took some Benedryl, too, to make that more tolerable. Anyway, I slept solid through to 1pm this afternoon, didn't even hear Jeff get up for work.

My foot wasn't hurting too bad when I first woke up, just a little sore, but once I started moving around and the blood started flowing more, the throbbing started. Not horrible, just there. And I started feeling my incisions more, including that 4th toe, which I thought maybe would be a bit numb after removal of the neuroma, but nope, it's still there.

Now I know Motrin and Percocet can both be hard on the stomach, so after my above-mentioned bathroom issues, I got some fruit, yogurt, etc from the kitchen, and then took my pain pills. I know better than to just take them on an empty stomach, to do so can bring on other unwanted symptoms...stomach ache, etc.

The Motrin works well for aches and muscle pain, and Percocet, of course, is intended for more severe, sharper pain, like my incisions. Doctors will often prescribe both together, as they work well together. As Motrin is hard on your kidneys if you take too much, it's important to follow the directions on the label as exactly as possible...if you regularly take more Motrin an hour before it's due, you will end up taking more than is good for your kidneys each day. And kidney damage is irreversible, so it's really good to avoid that....

Anyway, once the pain meds kick in, the most irritating thing is the itching. Itching under the bandages, itching where the incisions are starting to heal, itching sometimes related to the Percocet, as that is one of the most common side-effects of narcotics. I resist taking Benedryl for the itching as much as possible, because Benedryl also makes me drowsy, and I'd rather not spend any more of my days sleeping.

Another irritant....my shin bone is starting to feel bruised. My knee was already bruised from the horseback riding before my surgery (Reba seemed to find it amusing to try to run me into trees and try to knock me off, until she realized I wasn't going to be that easy to knock off).  I had thought ahead and bought extra sheepskin padding for over the top of the padded leg support on the knee scooter, but apparently it still takes time for the knee/shin to toughen up, as I don't routinely bear my weight on my knee/shin. I guess I need to use the crutches sometimes, too. 

Now blood clots are also a risk after any bone surgery, or indeed any surgery that can limit your mobility. Also, the doctor splinted my foot to keep it in it's regular, right-angle position, because when numb, a foot will relax and point down more....and with limited mobility, that can result in tendons and muscles stretching out and getting used to that position, so that when time comes to start walking on the foot again, the muscles and tendons aren't used to it. So I'm constantly flexing my foot back upwards, as it tends to relax down against the splint, and moving both legs as much as possible when not on my scooter/crutches, to keep the blood flowing (preventing clots) and the muscles in shape. 

It's looking pretty shaded out on the deck right now...I think maybe I'll scoot on out there, read a book for a while. 


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ahh, a little time reading on the deck, got the plants watered (this is the longest we've gone without rain since last year...the first dry spell, it hasn't rained since last week..up until then, it seemed like every 3 days, it rained for 3 days.). A nice grilled cheese panini for supper, and a banana, and a Percocet...now sitting back, watching Avengers in bed with my honey, testing out that padded headboard we slaved to assemble and mount to the wall last weekend:
 

Mainly, my foot is just sore, parts are a bit numb, feeling like they are going to sleep, not numb like the block made them. The pinky toe incision seems to be the most painful, but nothing is excruciating; the percocet is doing good.

I just tried crutches again...I guess I need some practice with those. My shin is going to need some relief from the knee scooter...or more padding, one or the other.

2 hours after my percocet...time for a nap. Can't keep my eyes open. And can't ignore the itching anymore. Benedryl time.

Post Operative Day #1. Here comes the pain.

And that leads me to how POD 1 started....after finally falling asleep around 3am, I woke up at 9am. Still no pain, but starting to be able to wiggle my toes...IT'S ALIVE!!...



WTG Dr. Pittman, more than 24 hours pain relief, can't ask for much more than that, with modern medicine. Again, if you ever have foot surgery, or any appendage surgery that they can do a nerve block for, ask for it...it's well worth it, even if there is a disconcerting period of "will I ever feel it again?". Now I can better understand my patients who get a really numb leg from their epidurals and why they sometimes can panic a little bit. 

I had thought ahead, and had a cooler ready with ice packs in the freezer, and a list for my honey to put into the cooler before going to work each day. I'm very independent, and after taking a few hours off the previous afternoon to tend to me, I sent him to work as usual the next day...several friends in calling distance, plus his work wasn't that far away, so I felt I could handle it on my own. I set up a snack basket on my bedside stand, and he packed me a cooler beside my bed full of cold goodies...juices and gingerale (in case of nausea), yogurt, hummus, veggies and dip...I'm determined that this sedentary time is NOT going to add to my middle-aged spread!!

So after a little caffeine (I also had him add one Monster zero calerie drink to the cooler, my cold caffeine beverage of choice, because I had a feeling I may not be up to making coffee, and cold caffeine might sit better than hot, post-operatively), I got myself onto my knee scooter, decided I'd better take advantage of the lack of pain to perform some basic hygiene....I got to my shower (my other purchase, a basic shower stool, $26 from Walmart). I have a tub shower with a hand-held shower head with an on/off switch right on it....I plunked myself down, stuck my foot on my scooter seat outside the shower, covered that part of my leg with the shower curtain to keep it dry, and showered away. I had enough energy to brush my teeth and dry my hair before retreating to bed, feeling much better.

