wooÐs

Was there any one in particular that was worse than the others? Any words of caution to others who may have the same surgery in the future?

• My first was in high school - all 4 impacted wisdom teeth were removed. They say folks swell up like chipmunks post surgery. Not only did I swell, but I looked like I had the poo beat out of me for a little over a week. All bruised on my face and down my neck.
• In '95, I had knee surgery on my left knee to snip and shave off some torn cartilage. It wasn't too bad. The worst part of that was the physical therapy.
• And a couple summers ago, I had my gallbladder removed. Not too terribly painful but I'm still pissed over the scarring. My belly button piercing is now pointless. Nothing sexy about it at all anymore.

levite

I had my tonsils out when I was 17. Not much to say about it. They put you out (general) for it, so.... I was pretty swollen around the neck for a few days, and I hurt like a bastard-- felt like I'd swallowed broken glass-- but nothing that tylenol with codeine didn't get me through.....

I had all my impacted wisdom teeth out at 20. The surgery itself wasn't bad. They gave me a local, plus a demerol drip, plus a shot of valium on top of that. It was a great trip. I could vaguely sense the surgeons pushing and pulling and poking around my mouth, but I couldn't feel a thing. It was like floating on pink and blue clouds...at the end, after they were done, I thanked them for playing Floyd while they were operating, and I still remember the surgeon rolling his eyes and going, "Son, there was no music." It hurt a bit for the week after, but it wasn't too bad.

I got my gall bladder out when I was 31. It was hot-- they told me the gallstone was one of the biggest they'd ever seen: like a golf ball-- and I was so close to having it burst on me when they got me to the OR (maybe because of having had to wait for fucking SEVEN HOURS in the ER, I shit you not, before anyone saw me and diagnosed me....) they didn't have time to do it laproscopic-- they had to go in the old-fashioned way. I now have a long scar across my stomach and side.... I was in the hospital for four days after that-- missed the High Holidays, and everything-- and then at home in bed for another three weeks, the first two of which, every time I got up to pee it felt like all my guts were about to fall on the floor.... That was not pleasant. Not pleasant at all.

__________________
Dull sublunary lovers love,
Whose soul is sense, cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
That thing which elemented it.

(From "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" by John Donne)

Xerxys

ROOT FUCKIN' CANAL!!

May the fire that scorched Sodom and Gomorrah rain down and burn Dr. Emily to her DEATH!!!!

Baraka_Guru

1. Tonsils removed
2. All 4 wisdom teeth removed
3. Ingrown toenail removed
4. Cystoscopy (endoscopy of the urinary bladder via the urethra) to have a stricture removed

All surgeries to have something removed. With hope, maybe one day I'll have surgery to have something implanted!

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Plan9

Just a couple of stitches over the years. I must be lucky.

I've done some dangerous stuff in my life and never been seriously injured.

And apparently I was born without wisdom teeth. That says a lot.

__________________
Whatever you can carry.

"You should not drink... and bake."

dlish

- i had all 4 widom teeth out under general anaethetic when i was 21
- i had another operation about 2 years ago that i care not disclose

__________________
An injustice anywhere, is an injustice everywhere

I always sign my facebook comments with ()()===========(}. Does that make me gay?
- Filthy

seamaiden

Had my tonsils removed when I was nine.
Impacted wisdom teeth came out when I was 22.
I had a couple of small cysts removed, under local anesthetic, when I was in my teens. One on my shoulder and the other on my calf.
Not sure if episiotomies count, but I had one for the birth of each son. (cutting, removal of baby, stitching = surgery...maybe)

KellyC

Two root canal
Two wisdom teeth.

__________________
Him: Ok, I have to ask, what do you believe?
Me: Shit happens.

The_Jazz

Let's see..... I had 4 four wisdom teeth out at age 18 under a general. Then at age 19 I had a chip of bone taken from my hip to be pinned in place of some bone that died in my wrist after it was broken. That cost me a season of indoor track and most of outdoor track (but introduced me to some gateway drugs). Then I had a hemangeoma removed at about age 34 from a fingertip (that was nasty). The finger still has a chunk missing from it and the nerves are still dead on one side of the finger tip.

