MaitK’s AchillesBlog

Seventh of september, year 2014, sunday. Last night (saturday) I had been on a party that was called “Sin City” and main performer was London Electricity, it was season opening party. Had really good time, danced all night and arrived home pretty late (about eight o clock), sleeped few good hours and went to football practice.

I injured myself during football practice. I have played years for my own amusement and so there was quite good sunday afternoon and I went to parctice (I usually go 2-3 times a week), we have been playing for about 30 minutes or so and me and my teammate had progressed towards enemy goal. I was moving backwards, back towards enemy goal and mate passed me ball. So I started to move towards ball (this time onwards) and felt massive pain in my left ankle. Ofcourse I was on my knees and screamed like a little girl (I am male and 29 years old) looked quickly behind me and no-one was directly behind, closest guy was about 1,5m far. I didn’t have a clue what the hell was going on. Mates helped me off the field and  after i sprayed my leg with cold spray and it didn’t have effect I limped to my car and drove to nearest hospital. My car has manual gearbox, 3 pedals and had one good leg. That was my first challenge.

There were 11km dividing me from hospitals emergency aid reception and way there went through town. Luckily it’s very small town (population ~15 000) and only two intersections with traffic lights and very little traffic so this wasn’t really a problem. It was more difficult to manage those 3 pedals with only one foot at the same time holding other one in the air and paying attention to road. Luckily i have diesel engine car, so dead start isn’t difficult with it, it’s like tractor, hard to die off the engine. I arrived at the hospital and was fortunate to find parking space near main door. Got my car parked somehow I started to jump there on one leg. Was difficult but not the first time in my life. Distance to cover wasn’t too long too, maybe 100 meters or so. When I got to reception, there were no line, nurse asked me what had happened and pointed me to one of the beds and I sat down. After brief overview about what happened, she then contacted with surgeon to come and take a look. When surgeon arrived he instructed me to lay on my stomach and examined my feet. Few seconds later he told me that you have sutured achilles tendon and we have to do surgery. So medical stuff started to prepare me for this. But first I was covered with sweat, feet wasn’t clean etc like people who have just been in football field training. So I needed to wash myself but turns out there isn’t classic shower corner or a bath in this area of the hospital. There was this quite big room with shower head, bed, clothing and other things but this wasn’t meant to be for showering in classic terms, only for washing parts of the body, with assistance. But I managed to clean myself and had to put on most sexy outfit ever - hospital pijama. Only bottom and top, couse i didn’t have any underwear. Was fun. Nurse got me wheelchair, I managed to sat myself down there and she pushed me to elevator to get to eighth floor. I was put in a little room with two beds in it. I had the opportunity to put my things to drawer and was introduced most bizzare looking clothing ever what you have to wear during surgery. Basically I stripped down to naked and put this jacked-blouse hybrid on, bind up straps and that was it, no trousesrs - nothing (like cheap porn movie or something. I layed to bed, got some blankets on me and one nurses prepared to give me ride to operating room but before one of them shaved my left leg. And as you know it isn’t a smart idea to rush these things, also to shave without using any lubricant/shaving cream. Ofcourse she managed to cut in, happy me. But this isn’t relevant for many hours.

So I was riding on bed to the operation room which is on same floor, only other wing of the hospital. It was i think about 1,5 hours or so passed since I arrived to emergency room. Operation room was cuite big compared to the room where i have been staying. It is well litt and nurses tried to make me as comfortable as i can be in this situation. They lifted me on the operationg table, put me on the side, inserted cannula into my arm and monitored my wellbeing.

About anesteshia options - if surgeon talked to me at the examination he asked when i had last eat something and what was my preferable anesthetic method, partial (lower body) or fully (sleeping), actually I didn’t care, I had previously operation with full body anesthesia and thot it was ok, but I am all in for new experiences and this one didn’t sound so bad either. So lower body it was.

Other thing is with cannulas. I had 3 of them before surgeon even started to cut me open. I am left-handed. So naturally first one was planted to my right arm, backside of my hand. Didn’t succeed unfortunately couse blood vessel turned and it didn’t went all the way in. Ok lets try elbow and vein - success. Nurse was happy, I was happy.  When i was on operating table turned out that all hoses come from other side and need cannula on the left side. So be it and this was third time. Luckily I am not scared of blood neiter needles. Have been donating blood few times in my life (last time was in winter if I remember correctly) and i don’t have any problems with blood coagulation.

I was laying on operation table on my left side, anaesthetist made injection to my back and we started waiting it to get some effect. Few minutes later i didn’t feel a thing in my left leg and almost nothing on right leg. So it was working like charm. I was instructed and helped to lay on my stomach and nurses made me feel as comfortable as they could and surgeon started to work his magic. Unfortunately there was a cloth behind me and i didn’t see surgery with my own ehes. Nor did the have mirrors (I asked). So I was just hangin in there about an hour. Pretty boring if you ask me, becouse they didn’t let me even to get my phone to surgery (for obvious reasons). Surgery went quite fast, about hour later was my leg stitched together and casted. Still didn’t feel a thing. When personnel turned me on my back I briefly asked surgeon about my tendon. I asked if there were something what was good he said that few very small parts were. Mostly sutured. He fixed it and nurses escorted me back to my room. It was quite scary to watch if they lifted my leg and I didn’t feel anything. Quite creepy. Hoped for the best and layed on my bed and waited for something, anything actually.
I called few of my closest people in emergency room about what happened. Now after the surgery i contacted my boss to tell him the terrible news. Luckily he was calm and supportive. I had to make few work related calls, couse I had errand from tuesday to thursday ahead and that had to be cancelled also other work related stuff. I have medical center in my workplace so I called them too to make appointment for morning to get some painkillers, crutches and transport home from hospital (i left car at hospitals parking lot), deal was that i will call in the morning if my release time from the hospital becomes clear.

Till next post!

Added few pictures related to this day. All taken by me.

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