surgery's suck...

blindeyed · #1 01-22-2007, 02:26 AM

Well guys.. I haven't been here for a while, and I'm bored. So I figured I'd give ya'll an update on what's been happening. Early last December, my hard drive felt like crashing on me. So I was off the computer for a while until I finally reloaded windows onto a spare hard drive I had layin around. Then, late December I had to have surgery on my right ear. I apparently had a condition called "Cholesteatoma" (cho·les·te·a·to·ma). That link can describe it better than I can. But the run down was that the doctor had to cut into my ear, widen my ear canal, and get a mass of tissue out from behind my ear drum. The mass of tissue had apparently been eating away parts inside my ear and the bones surrounding it. The doc said once he pulled out that tissue mass, he could see straight to my brain, that the tissue had eaten all the bones down to my brain. Luckily he caught it too because if he hadn't caught it then I could have gotten "meningitis" (men·in·gi·tis).

Took about 2 weeks to somewhat recover after the surgery. I pretty much laid in bed the entire time, I was too disoriented and dizzy to walk straight. Not that I encourage this lol, but if you've ever been really high or severely drunk... then you could imagine what I was feeling like for about 2 weeks. I'm still a little light headed, but the doc says it's entirely normal for the type of surgery I had and he said it typically takes around 6 weeks to recover. But I couldn't wait that long, so I started riding my bike around the neighborhood, walked around alot more, mowed the lawn.. just stuff to get me on my feet to help stimulate activity ya know. It's actually helped alot. It's been about 3 1/2 weeks now and I've been driving and working for a little more than a week now. So.. there ya go. It's been hell, but as a wise man once told me, you gotta take the good with the bad.

goldz28 · #2 01-22-2007, 03:03 AM

Thats crazy. meningitis is not a fun thing. I work with someone that gets it all the time. Your lucky that the cholesteatoma did not cause brain cancer or something like that.
Good luck with the rest of your recovery.

blindeyed · #3 01-22-2007, 03:20 AM

Heh, yeah the doctor said that the mass of tissue was the size of a golf ball (I'm still waiting to see pictures from him). He thinks I was probably born with it due to it being so large.

goldz28 · #4 01-22-2007, 04:41 AM

Thats amazing. How did you find out you had it? I am surprised with it being that big that you did not have some killer earaches.

blindeyed · #5 01-22-2007, 06:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by goldz28

Thats amazing. How did you find out you had it? I am surprised with it being that big that you did not have some killer earaches.

Thats the same thing the doctor said.. It's weird, I never had any pains in it at all. I do know that the past 5 or so years everytime I would get an ear infection (which I think I'm on the 4th infection now in my right ear) the doctor would give me some antibiotics and it would go away. But at some point, it got weird, like if If I just kind of moved my ear up and down with my finger, the eyesight would move up and down with it. The doctors all thought I was just being weird and told me to go see an eye doctor. But earlier this year my ear started clotting up real bad to where I would have to wiggle it around to hear out of it and eventually it started draining this nasty puss that smells like crap. Thats when I finally got a doctor who knew what he was doing, and I went and got a ct scan done and thats when he saw how bad the damage was. He also explained to me that when I moved my ear up and down, the reason why it was affecting my eyesight was because it was moving the mass of tissue as well which was affecting my equilibrium. So.. it's been interesting.

goldz28 · #6 01-22-2007, 06:15 AM

I am just glad they cought it. That would be a weird feeling. When you get pics try to get them posted or pm them to me. I am doing Anatomy and Physiology in college now and it would be kinda cool.
Did they do this to you?

blindeyed · #7 01-22-2007, 01:02 PM

That would be exactly what they did. I still got the staples in the back of my ear.

stepho · #8 01-22-2007, 01:51 PM

Did you ask him to take pictures of your brain? I think that would be pretty awesome to see your own brain.

Glad to hear they caught it in time, before it caused any brain damage.

Get well soon!

wrightz28 · #9 01-22-2007, 03:17 PM

Damn, that really pisses me off when doctors thik you're full of it. I had a piece of feberglass, which I knew it was fiberglass jambed in my eyelid, but for almost 7 months because they said it was a cyst or stye and that I needed to "practice better hygene". Finally after requesting a Dr. With out saying anything or him haveing access to my records, within minutes he saiid it looks like something impacted in the tissue and asked what I do that may expose me to small particles.

FormulaLT1 · #10 01-22-2007, 05:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wrightz28

Damn, that really pisses me off when doctors thik you're full of it. I had a piece of feberglass, which I knew it was fiberglass jambed in my eyelid, but for almost 7 months because they said it was a cyst or stye and that I needed to "practice better hygene". Finally after requesting a Dr. With out saying anything or him haveing access to my records, within minutes he saiid it looks like something impacted in the tissue and asked what I do that may expose me to small particles.

They probably only said that cause you smell

. Anyway, I am very glad they caught it in time Blind and that you are most likely not going to have any lasting after effects (being blind and deaf would suck

, lame. I know).

blindeyed · #11 01-22-2007, 07:15 PM

Yeah, here's a pic of my ear after the surgery. Had a ton of staples, got all but 5 left in right now. Those things hurt like hell when they get pulled out.

http://www.blindeyed.com/IMG_0138.JPG

FormulaLT1 · #12 01-22-2007, 07:37 PM

No offense but man that is friggin gross as hell. At least its in a spot that isn't easily noticable incase it scars.

goldz28 · #13 01-22-2007, 07:43 PM

Get a damn hair cut...lol jk

97cavalier · #14 01-22-2007, 10:38 PM

wow that is gross. Can you hear out of that ear the same? And that is ALOT of staples.

blindeyed · #15 01-23-2007, 01:34 AM

Well I was actually kind of glad that I was already growin my hair out. It helps to hide the staples alot. So I kind of got lucky there since its not so noticeable. As for the hearing.. It was horrible at first, where I was completely deaf in it. But it's slowly getting better over time. Every now and then I get a speaker and put it up to it and see how well I can hear. The thing that drives me crazy is that it always rings.. just a never ending "eeeeee" sound.

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