The rest of the day was basically a blur of napping and installing our new AT&T modem...of course, came home from surgery and our wireless cable/internet decided to die on us within a few hours of getting home (it all runs wirelessly off one modem). This has happened before, about 6 months ago, and one call to AT&T, some troubleshooting later and they sent out another modem overnight...so that occupied some time for me. And as before, in the meantime it finally started working again, so I at least had cable and internet for the night, but past experience with this has been if a modem goes out once, it will go out again in the near future, so I installed the new one when it got to me.

Received a lovely surprise, a gift basket from a nurse friend the west coast...lots of chocolate yum!! And other friends called and texted, throughout the day...it's good to be loved!!

My foot? Well I know there's an incision over the main bunion, another over the pinky bunion, both are stinging and sore, and if I wiggle those joints, they're sore... the arch of my foot feels bruised, likely as a result of the removal of that nerve tumor, and my broken hammertoe? Pretty much numb at this time, mainly because the nerve tumor involved the nerves of that toe....will the numbness go away? Possibly partly, as the body has ways to bypass things and get what needs to be done done, and some other nerves may pick up the job of innervating my 3rd and 4th toes, but for now, I'll take numb. The pain is not bad right now....trying to alternately stay ahead of it, but also, since the percocet tends to knock me out AND make me itch mildly, trying to stretch out the times between doses a bit.

By the end of the day, the pins and needles are gone, the pain is increasing, and I'm going to have to break down and take another percocet...the arch of my foot feels swollen, and that 4th toe? It's coming to life...yup, not totally numb.

Time for my antibiotic...very important to take all of the antibiotics prescribed. Infection can make a mess of things, and if you stop early, you can simply cause a bacteria to get resistant to the antibiotic, instead of completely wiping the bacteria out. This is how superbugs, bugs resistant to a lot of antibiotics, like MRSA, VRE, to come to be, and these are life-threatening. So take your antibiotics.

And move a lot....legs, feet, getting up the bathroom, whatever....keeps the blood circulating and prevents blood clots.

Oh, and don't think that those thick dressings around your feet make applying ice to the foot useless...they should give you an icepack that will tie around the foot. Keep it filled with ice and on there...the cool through all of those dressings feels good.

Sorry, once a nurse, always a nurse...using my experiences to help others. Or bore them to sleep, whichever.

Soon, Post Op Day 2. I wonder how long before I start climbing the walls?? Thankfully, I have lots of projects lined up for when the pain isn't that bad any more. And Mom's coming this weekend...just in time for Mother's Day!

Off to percocet lala land........

Fixing "Nurse's Feet" - Journal of a nurse going through bunion and hammertoe repair and removal of a neuroma of the foot foot.

Now for a departure from my previous NASCAR-related blogs. Something that has always cut into my enjoyment of attending a NASCAR race. Foot pain.

Passing the time, rain delay at Bristol Motor Speedway. Foot problems slow me down, but by the time I'm back here in August, I hope to be MUCH better.

My whole life I've had foot pain. Genetics gave me large feet with bunions, hammer toes, and 20 years as a nurse have exacerbated that pain. I had always been envious of people who could run in bare feet over gravel...I could barely even walk on it. About a year ago, I had noticed increased swelling in the ball of my foot, the second and third toe started "going their own way", separating when I walk, and throbbing/burning pain in the ball of my foot extending to my 3rd and fourth (hammer toe) toes. Enough so that after a long shift with lots of walking, aside from my bunion pain (which is much less than that pain, because at work I wear New Balance walking shoes with a thick, firmer, less flexible footbed than runners, and a good arch support, the Dr. Scholl's ones that you stand on the machine at Walmart and it tells you which insole is right for you. I will be getting orthotics soon, but I kept putting that off, as the arch supports I had worked fine for arch pain.

A little pre-op fun, horseback riding at Douglas Lake Stables: 

Surgery Day: Fixing what God messed up on. Well, what he has tested me with, that is.

Anyway, yesterday, I underwent an Austin Bunionectomy (fixing the bunion at the joint of my big toe), Tailor Bunionectomy (fixing the bunion that developed at the joint at the base of my pinky toe), straightening and pinning of the 4th toe (hammertoe, pin to be removed in a month...basically, he broke the toe, and reset it into a more natural angle, not the crooked, sideways toe I've had most of my life), and, if it is found to be the cause of the ball of the foot and toe pain I've been having, removal of the Morton's Neuroma that had been tentatively diagnosed (will be confirmed with surgery) in my right foot, by my podiatrist, Dr. Kendall Ritchey.

It had reached the point where I either had to bite the bullet and have surgery to fix the problems, or find another line of work.  Staff nurses, we spend the better part of our shift walking...up and down halls, in and out of patient rooms, to the cafeteria, etc.  In emergencies, we run. People who have never had foot pain, or who just get sore feet after a long day on their feet, can not comprehend, not really, the pain people like me, with bunions and hammertoes, live with every day. Foot pain as just part of life, until it starts to get to the point where you can't just live with it anymore...I had always walked harder on that foot; back in the day, as a teen, when I used to wear the cute little slip-on thin-soled shoes that were in style then, I wore through the sole of the ball of that foot quickest, walking with a twisting motion, so it didn't really surprise me that that foot started giving me more problems more quickly.

