Hand Update

So, it's been more than a while since our last post. Sorry about that. I had my finger amputated on Nov 19th, we went down to San Luis Obispo for Thanksgiving, got home and packed for Hawaii, got my stitches removed the day before we left (Kim's birthday), and spent ten days in Hawaii. Whew!

It was really close timing with the surgery, because the stitches had to wait ten days afterwards for removal. The doctor released me to do anything I felt like, which is great since we planned on kayaking over to Captain Cook's monument. They gave me little plastic torture devices to strap on to get my fingers to bend again after being pinned for two months. The doctor said I might need another surgery to release my index finger's tendon, but I'm going to see if I can do it manually. Yes, that will hurt. The stump/nubbin/whatever has healed nicely. It's extremely sensitive on the scar, but I'm using the hand as much as possible and even wearing ong sleeeved jackets again. It's been difficult to get my boo-boo all the way down the sleeve with the scabs stickiing out.

Anyhoo, here's some pics. Snorkeling in Hawaii was great for sloughing off the scabs. My physical therapist was elated with the progress I made over the vacation, so to celebrate, she made me another set of torture devices. How's that for reinforcement?

My thumb was pretty well trashed by the saw blade, in fact there's a scar where the blade zipped across the pad. Half of the pad is numb scar tissue, and the other half is hypersensitive. I'm babying the thumbnail so it'll stay on as long as possible, but when wet, it gets a little flippy.

I gave Kim's mom the little middle finger (aka LMF) the other day, which made everybody laugh. I hope I'll be getting back into the shop and participating in sailing soon. I'm not looking forward to modifying my sailing gloves.

Thanks again for all the calls, e-mails, gifts, and well-wishes. It's really meant a lot to me. BTW, I'm typing this with two hands. I just keep stumbling over C, D, & E for some reason. Things are slowly, incrementally returning to normal. I even cut my meat witha knife and fork the other night!