Surgery is Like A Long-Haul Flight

Photo by 贝莉儿 NG on Unsplash

I’m two weeks out from a hip replacement.

It’s the first surgery I’ve ever had, and the first anesthesia. (I’m the mother of two children, but I had both of them naturally without drugs.) So I was a bit (understatement) apprehensive about this whole process. Now that I’m done with it, I’m convinced it is a modern miracle.

It is two weeks out and I’m walking most of the time on my own, using a cane to go up and down steps. I’ve had very little pain which I’ve controlled mostly with over-the-counter meds. This morning I saw my surgeon and he cleared me for driving. I’m walking without a limp for the first time in years, and I feel great.

Photo by Marcelo Leal on Unsplash

But in the run-up to the big day, I felt like I was preparing for an international trip (which I am very familiar with, since I go to France every year). And the more I thought about it, the more I realized the similarities. The morning after my surgery, as I lay in my hospital bed, I grabbed my journal (because I go nowhere, not even the hospital, without my journal) and wrote all the parallels:

— There’s a lot to do the day before, and as you are doing it, you feel you are preparing to be out of commission…