The problematic appendage:

Here is my journal about what my surgery and recovery. I hope by posting this, I can help others faced with foot surgery know a little bit of what to expect.

I had a pre-op testing appointment about 2 weeks prior to surgery, where they did an EKG, chest X-ray, routine lab work, just to make sure I was basically healthy. Anesthesia talked to me then, too.

I arrived at the hospital (MY hospital, where I work, of course!) at 6am, 2 hours prior to my scheduled surgery time, which is standard. They use that time to get my vital signs, start an IV (often tricky, as they don't let you eat or drink anything after midnight the night before, to prevent you vomiting while under general anesthesia and possibly inhaling it, leading to the risk of pneumonia...but this dehydration also makes veins collapse a bit, so it takes talent to start IVs on a dehydrated person), and get urine for a pregnancy test (as they do for all women within child-bearing years who have not had a hysterectomy, even if you use contraception. They don't want to take the risk of harming a baby with the medications they give during surgery).

My honey and I checked in at the Surgical waiting area desk, where they gave him info on the number to call to get an update on me (he planned to go to work after I went back for surgery, because it was that or wear out the waiting area carpet for the 4-6 hours I was expected to be there. Yes, this procedure is a same day procedure, I would go home later that afternoon) and got his contact information in order to be able to call him if needed. They will not give out information over the telephone to anyone who does not have that patient's PIN number, which the patient makes up and they record on the chart.

Like a restaurant, they gave us one of those little flashy disk-shaped pagers, and when it went off 5-10 minutes later, we turned it in and were escorted to a room by our nurse. Now, I'm horrible with names, so I won't likely remember them all, but I believe Wanda was our nurse, and she was great. She was a nurse at Parkwest for more than 30 years, so I knew I was in good hands, and she started my IV like the pro she was.

Of course, as anyone who has had surgery knows, even if it's just on a foot, they make you strip down to nothing and put on one of those gowns that flashes your backside to everyone you pass...unless you choose to wear it backwards, in which case the nurses will be talking about you for a long time to come. ;) But those gowns, for the most part, make it difficult to maintain your dignity. And I still don't know why I couldn't leave my undies on...they weren't operating ANYWHERE near there!!

Anyway, after the IV start, and verifying that I'm NOT pregnant (Thank GOD!! I'm 46, aside the risks of having a baby at that age, I don't want to be putting one through college and trying to retire at the same time!!), it was pretty much routine, answering all of  the same questions they asked 2 weeks prior, updating my home medications list, etc.

Part of the pleasure of having surgery where you work is that you see a lot of familiar faces. Dr. McIlrath came for anesthesia, then they rolled me back to the holding area (passing Dr. O'Kelley in the hallway; used to seeing me in the Birth center, not on a stretcher, rolling towards the OR, he did a bit of a double-take....). There Judy, a CRNA (Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist--I don't know her last name, she hasn't worked the birth center while I've been here) went through the plan with me. Dr. Baird checked in, the anesthesiologist assigned to my case, and told me he had to start another case, but Dr. Pittman would come do my Popliteal block (a injection of local anesthetic into the nerve behind the knee that affects the entire foot...I HIGHLY recommend having one of these!! No pain for the first 12-24 hours...me, I didn't need to take anything for pain until about 28 hours after surgery. The numbness was disconcerting, not being able to move any part of my foot, but it drastically improves comfort after surgery!!)

Judy chatted with me and gave me some Versed (a medication to relax me and with an amnesic quality if a certain amount is given, it is commonly give pre-op....you are still able to follow orders, but you're very relaxed, and given enough, you don't really remember anything) and Dr. Pittman did the nerve block...he propped my lower leg up high on about 4 folded up bath blankets to get my leg up to access the back of my knee from the side and negate the need to flip me on my tummy to inject the nerves (thankful for that...the broad view of my pasty white Canadian butt through aforementioned open-back gown if flipped over would make me blush forever when I see him at work!!).

He first injected some local anesthetic into the spot where he was going to put the needle for the injection of the nerve, which is deep behind the knee. Using an ultrasound machine placed behind my knee, he located the nerve bundle and advanced the needle from the side of my knee until he was able to inject the entire area...a nurse assisted in the injections, injecting more fluid as he commanded...it was amazing how much medication they injected, about 20 ml, but the Versed made me mildly curious, not freaked out at the thought of all of that fluid going into the back of my knee. Good stuff, Versed.

After 15-20 minutes my foot was completely numb, at which point Judy injected some more Versed into my IV, and we rolled down the hall towards the OR...and that was the last I remembered until I woke up in recovery. Oh, the nurse in me knows that we rolled into the OR, and I helped as much as possible move over to the OR table (I sort of remember that, because I remember Dr. Baird or someone male telling me to move my shoulders over a little bit more, to be centered on the OR table but that's it....Versed is a wonderful drug!!)

