From hospital - Tuesday

Tuesday was a good day where I didn't need any morphine, and my drain was filling up nicely. I saw the physio, started my exercises to get my lymph moving properly, and even went for a 30-minute walk around the floor. I had a blood sample drawn and I ate a little food without being sick. My two best friends came to see me, which was lovely, and all was well.

And then.

Just before bed, I asked nurse if she would empty my drain because it was just shy of being full and I didn't want it to overflow in the night:

She got a new flask, detatched the tube from the old flask, pressed the vacuum button and attached it. The vacuum sent a swirl of blood, clot and fluid swishing out into the new drain and then it began. AGONY. My vocabulary is not impressive enough to fully describe the pain. The closest image you can get is of ripping open your thigh, pouring acid into your muscles then taking a blow torch to it. I was aware that I was screaming very loudly and I was unable to stop. I knew I was making this noise but it didn't sound like me. I was aware that people came running into my cube and after a few seconds that felt like an eternity, someone de-vacced the flask so the liquid stopped gushing and the pain ended. My main memories are of the taste of blood (I had bitten my hand so badly it was bleeding) and of the nurses not seeming to understand what I was telling them (later confirmed by the inaccurate notes written in my chart). I certainly didn't understand what was happening. All I knew is that I couldn't stop crying even though the pain was gone. The pain was right across the thigh above my knee. There is nothing obvious there to hurt - it's well away from any incision and drain areas. (ETA I later found out the drain was sucking on a nerve...the agony was nerve pain).

The nurse told me they had stopped the drain's vacuum and to load up on morphine to get me through the night. I went from 45ml to 97ml that night through fear the pain would come back. It didn't but I was too afraid to move even a millimetre just in case.