That doesn't count all the times I was stiched back together from various accidents.

__________________
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin
"There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush
"We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo

ShaniFaye

I love all of y'all that say "4 wisdom teeth"

Why do I love it? Well because I am evidently part shark as I have had 4 full SETS removed (awake for every one) and the 1st tooth of the 5th set has erupted. They seem to grow out of no where, I feel like a pez dispenser of wisdom teeth

I had my tonsils out at 17, back when you had to stay in the hospital for it
I had 4 pounds of boobs removed 3 years ago when I had my breast reduction, best decision of my life, I recommend it to anyone thats tired of having to move their tits out of the way when they are in the bathtub shaving their legs, or has to buy extra large bathsheets just so you can actually wrap the towel around your body, or has to take a muscle relaxer after walking around the grocery store.

__________________
I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!

Craven Morehead

tonsils/adenoids removed at 5 years old
cut the tips of two fingers off, were sutured back in place
2 wisdom teeth removed, ended up with a dry socket and then an infection, it was hell
2 wisdom teeth pulled on separate occasions, no problems
4 root canals - they were a breeze

Xerxys

OMFG he had a vasectomy ... you bastard, you promised me so many things, damn you, DAMN YOU TO HELL!! DO NOT CALL ME!!

snowy

I am apparently the opposite--mine never came in! When I was 20, I asked my dentist if I could expect them to EVER come in. He looked at my X-ray and said, "Nope. If they were going to come in, there would be buds here, and there aren't." So, yay! Good for me as my upper teeth are set PERFECTLY (no braces needed, thank goodness) and my lower teeth are a bit crowded but it's not noticeable.

I've never really had any major surgery--knock on wood. I've had a couple minor procedures. I had two teeth removed after an accident, and another tooth removed a few months after that. I've had a pilonidal cyst lanced, and couldn't sit on my butt for three days after. I've had a tumor in my neck biopsied. I also had some stitches in my finger after slamming it in the front door, but that's about it. I'm the one who gets to sit in the waiting room while other people have surgery.

__________________
If I am not better, at least I am different. --Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Plan9

Thanks, Xerx... now I know what to look forward to in my near future.

__________________
Whatever you can carry.

"You should not drink... and bake."

Xerxys

^^ Lol, don't make promises you cant keep.

Threadjack ....

Sorry to hear this. I have had a bad tooth problem ever since my fall when I was 12-13 years old. Part of it was my fault because as a kid I never brushed my teeth, making them brittle and frail. Lately I have been looking into a research facility in S. Africa that is investigating the properties of ruminant animals. Their teeth enamel grows back.

Shani has your case been documented and/or been replicated as a common occurrence? Is it very rare? Does the condition have a name?

ShaniFaye

I honestly dont know, I never asked, all I know is when I go to my dentist, when she takes xrays she will come back and say, oh lord not again lol I know she's told me she's only ever seen one other person like me.

My mother has had 3 sets

My dads tonsils grew back

I used to have nightmares about my wisdom teeth growing where my tonsils used to be lol

__________________
I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!

wooÐs

I keep reading 'tonsils' as 'toenails' :/.

Xerxys

Heroes much??

I have to do some more reading about this.

Strange Famous

nothing yet

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

ShaniFaye

I dont understand?

__________________
I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!

Embic

- hernia @ age 5
- both heel cords lengthened @ age 7
- tonsils removed @ age 10
- root canal @ age 12
- large tumor/scar tissue removed from chest @ age 23
- testicle removed @ age 23

Xerxys

Claire Bennett of Heroes can regenerate. You cut off a limb and it grows back.

