Clever Bird is amazed at just how clever the human body is. Baggy Body has an incision in her stomach that is a vertical cut from an inch into her pubic hair line to just beneath her belly-button. Not surprisingly, it's still incredibly tender. So tender, that until yesterday she'd only been able to sleep on her back, not on her side as she normally would and still she can only be on her side briefly. Usually, like most people, Baggy goes to sleep in one position and will wake up in a different one entirely. But when she's "damaged" she goes to sleep in one position and wakes up having not moved at all. After accidents or surgery she's always very impressed by how the brain, even when asleep, knows how to "protect" the damaged body. So wouldn't you think that Clever Bird would choose to put Baggy to sleep in a sensible, comfortable position? Why would she lie on her back with her left leg stretched straight out and her right leg bent at the knee with her foot on her left knee? Not comfortably with that knee raised in the air. Oh no! Uncomfortably, with her leg flat on the bed, stretching her pelvis out like a frog pinned to a biological specimen board. So that when Baggy woke up a couple of hours later, she had absolutely no feeling in her inner thigh and couldn't actually move her leg at all, other than by using her hands to do it (squashing the body-piercings in the wound in the process). STUPID.
Having achieved some blood flow back to her right leg a minute or two later, Baggy was just about able to walk. But she was now desperate to expel wind. With her new "let it go" philosophy, she headed off across the bedroom, farting like a trooper, only to suddenly realise that the laxatives were now working rather too well! For decorum's sake, Clever Bird feels that at this juncture Creative Clara should now omit to go into the full gruesome details of what happened next. But let's be clear about this, there are times in Baggy's life when it really is important to pay some amount of attention to Freda Fretter's concerns. And for the sake of honest transparency, let's just say that negotiating steep stairs catching poo-splats in your hand as you go, is kind of disgusting. Some while later, cleaned up and back in bed once more, Baggy once again fell asleep. Clever Bird had once again put her into the "specimen frog" position. Baggy once again woke up with a dead leg and a desperate need to get to the bathroom. STUPID. STUPID. STUPID Clever Bird.
Eventually, back in bed, Freda Fretter really started bending Baggy's ear. So much so that Baggy started having massive palpitations with her heart racing and jumping. Although she has suffered such episodes on and off for as many years as she can remember, this was a particularly bad one. Usually Clever Bird can get Baggy's heart to calm down by doing deep breathing techniques, but tonight this just would not work. As Clever Bird pointed out, Freda Fretter was making it much worse by concentrating on it. "Well yes", says Freda, "that's fair enough really, now we know that it could actually result in causing Baggy to have a heart attack". Not helpful. The simple fact is that if Baggy had been wearing the 24-hour ECG, her heart was pounding so hard, it would probably have pinged the little sticky-pad thingys off her chest! An hour later she was still awake with her heart doing weird jumps (maybe she is a frog).
When she was taking Baggy's medications this morning Clever Bird decided that maybe Freda did have a point, so she omitted to take her morning dose of laxative. Whether this will turn out to be a clever or stupid decision remains to be seen.
Creative Clara decided to distract Freda by checking on Baggy's maiden blog. Last night Clara had spent two hours typing the blog that she intended to post today. Clever Bird had made sure that she saved it regularly. Clearly she'd done something wrong though because this morning when Clara checked, the draft had vanished! Ah well. Start again. A few hours to take Freda's mind off things and Baggy's mind off the pain. In the meantime Clever Bird discovered the "statistics" button on the blog site. Wow! Baggy's gone international. Okay she's only had forty-odd page viewings, but one was from the USA and 16 were from Ireland - really, why? Clara was chuffed. It was encouragement enough for her to re-type yesterday's efforts and post them (thank goodness for Clever Bird's plan to get Clara to write everything in her notebook first, two days ahead of herself and post retrospectively!). In re-doing it she realised the error of her ways and how to save her draft for next time. Phew.
Baggy's confidence and well-being were boosted yet further as the day wore on. First some "Get Well" cards arrived from family, friends and neighbours. Then a neighbour popped round with a card, gifts and fresh home-baked bread for a chat, just as a beautiful bouquet of flowers arrived. After much searching for the gift card, they turned out to be from Baggy's Slimming World group. A new bunch of people she'd got to know in the previous few months on a weight-loss journey. A group she considers to be friends and supporters and whom she'd told all about Lawrence, even before she told her own family. She was so touched by their kindness that she burst into tears. Yes, emotions are rife.
But if there's one thing that Clever Bird has realised whilst going through all of this, it is that the more support one has, the better. Hence Clara deciding to write all of this down in a blog. If one person who has to go through a similar operation to Baggy Body gets a little bit of extra support from hearing about Baggy's experiences, she would feel very chuffed........
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