In the recovery room, I slowly woke up, and looked around....the nurse assessed me (that danged Blood Pressure cuff that goes off automatically and squeezes TIGHT....just relax your arm and let it do it's thing, it will keep squeezing until it does anyway) and gave me some ice chips and I dozed on and off. No nausea, no pain...the leg below the knee was numb. The foot was splinted, too keep it in a normal position, padded and wrapped securely with ace bandages that I had been warned by Dr. Ritchey (obviously used to nurses and their penchance for changing dressings) NOT to touch until I returned to see him in one week. Wow, one week, that's gonna be one funky smelling foot by then!! But o-kay......

I was moved back to a room in same day surgery, and had some crackers and liquids. Dr. Ritchey called Jeff to let him know everything went o-kay, but I didn't see Dr. Ritchey myself again until dressing removal day a week later.

When Jeff got off work to come pick me up, they took my IV out, and fitted me for my crutches. I had gotten my prescriptions ahead of time and gotten them filled already, and had bought a knee scooter, recommended by my podiatrist and another friend who had broken her foot and used one, so all we had to do was head for home. Her advice: Get one with a basket on it. It sounds silly, but she found it very handy. And I opted to buy, found one on Amazon.com for $175...the cheapest I found to rent was $75/month, and I will need it on and off over 3 months for sure...and if the results of this surgery are as I hope, I'll likely get my bunions on my left foot done in the next year or 2....so it's a worth-while investment, to me. Plus, it's tax deductible.

Other things to think of...things I tell my patients. Pain medications + decreased movement = constipation!! Get yourself some Colace (stool softener) and take it twice a day until you get moving around better. If you don't, beware. I've warned you. (unless you are one of the lucky souls who get diarrhea from your antibiotic...then probiotics and immodium!) Taking colace ahead of time will prevent the need for much straining, or laxatives.

They wheeled me out to the car. I went home and napped a bit, then later that night I watched TV. No pain....blocks are a wonderful thing. BUT I had trouble sleeping that night, because I had slept so much in the day AND the numbness actually became disconcerting enough that I couldn't get to sleep. Not to mention that I'm a night shift nurse, and after midnight is prime time for me!!

Sorry, timed out there...ironically, writing this at the end of post op day 1 (POD1); the nerve block has worn off, and I just found out that 1 Percocet 10 on a stomach that hasn't had that much more than yogurt and popcorn and a few snacks in it all day means nap time.....who knew?? My C-Section patients at work pop 2 Percocet 5s and continue on like they're Tylenol!! I'm a light-weight, I guess.

Is Sprint Responsible???

Shame shame, NASCAR and Sprint!! Didn't your Momma ever tell you not to tick off a nurse...she's the one who sticks things in you!!

Let me preface by saying I am a happy AT&T customer. I've been with AT&T through Cingular and back, from my first bag phone back in the 90s (most kids nowadays wouldn't know what those looked like!) when I moved to the States from Canada, to my current Blackberry Torch.

Nextel, Sprint, it didn't matter which cell phone giant sponsored the series I call my favorite sport, I was and am happy with my AT&T service. I cheered like a crazy person when Jeff Burton drove that orange 31 car out on pit lane at Richmond a few years back, AT&T logo blazing beautifully on the hood of the car. It had been a long battle for AT&T to win the right to finish out the contract with Richard Childress Racing that Cingular had started, but they did. At that time, that was like David landing a blow on Goliath. YAY for the (at that time) little guy!!

Those of you who have read my race weekend stories over the years know that I've attended a lot of races. And I've done so with my AT&T cell phone faithfully at my side, first with a Hawaii number, then a North Carolina number, followed by the Massachusetts number that has worked for me for a long time.

So I had no reason to be concerned by changing over to an AT&T Tennessee cell phone number when we chose to move to Tennessee this past year. In July, we both got new Tennessee numbers.

I had no worries about a cell phone in the same state as the race track working at the track.

Until I got to Bristol Motor Speedway last Saturday and was unable to upload a photo of the track to Facebook to let my friends know I'd made it.

Now I'm not one of those people with her Blackberry welded to her hand, constantly texting or Facebooking or Tweeting, freaking out because she couldn't get her phone to access the 'net...nope, at the race it is purely for communicating, and the occasional photo upload to Facebook for my friends who are not so lucky as to be attending the race. Most of the time, it's in my hip pocket, set on vibrate, in case a friend calls or texts.

And being a seasoned race goer, I am quite used to sluggish service at the track. Heck, 100 000 + people in close proximity to each other often simultaneously using their cell phones? Yeah, things are bound to be a bit slow...it's why I generally stick to texting at the track to get together with friends, etc.

Not this weekend. Nope. Something was different.

For both my boyfriend and I, from the moment we arrived at the track, our AT&T phones showed 5 bars, full service available...and we weren't able to get so much as a text out.

Now, the black helicopters in this area of race attendance have long hovered in the background of my subconscious, ever since Sprint took over primary sponsorship of NASCAR's premier series. Got a little louder as we watched Sprint push first Alltel, then finally AT&T out of the series, so as to be the exclusive cell phone provider for NASCAR.