After some on the fly googling ... just out of curiosity would you know how old your dad was when his tonsils were removed. It is possible for these things to grow back at a young age. Also, when your teeth are puled out, do they remove the roots?r

ShaniFaye

Daddy's tonsils "exploded" (not sure what that means but thats what he and my grandmother always say) when he was in highschool (early 1960's) they removed them

When I was 5 (1972) he had them removed again

Yes they remove the roots, each and every tooth has come out whole, I saw them after extraction (as I said previously...I was awake for each and every one)

__________________
I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!

Grasshopper Green

I had a lumpectomy when I was 15

All my wisdom teeth out under general anesthesia last year. I'm glad I chose that option because the surgeon said my teeth were very difficult to remove.

__________________
"They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings; steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king"

Formerly Medusa

12Packaday

In my youth I was fairly resilient, requiring little more than routine maintenance. As I reached my early thirties though, stopping objects with my head and bouncing off the surface of the earth began to hurt. And the body began to show signs of the miles it had traveled.

I lost count around 125 stitches above my hairline, hope I never go bald! I fractured my left xygomatic arch (it's a small bone by the eye socket) and that was surgically repaired, had stiches in the outer corners of both my eyes, broke my nose several times, I had bi-lateral inguinal hernia repairs, but not simultaneous, bi-lateral ACL tears, again on seperate occasions. I currently have a torn rotator that I keep putting off getting fixed. I had six teeth pulled in one day. I've broken my ankles, a wrist and an arm But by far the most invasive thing ever done to me was a colonoscopy! Whose bright idea was it to shove a camera up peoples asses!!!

Zeraph

I had the Eye of Osiris implanted in my brain so I could open gates and travel through the underworld. Despite the hellish atmosphere its still more comfortable than flying.

wooÐs

Imma add a few things to my original post, as I didn't consider them surgery...

• While working retail, I was pulling a metal cart of product behind me to go stock shelves. The cart caught the back of my ankle and ripped it open. I had 7 stitches.
• While cutting hair, I was working on an Indian dude - you know how heavy and thick their black hair is. I was rushing through it, as it's difficult to spot mistakes in a mop like that. Sliced open my middle knuckle on my left hand. It was a super clean cut, but because it was my knuckle, it had to be stitched closed. I got 5 stitches for that one.
• Endoscopy in '02.
• Colonoscopy in '09.
• I was born without tear ducts. They put me in a body cast from the waist up. My parents had to move 2 strings back and forth - one in each eye - they went from my new tear duct through my nostrils. This helped the new ducts form. I made medical journals for this procedure.

highthief

Weird, I never considered wisdom teeth, root canals and vasectomies as "surgery". To me, they are minor medical outpatient procedures.

Tonsils, appendix, anything to do with a vital organ, etc., those are surgeries.

__________________
Si vis pacem parabellum.

seamaiden

According to the array of dictionaries on our bookshelves, surgery is the branch of medicine that deals with diseases and conditions by operative or manual procedures. Seems like that would definitely include vasectomies and the removal of wisdom teeth. Mine were impacted...I had general anesthetic, stitches, and slept for three days.

Craven Morehead

If it happens to me its surgery, if it happens to someone else, not so much.

ASU2003

This is the one reason why I support universal healthcare that uses the best practices. No one should have to go through the torture of having wisdom teeth removed while awake.

Then again, I still think this procedure is done way more than is actually needed.

levite

I forgot about stitches and stuff....

I have a scar on my left ankle from when we were moving, when I was around 6. A kitchen box opened, and the blade from the Cuisinart food processor fell out, and sliced open my ankle. Two stitches.

I have a scar on my left forefinger's knuckle. I got my first pocketknife at 9 years old, but nobody ever instructed me on how to use it safely...or taught me any common sense. I was using it to cut open some sugarcane. Sugarcane that had not been adequately dried off. Cutting backwards. I sliced the knuckle open, down to the bone. Four stitches, done by a first-year med student, so that they came out leaving me with a permanent little Frankenstein scar.

