Frankenstein Face

It actually didn't look too bad this morning when I took off my giant bandage, washed my incision, put the prescription cream on it and then applied another giant bandage to my face. The incision looks like it is healing well and the six black stitches will get taken out on Friday. Hopefully it won't take all morning to get my stitches out like it took all morning to get them put in.

My appointment was for 9:30 and I thought that maybe since it was an early appointment I'd be first in line but when I got to the dermatologist's office, every chair in the waiting room was full. I checked in and paid my copay and then stood there for a little while until someone was called in to see the doctor and I took their chair. The waiting room is small, with one larger room and then like a hallway off to the side with chairs along both sides and barely enough room to get in between the chairs to sit down. Kind of like movie theater seating only facing the people in front of you. One of the people in front of me was an older lady who apparently doesn't get out much because she talked to all the people around her like they were long lost friends, discussing hot flashes even though these women had been done with all that for years, then discussing wearing sleeveless summer dresses, one woman said she didn't care what her arms looked like after losing 180 pounds and then gaining some of it back only to lose it again. The really chatty one said she wouldn't show her arms so that is why she was wearing a jacket over her sundress. Hey, it was already about 95 degrees that morning and who wants to wear a jacket in the heat no matter what your arms looked like.

I was trying to tune all of these people out so I could read my book but it was difficult since I was sitting so very close to them. I endured about an hour of this before I finally got called to the back. Where the surgeon came and looked at my cyst and then marked all over it with a felt tipped pen, then said see you in a bit. I was asked a bunch of questions, questions that someone had already called and asked me about and then signed some paperwork. Then it was time for the lidocain, which can sting a lot but wasn't too bad. Apparently some of the markings on my face were for where to insert the needle and it was inserted a lot, all around the cyst.

So, as my face is numbing up I'm taken down a long hallway to the surgery center where I'm deposited into another waiting room, fortunately with no chatty people yakking away. I've already been to the bathroom 3 times by now and have to go again. Good thing there is another toilet in this waiting room.

I sit for quite a while, a few other people being escorted around and all of us signing more paperwork, then am brought into the before and after surgery room where they have 3 beds with curtains and where my vitals are taken and I answer some more questions, again questions previously asked and answered more than once. Computerized records, people!

Then into the surgery room, where I lay on a table that is then pumped up to standing doctor level and a very bright lamp is adjusted to shine on my face. The nurse leaves and says the doctor will be with me soon. There is a constant beeping sound every few seconds and piped in music playing, new wave type music from the 80s that is incredibly annoying and kind of loud. So, beeping and annoying music and I'm laying there and laying there and laying there and I don't know how long I've been laying there because the clock on the wall is stuck at 3:45 and the only thing moving on it is the second hand which clicks up a second and back down. Over and over.

Time is standing still and I'm beginning to feel like I am in The Twilight Zone and this room is the portal to Hell and this is what I'll be doing for all eternity, listening to beeping sounds and horrible 80's music. I am looking over the side of the table and wondering if it's high enough to where if I rolled off the side of it I'd knock myself out and put me out of my misery.

Finally a nurse comes in and apologizes for the wait, the doctor got backed up but it's more like he was overbooked, and then finally, finally, here he comes to do the surgery. I'm a little nervous that the lidocain has worn off by now, but he said it should be okay and then down to business.

The surgery itself was painless but very odd feeling, as if my cheek was made of silly putty and he was stretching it out. I could feel tugging but no pain. I was stitched up and bandaged and then led out back to the original waiting room where I made my appointment to have the stitches removed.

All in all it took a little over three hours and as I was leaving I noticed that a man that had been sitting next to the talkative lady was still sitting there waiting for his turn. He didn't even have a book to read or a phone or tablet to play with like so many other people still waiting. I'm sure he was thinking along the lines of Twilight Zone portals to Hell too.