dyfunctional families, fluffy kitties, narcotics and Christmas

Rather than regale you of stories about how I didn't know I could feel this much pain, how about I talk about fluffy kitties, or my grandmother's impending visit?
Wait--narcotic time...
Okay, no wonder my throat felt so awful, it was time for my drugs.  While I am sipping my narcotic cocktail I shall continue to update.

Basically, my recovery can be summerized as 'ouch, ouch, ouch' and 'don't these drugs come in a stronger dose!?'  The first couple of days weren't too bad, but it went downhill from there, ironically at about the same time that my husband stopped giving me the full dosage of my pain meds.  We weren't sure that we wouldn't run out before we could get more, and didn't want to max the dose out.  My ears have been hurting pretty badly from the weird traveling pain. Who knew that your ears, sinuses, tonsils and teeth were all at the same level and could ALL hurt at the same time!

I think that I am starting to lose the scabs. I am going to let this process happen however it wants, and do nothing to facilitate it! I was reading about people eating toast to make the scabs come off, and I wanted to smack them.  Seriously, people?  Isn't that FIRST thing the surgeon told us NOT to do? It is this interesting burning sort of pain that goes from a 3-4 to 9 when I swallow. That is just swallowing spit, now if I try to EAT anything it is off the charts.  I made myself eat pasta last night, and my stomach was ok with it, but I paid for it with a lot of pain. Even my jaw hurt.

One of the interesting side effects of these drugs are weird dreams that just don't stop, that I remember.  I also had an Andy Warhol moment where I could see our black cat changing colors. He made a vibrant blue, and a rather pretty pink.  It was odd. Kids--stay off the drugs!

Now on to life that isn't painful. Omg my cat is so adorable! This isn't a shocker for anyone that knows my kitten, that he is the cutest thing on God's green earth, but he has really outshone himself during my sickness.  He comes up and lays with me for hours, even letting me pet him while he's sleeping, or he'll actually sleep on me.  He usually doesn't want to do anything that can involve someone moving while he is sleeping.  He gets into the tub and gets soaking wet too, so all of the sudden I have a very happy, wet, purring cat rubbing all over me. hilarious.

Moving on...my grandmother is coming to visit.  She's driving down here from where she's visiting in-laws in Pennsylvania.  My gma and mother have a strained (to say the least) relationship, and I've always felt stuck in the middle.  My gma may have not been a good mom, but when she had to step up and take care of us when my mom couldn't, she didn't do a bad job. We were loved, fed, and raised around our other cousins.  Perhaps this is why I have such a love of communal living now, since I was raised with my cousins and always felt like some part of me was taken away when we moved away from them.This said, I disagree with a lot of things that she's done, but I would like her to be a part of my life, and a part of the lives of our future kids.  A totally respects how my mom feels, b/c he feels the same about my mom, but I would at least like for him to meet her.

This will be the first 'grandparent' that he will have met actually. He hasn't met much of my extended family at all. Wait, I don't think he has met ANY of my extended family at all.  We had a rather whirlwind relationship, and marriage, moving, jobs and moving again have kept him from being able to travel with me up north to visit.  Hopefully now that we are in a more central location I can get him to visit with me more often. I quite enjoy the company of much of my family, and would like to show off my fabulous husband.

I'm not stressed about gma visiting, but I am annoyed that I am still too ill to clean and organize my house better, and since we just moved into, much of it is still in boxes.  I started making to-do lists last night while in bed.  Thinking about what needs to be done however is a lot easier than getting up and doing it, especially when post-operative pain, strict rules against 'working' and narcotics are in effect.  For the record--I bring up the narcotics because even when I had surgery or injury in the past I never took them for more than 48 hrs. I hated how they made me feel loopy, tired and grouchy.  This time I haven't had any other choice since even with them the pain can be almost unbearable.  You literally are just waiting it out.

How was your Christmas? Did you share it with fluffy kitties, dysfunctional families, or narcotics? Please share!