And I resisted going to Sprint as a service provider, because I had no problem with AT&T's service; it's always been comparable to the other major providers in price and service. And I've lived on both coasts and in Hawaii with it and never had a problem.

But I attend a NASCAR race in the mountains of east Tennessee, 2 hours from my home base and the zip code my phone is based out of, a race I had attended several months previously and had no problems with my old AT&T cell number, other than the standard slowness....and I can't text my friends to arrange to meet up with them. Neither can my boyfriend, on the same plan. What gives???

AT&T is not perfect, but listening to my friends who have cell phone provider-hopped over the years, none of them really are....but if this is a problem with the service in East Tennessee, then I AM going to have a problem with them. Because I AM a regular NASCAR Sprint Cup race-goer, and intend to continue in this practice.

And if that problem is isolated to Bristol Motor Speedway, like it sure seemed when suddenly our phones both came to life with a flood of texts and voice mails when we left after the race and got a few miles away from the track, then BMS has a problem.

If it's a problem isolated to NASCAR Sprint Cup race weekends, then someone needs to deflate Sprint's ego, because they are NOT the be-all and end all of cell phone providers...if those black helicopters aren't just a figment of my imagination and Sprint is somehow directly responsible for blocking AT&T signals at that track, and possibly others, then shame on Sprint. And it should not be allowed.

Because a phone that works all across the country, on islands in the middle of the Pacific ocean, and in Canada without problem should NEVER just not work when there's no natural disaster going on. 5 bars means full service. Something is fishy.

Don't mess with me...I just might give you an enema. ;)

How much traffic should NASCAR fans have to endure

I've been lucky enough to attend many NASCAR races and I have put up with a lot when it comes to traffic. Nothing surprises me anymore. I routinely leave hours before most would just to avoid the traffic inbound to the track, and I don't expect to get rolling within an hour of the end of a race. If I'm there alone, and driving, and it becomes apparent Kyle Busch is about to win, and Carl Edwards is not nipping at his heels, I even leave the race before it's over to get a head start on traffic. Nothing personal, just don't like seeing the Shrub win over and over again enough to want to brave post-race traffic on my own.

Recently I have even taken advantage of a wonderful shuttle service from the Knoxville area up to Bristol Motor Speedway, courtesy of Rocky Top Tours....$30 round trip each day, and Bristol holds traffic one hour after the race to let all of the shuttles out; if you aren't on your shuttle within an hour of race end, you have either missed your shuttle home, or have a whole bunch of really annoyed co-riders (not to mention the shuttle driver) who are delayed in the race traffic because they missed that window when the shuttles are allowed to leave while the traffic is held for them. I live in fear of being this person. LOL

I have sat, engine off, unmoving, alone, for 2 hours in a parking lot at Dover Raceway where some unthinking soul didn't realize that several thousand cars trying to funnel out one parking lot exit all at once, rather than being split up through the residential neighborhoods around the track (heaven help the neighbors suffering some traffic, that comes with living next to a track, IMO!) would cause a serious back-up (or they just did not care), and I have tailgated after the race at Pocono to avoid the traffic. I've also been pleasantly surprised by tracks like Bristol, Charlotte and Richmond, as well as Phoenix, who seem to have the traffic patterns that other tracks need to aspire to.

And I am SO thankful that events conspired to keep me from attending the inaugural Cup race at Kentucky Speedway in Sparta, Kentucky.

I have NEVER left hours early for a race and MISSED it because of traffic, as reportedly many fans did, this past Saturday. That, to me, is the worst way of taking advantage of fans, and is inexcusable.

Here is one of my fellow loyal NASCAR-fan friend's first-person view of what it was like.

"Kentucky Report...

We sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic for 2.5 miles (from our campground 2.5 miles from the track)... trying to get INTO the track. It took us 3.5 hours plus another 15 mins to park infield and walk onto the track. We arrived for the race at Lap 199 [out of 267 laps total]. We only got in AT ALL because we went to TWO track entrances.

Understand... this was already NINE-THIRTY at NIGHT... and the race was almost over! We had been sitting still and creeping forward for HOURS... just trying to get to the track. The first one, the State Troopers waved us angrily by. Second entrance, first trooper was mean and said Go! We asked a second one... showed him our parking pass and he started talking to us. He started out kinda nice, explaining that no one understood the place was full. Then he got irritated and got an edge to his voice. I let him know we appreciated the Troopers' efforts and thanked him profusely for hanging in there, considering what they were dealing with. I kept telling him I couldn’t imagine how tough his job was with that mess. TRUE! He got nice again. He said, "I'm gonna let you in..." and he started to move the cones and tape. The other trooper got mad and tried to stop him, but he ignored him. We almost got out to kiss his feet. Ha.

I can understand if we drove up to that entrance and were bad-mouthing them... giving them a hard time. We were very kind and understanding to them. We had reserved parking infield. We showed him our pass on the window. The point is... all but one of the troopers were absolutely RUDE and MEAN and THREATENING. I was amazed. The problem was the general parking... not the infield. When the nice trooper let us in, we drove under the tunnel and there were about 50 open parking places, just in our lot. And they were refusing everyone entrance.

