The wound care nurse finally came today!  I was sooo happy to see her!  No one had told her Frances was away or she would have tried to come sooner.  Unfortunately she confirmed my thoughts about my wound and worse.  My wound is 5 x 6.5 cm, up from 5 x 6cm on July 20 and is no longer diamond shaped, she says it's grown at the top of the diamond.  Plus the area which she was burning off that she called a polyp, is now and open wound and she had to put a dressing in it .  I told her all the problems I'd had, and how fed up I was, and that I was concerned I would have to cancel yet another trip to Ottawa November 16 and was even scared to book my trip to Vegas for my 40th birthday in February.  She has finally said more about how long this might take to heal, after refusing to speculate for months.  She does not expect to to heal by the end of November with the wound vac and has indicated if I am taken off wound vac, I'll need to switch to daily dressing changes.  She also spoke the words I was scared to put in my blog yesterday, but had planned to ask my surgeon about,skin graft.  She has written a letter to my surgeon saying the wound isn't healing and I'm fed up and asking her to consider a skin graft.  I was both happy and sad/scared when she said it.  I think it's better the suggestion come from her rather than me, as Dr McLeod shot down anything other than wound vac when I was in hospital.  I was concerned she'd pull another glmpse and run out of the room without reading the letter, so I called her office and asked them if I could fax the letter and ask that she read it and have options/answers for me on Wednesday.  I also called the wound care nurse and explained it all to her.  I will NOT leave without answers on Wednesday, even if it means I have to ask for a referral to a plastic surgeon, or if I have to finally say I'm going to get a second opinion. 

I've been thinking about pursuing a skin graft for the last month, one of the nurses asked me if they'd mentioned it.  I need to know the pros and cons and what is involved, the risks and how long I would be off work.  The last thing I want is to be off work again, but I can't take much more of this.  The wound vac went ballistic at work.  I spent several hours trying to get a hold of the nurse to meet me back at my apt before I finally found the problem myself....the tubing came out of the part that fastens to my wound, a part that isn't supposed to come out!  I fixed it, but it happened again tonight.  When I figured it out I cancelled the nurse tonight as I didn't want an unfamilar nurse coming in.  I've asked they have Carol call me in the morning instead, just in case.

I talked to my boss for a bit today about it as I was kind of shaken up by the idea this might actually be something that's going to happen.  I told him about my concerns about work and stuff too, but he reassured me it was fine and that I was getting my work accomplished so I shouldn't put so much pressure on myself.  This afternoon was so hard though, the noise of the machine was disturbing to people around me and I was totally stressed out.  I kept working on my presentation, but didn't get quite as far as I'd hoped today.  I finally decided to go home and my cubicle mate Ike gave me a ride part of the way and I went out for a bit.  Again it ended badly, with the tubing coming apart again and a cab ride home that I didn't have enough cash for and hence had to pay a $10 credit card charge for a $6.75 fare.  Oh well.

I have a couple of meetings tomorrow, hoping for a good night's sleep without and wound vac problems.  I had planned to write something about the Ontario election today instead of just a wound vac update, but this was more important.

Please pray that my surgeon reads the letter and comes up with some options for me on Wednesday.  I can't take much more of this stupid machine, but I need to make sure any other solution such as a skin graph, is not exchanging one problem for another.  I have a feeling I'll have a lot of decisions to make this week, and I want to ensure that it's the right decision.