One week on

Hi, I haven't posted since Saturday as there's nothing new to report really. My scar is still covered by steri strips and I haven't yet had the courage to remove and replace them. In fairness, the two horizontal ones are still in place . All I've needed to do is put two more vertical ones on.

I have to confess that I have just now e mailed Mr Hussain's Secretary to ask him if the strips should be changed, regardless of ' lifting ' at the edges. I don't want to be a high maintenance ( read " pain in the ar*e " ) patient but .... I'm apparently willing to risk it for the sake of my face ! I will report back.

The bruising on my neck and face is fading from a violent yellow to a pale primrose and the swelling on my lip has reduced considerably . My black eye has receded and I finished the course of anti biotics yesterday. 

The worries of everyday life which, for survival, were mercifully suspended in the early days following the operation , now return with a vengeance . I won't explore them here only to say that the sentiment that, as a Parent, one is only ever as happy as one's least happy child, is so painfully true. Yet, I still feel somehow wounded, not back up to fighting form , struggling to balance my own need for recovery with the compulsion to take up the reins and begin ' sorting ' out ( or attempting to ) , again.

I went through an odd thought process about the bcc and the op this week end. I began to minimise it in my mind. To think that I had, perhaps, overreacted, made a big deal. That the people who had seemed only mildly moved by my fears might be right . I know that is wrong and if anyone is reading this, and waiting to see what the day of their operation will actually bring, I do need you to know that your concerns are valid. Not in the sense that you are right to be worried because what will happen is dreadful, rather that it is natural to be deeply anguished about a procedure of which you do not know the outcome and which will affect your window to the world - your face.

The way I felt before the operation remains more to the forefront of my mind because my very dear friend is preparing for the same procedure in a few weeks time. Her bcc is midway on the side of her nose though, to the edge of her eye socket . Her preoccupation and understandable wish to talk about this means re living that same , hellish, time .One of the hardest parts, for me, was to disguise that all consuming anxiety for what was to come. Maybe it was wrong?