All I can say is that it was VERY sad in KY. We drove a long way to get there, and missed 200 laps because of the traffic. A young man we had hung out with the night before left the track a few hours before the race to get generator gas for their camper. They were camping INFIELD, while we were camping 2.5 miles from the track. HE CAME RIGHT BACK AND THE TROOPERS WOULD NOT LET HIM IN. He had the parking pass that said he was in TOW VEHICLE for the INFIELD CAMPER... and they told him NO. This was hours before race time. He had waited impatiently for a whole year for this race, and that is all he talked about the night before. He sat on the side of the road outside of the track until 1:30 AM! He never got to see a minute of the race. His whole family was inside and refused to use their tickets to go in without him. His Mom was really worried, as they had no idea why he didn't return.

There were cars streaming BACK toward us AWAY from the track about an hour before we made it all the way up there. Larry would roll down the window and ask, and they said they were turned away from the track and told there was no parking available. They were told it was at least 10 miles to the nearest places to park. People were stopping on the side of the road, asking drivers of other cars to take photos of them holding their tickets... then they would get on the interstate and go home. Can you imagine???

Sad!

-Angie S. H. Little"

It blows me away that NASCAR did not demand from SMI (the parent company of Kentucky Speedway) proof of the ability to do more than just seat more than 40 000 more fans in the stands, but get them into the track in the first place. Bruton Smith (chairman of SMI) can try all he wants to blame it on the 2-lane I-71 that feeds the Sparta, KY area track, but the fact is, as the Governor pointed out on his Sirius radio interview the Monday following this unfortunate incident, I-71 could be 6 lanes wide, but there would still be a huge traffic mess at the 2 exits expected to funnel all of those people into the track. At the track itself, they estimated it would require the parking of 3000 vehicles/hr AND a lot more parking spaces than the track already has. Which to me should have precluded them getting a race date UNTIL THEY GOT MORE PARKING AND A PLAN FOR A BETTER TRAFFIC PATTERN IN PLACE.

The impression I get is that NASCAR handed SMI this race date (after years of legal wrangling and saying "NO!"), and SMI put the stands in, and said "well, there are going to be some parking problems this year, but that means we can put pressure on the area municipalities to help build more access to the track, by creating a mess this first race weekend." I mean, this mess will be talked about for a long time, and many fans will NOT return, but by creating a mess, they can now pressure municipalities around the track, not to mention the state of Kentucky, to help pay for the improvements, rather than pay for it all themselves.

It may only be my impression, and I may be way off, but nothing related to the ability of NASCAR (hey, I love NASCAR, but that does not mean I'm naive about what they are generally about!) and it's affiliates to make much $$$ off us poor fans surprises me any more. And this would not surprise me, either, if my impression is correct.

My friend said it best. Sad.

A Dark and Stormy Night in Thunder Valley

Bristol Night race, 2010: Ponchos, (Driver) Pouting, and the Perfect National Anthem

Well, as many of you know, I have finally settled down (for the time being) in Knoxville, Tennessee, giving up my (not so) glamorous life as a travel nurse. I just decided 10 years was enough, and although I may travel again someday, I was soundly sick and tired of the moving involved.

Why Knoxville, you say? Well, aside from it being within a day’s drive of my family in Southern Ontario, and also my boyfriend in Iowa, I have several friends in the Deep South it will be nice to be close to.

Okay, the proximity to Bristol, Kentucky, Nashville, Charlotte, Martinsville, Richmond, Darlington, Atlanta, Talladega MAY have weighed in on my decision just a little bit.

So after my long summer vacation (during which I never DID get around to telling y’all my Infineon race day story! Sorry about that, but really, nothing very exciting happened. Good race, no sightings. Gateway was another story, but I just never got around to it, with all the vacation travel) and settling into my new home, I found I could afford a day in Bristol for the Cup race. 2 hours away??? You KNOW if it was at all possible, I was going to be there, come Hell or High Water (and believe me, the weather made the latter a distinct possibility!!).

The main problem I foresaw? NIGHT RACE. Probably over around Midnight. That 2 + hour drive back in race traffic (which means likely more like 4 hours) meant I’d be fighting sleepiness in race traffic alone. I’ve done this in the past…it’s just not fun. You end up doing a lot of talking to yourself to stay awake, and road rage may surface.

Jackpot!! I love Google!! I started my search of companies transporting fans up to the track from Knoxville. I mean, I have heard of many who stay in Knoxville and drive up, it’s one of the closest major cities near Bristol, and I had seen travel packages that offer this, so surely there would be a bus for locals going up.

It took me a couple of days playing with the wording of my search, (between shifts in the Baby Factory). This technique, changing the wording to fine-tune my search, is my specialty for finding deals on-line, and it didn’t fail me this time, either: Rocky Top Tours, leaving out of Pigeon Forge (near Dollywood) and stopping to pick more up in Sevierville (Dolly’s home town) before heading to the track, $30 round-trip. If I drove, gas alone would cost more than that!!

