One Less Bone to Worry About

 

 Last week Jo finally decided it was time to decrease the pain she has been experiencing in her hands.  Over the last few years she has had increasing problems with the joint at the base of her thumb leading her to have to modify everything from how she holds a pen to opening jars.  So last Monday she went under the knife again - yes it is becoming a yearly event - to have Resection Arthroplasty of the Thumb.  That's the technical term (I think), what it consists of is removing a bone near the base of the thumb (the CMC joint) and filling the space with a tendon from her wrist (turns out many people, but not all, have a spare tendon in their wrist - if you are curious I now know how to tell).  She came through the surgery fine and spent the week with her wrist elevated and in a really large splint/bandage.  The pain was pretty intense for the first two days but after that it leveled off to something she could manage without any painkillers.  The hardest thing was she needs to keep the hand elevated all day and night.  She is getting tired of sleeping only on her right side.  But, she gets a more permanent cast later this week, which I'm hoping to be able to sign with something witty, which we're hoping provides her a few more options for using her left arm/hand.

With Jo laid up on the couch most of the week, we didn't do too much else.  But we did manage to take in a UW-Milwaukee women's volleyball game on Saturday in which they played UW-Green Bay (in case you are curious, there are 26 UW campuses).  It was fun watching some good volleyball and most importantly it was good to get Jo out for a few hours.  Although, clapping is really hard when you only have one hand.  She has definitely hit the point where she really wants to move her thumb even just a little bit.  But as you can see, they immobilized it really well.  Next up sometime next year is the right hand.  Which will be really interesting as my right handed wife has to do everything with the wrong hand.  Can't wait to go through this all again - but it does continue her streak of yearly surgeries.  We are welcoming ideas for the 2017 operation.

By the way, the first picture is not Jo trying to reenact scenes from the Virgin Mary's life, the post-op area was really cold and the nurse was trying to keep her warm.