So I met up with a couple of dozen other sodden race fans (Knoxville’s weather was NOT promising!!) at the Sevierville Welcome Center, on a wet, wet, wet Saturday morning. No matter….I had packed in my trusty bottomless shoulder bag, with my scanner, camera, cushion and other necessary stuff (even sunscreen…the eternal optimist, that’s me!), my lucky rain slicker, a freebie about 5 years ago from RIR. Why is it lucky? Whenever I carry it with me to a race, it doesn’t rain!! That meant we’d leave the rain behind in Knoxville….

Sure. We DID drive out of the rain and arrive in an overcast, but dry, Bristol, TN, around 2pm. So far so good.

Stepping off the bus, it immediately started to spit. Uh oh!

Not to be deterred, as it got heavier and heavier (to the tune of the hawkers selling programs in plastic sleeves “Guaranteed to stay dry!” and t-shirts “Get your dry t-shirt!” LOL), I plunked my trusty Canada bucket hat on my head to keep my hair as dry as possible, and opened my bottomless bag to dig out the poncho, as it was going to be needed.

Only problem?? No poncho. Brain fart! When I first packed the bag for the track, I had thought about carrying my little cooler with some cold drinks, thinking it would likely be hot, and changed my mind about the cooler when I saw the forecast…and packed the slicker in the side pocket of that cooler. BLAME THE RAIN ON ME!!!

Best laid plans.

By the time I retraced my steps to the bus and got my umbrella (which I knew I’d have to forfeit at the gate…no umbrellas allowed into the stands…but it was old and starting to fall apart, so no biggie, and the rain WAS getting heavier and heavier) I was pretty wet, but as I returned to the track, I soon realized even THAT wasn’t going to be enough.

A flash of Sprint yellow in the corner of my eye showed a trailer selling yellow and clear slickers hand over fist, so I trotted over and got myself one. $5, not bad, and now, although steaming up with the greenhouse effect of the poncho over wet clothes, at least I wasn’t getting any more wet. I had my trusty waterproofed Dr. Marten’s on my feet, so they were nice and dry, having seen me through wetter and colder weather before.

But I now have a new wish….galoshes. I saw so many cute pairs of galoshes (we called them “rubbers” growing up, but that has a whole new definition as an adult, at least in America! LOL) at the track, I decided then and there I wanted some! Too late for this day, though.

Heading into the track, I knew right where I wanted to be….by the entrance to the track, where the pedestrian tunnel was, to watch the comings and goings of drivers etc. as they did their sponsor pre-race dances. Sure, this was clear around the other side from where my seat was, but I’d head over there later….

Dodging puddles, and indeed, giving up my trusty old umbrella at the gate, I gained the RELATIVE dryness of the area under the grandstand…well, if you didn’t count the waterfalls coming THROUGH the stands in spots! LOL

Making my way down to the track entrance, I started shedding the poncho as the dry spots got bigger, and my wind breaker, because although the rain was keeping it relatively cool, by Bristol standards, NOW I was starting to sweat!

Claiming a spot, I enjoyed the comings and goings. When the rain finally stopped, I headed up into the stands to get some pics, but always came back to my spot….I talked to a lovely young man who was one of many in red t-shirts hanging out in that area. No, they weren’t Kasey Kahne fans, they were National Guard, there to help with security…with all the rain there were few in the stands to patrol so they were in a holding pattern, but later, they were the ones who would be responsible for making sure fans didn’t scale the fences….in light of the guy we saw hanging like a monkey on the fence at Gateway in July when Carl won the race, I’d say they could have their hands full, and wished him good luck with that.

As the day wore on and drivers’ meeting time approached, the number of drivers, owners, etc, coming into the track increased, and I had a great time snapping photos.

When Jack Roush came through, all the fans there called out variations on “Welcome back, Jack!” to him as he walked by. He even paused long enough to make one young fan's day, with an autograph and a photo..

When Randy Fuller (Carl Edwards’ PR rep) walked out of the track alone, I called hello to him and wished him a good race. He said something back that I didn’t hear because of the ambient noise of all those people around, pointed over to the side of the walk-through area opposite from where I was, where some in Carl Edwards gear had gathered, and gave me a thumbs up, then headed on….it didn’t take me long to figure out he was letting me know Carl would be stopping with those fans, and to hang around if I wanted some pics. But then, you know I wasn’t leaving the one area all drivers have to go through to get into the track without seeing Carl, so I had no plans to move from that spot until he headed into the track.

Other than the tall guy who insisted on being in the way of some of the photos I took, I wasn’t disappointed…Carl hung out with those fans, doing a Q&A, for a quite a while before heading in to the drivers’ meeting. As he went by I and the other fans called out our well-wishes.

Matt Kenseth and Jeff Burton were busy little bees, going back and forth to sponsor engagements throughout the time I was there, and even Junior Johnson went through to the pedestrian tunnel.

The previous nights’ Nationwide combatants came through not very far apart, which I found amusing…you’d think Brad and Kyle would stay as far apart as possible after all that.

After seeing Carl, I headed out for the trek around the track to my seat, going down by the start/finish line and right along the frontstretch for some photos, then made the climb up into the stands….as I was sitting in Pearson Terrace, WAYYY up, I took the first elevator I came to to get up there….Had I climbed, my out-of-shape butt likely wouldn’t have made it!! LOL

Finding a perch closer to the Start/finish line than my seat, with a better angle for shots of the trucks carrying drivers around the track, I waited.

I still say the highlight of the whole night was Brad Keslowski calling Kyle Busch an Ass while introducing himself during driver intros. THAT had the fans making so much noise, had there been a roof over that track, it would have been lifted off! I myself, no fan of EITHER driver, but aware of the fact that Kyle had dumped Brad the night before to win the Nationwide race, almost fell out of my chair laughing….And by some miracle, although I don’t know why I turned on the video when Brad was introduced, it was on…and I caught Brad’s opinion for my permanent collection.

Too too funny!!

A few intros later, I believe it was AJ Almandinger who said in his intro something to the effect of he just hoped he didn’t end up between Brad and Kyle. LOL

As many of you know, the drivers pick a song to play before they are introduced. Many I didn’t even recognize, because IMO, the track PA system didn’t play the song clips loud enough, so unless it was something immediately recognizable to me, like Mark Martin’s choice of Aerosmith’s “Walk this Way” and Carl’s “Why Can’t We be Friends?” (IMO, a little poke at his own troubled past with Brad! Also funny, considering how many friendships have been tested over the years by that little bullring, Bristol Motor Speedway), I missed it. Some just made me LOL (Todd Bodine’s choice was particularly amusing: the theme from “The Three Stooges”…considering his past in Cup series, when I use to refer to Todd wrecking someone as that someone getting “Bodined” that was particularly apt), and others made me scratch my head (Really, Jamie Mac? A country song??? Maybe because I don’t follow him enough to know what he prefers, I just never pegged him for a country music guy…but then again, who knew Mark Martin loves rap? LOL).

As race time approached, it was WONDERFUL to hear the kids singing the National Anthem, LIKE IT SHOULD BE, with no ad-libs or horrible tweaks as we have heard so often recently. Sadly, although if the rain came again I was going to stay good and dry, my seat was up under the suits in turn 1, and I could only hear the flyover. Also up there, if you’re not lucky, one of the support pillars will block part of your view of the track. So despite what I’ve always been told, there IS a bad seat at Bristol, depending on what you want to see.

The only highlight of the race for me was Jimmie Johnson getting wrecked. (ABJJ!! Or KB. Or BK. LOL). This wreck happened just after Carl’s pit crew missed a couple of lugnuts on one tire during the round of pit stops a few laps prior, causing him to have to come back in and go from running right were JJ was to back in the pack. On the plus side, as Bob relayed to Carl, the missing lugnuts and lost spots might have been a blessing in disguise, as if they hadn’t ended up back in the pack, it COULD have been them being wrecked by Montoya.

Hey, glass half full, why not?? At that point, they still had half the race to go, and a fast car, plenty of time to get back up to the front, right???

Unfortunately, the race settled into what you rarely see in a Nationwide or Truck race at Bristol, but which does occasionally happen during a Cup race since the track was resurfaced: a long green-flag run.

Now Carl qualified on the outside pole, his team selected the lead pit stall on the backstretch, one of the 2 best pit stalls at this track as in that stall: like the one on the frontstretch, there is no-one pitted in front of you…you just drive straight out, don’t have to worry about getting around another car in a pit stall in front of you.

I’m not 100% sure, but I think Carl wasn’t sure at what point during a green flag pit stop, when they enter the end of the pit lane their pit stall is on, and exit at the exit, instead of going all the way around both pit lanes like when they pit under caution, he could floor it after leaving his pit stall, while still on the flat. Bob told him they’d talk about it after the race on the radio, but I think Carl was supposed to just immediately start coming up to speed as soon as he left his pit stall, before merging into traffic in turn 4, and Carl said he waited until closer to turn 4 to really floor it….that caused him to end up back in the pack, and he almost immediately lost a lap.

Fortunately a caution FINALLY occurred, just in time for him to get the Lucky Dog pass. Sadly, though, another long green flag run spread out the pack, and Carl just didn’t have enough time to get up to the front.

The good news? Carl is now up to 4^th in points…Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart both having a bad night allowed his 13^th place finish to be enough to move up, so in the end, it was a good result from a fair night for the 99 team.

As the laps wound down, not wanting to fight through crowds down all those stairs, I worked my way to the ground level. Watching the last few laps from near the S/F line, I knew once again I was going to witness Kyle Busch winning. And THIS time, he’d finally get the Trifecta, winning all 3 races at a track in one weekend.

Nope, I was NOT going to watch that, it wasn’t worth fighting so much foot traffic out of the track, so I headed out to the bus, listening to the last couple of laps on the radio. Might as well get a head start on napping before they let the busses out of the lot an hour after the race finishes.

But all in all, getting rained on, Kyle Busch winning again, Carl having some bad luck and not ending up being in contention even though he had a car good enough to do so, I still say (as many many others do) Bristol Motor Speedway is one of the best tracks to be a fan at on the circuit!!! A bad day at Bristol beats a good day at a lot of other tracks any day!

Next time I’m sitting in the DW grandstand; I’m determined to find that set of seats perfect enough for me to consider buying season passes. I mean, come on, if I’m going to live this close for a few years, you KNOW I’ll be there!