I have a scar on my right little toe, from getting 1 stitch and the toe set when I kicked something metal with my bare foot, in anger. I was 13.

And I have a scar on my right knee, from where I got a long scraping cut from falling off a picnic table where I was having sex with a girl, onto concrete. I thought I heard someone coming-- someone not either of us. I was wrong, but it cost me three stitches. I was 16.

I never had to get stitches for it, but my foot was bound up tightly for two weeks when I was 17, after stepping on a 3.5" nail during set construction for a play I was in.

And I have a small rough scar, not from stitches, but from getting a cyst lanced. A cyst, I found out the hard way, is like a minor abscess, or essentially a giant boil or zit, deeply buried under the skin. In my case, it was a pylonidal cyst, which means it was deeply buried under the skin inside my buttcrack. Not fun. They hurt like fuck-all-get-out, and don't just go away. You have to get them lanced and drained, and then take antibiotics. I honestly don't know which was worse: having to get a doctor to do that for me, or hearing her look at my ass and go, "Oh, gross. That's really a nasty one." The psychological scars from that one might be worse than the actual scar. I was 22.

__________________
Dull sublunary lovers love,
Whose soul is sense, cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
That thing which elemented it.

(From "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" by John Donne)

Jove

4 Blepharoptosis Repair surgeries (back when I was a young lad in the single digits they had my eyelids lifted because I had droopy eyelids and then two years ago I had it again because it was getting quite noticeable.)

2 stapedectomy surgeries several years ago on my right ear since the first surgery didn't work properly and the doctor wanted to perform the surgery again. The surgeon woke me up during the surgery when they were drilling in my right ear asking me questions and wanted me to inform them when I felt dizzy. It was an interesting experience.

Halanna

Had my tubes tied January 6, 2000, my new decade present to myself.

Had 3 wisdom teeth removed, the 4th was missing.

Vaultboy

Lemme see,

I had a birth defect: My feet were attached to each other at the back of my achilles tendons to the base of my calves, so that had to be seperated and reattached. I was also born with one club foot, so that had to be corrected. I basically spent the first year of my life with my legs in casts.

I had a follow-up op on my club foot to correct it when I was six.

The foot problems came back to haunt me when I played soccer in college. I had to have 3 seperate surgeries over the course of 5 years to fix ingrown toenails. My doctor finally told me to stop running and kicking, and swin/cycle instead.

I injured the membrane that hold the lubricant in my right wrist last year (don't ask me how). The weakness in the membrane caused it to swell and cause carpal tunnel syndrome AND restricting my range of movement. So I had it fixed, and now my right hand has probably 60% of the strength it had before, and 80% movement range. :/

I also had all my wisdom teeth extracted a couple of years ago. Now I do a lot of dumb shit, like injuring my wrist.

All of the above were done under general anesthetic, so I consider it surgery.

__________________
"Failing tastes of bile and dog vomit. Pity any man that gets used to that taste."

savmesom11

My daughter was born with something similar but luckily we were able to keep her feet wrapped tightly for a month and they formed correctly, she was a premmie too so maybe that made a difference.

When I was 14 I had spinal fusion surgery due to a 70% scoliosis curve. I have to steel rods that hold my spine in place with corresponding hooks on each vertebra. When I was 23 I had the wisdom teeth extraction...not fun, and about 2 years ago I started developing bone tumors (noncancerous) around my clavicle so I have had one surgery to remove them.

But the exciting news....my tubal ligation scheduled for January 2010! Now that is a surgery I am looking forward to

__________________
* I do not believe that struggles are a sign of life falling apart, but rather a step of life falling into place. *

ngdawg

5 years old: Tonsils (they forgot a piece though)
19: Bottom wisdom teeth(semi-awake for that).
32: Laparascopic exploratory of reproductive organs.
35: Laparascopic laser removal of scar tissue and endometriosis and some reproductive reconstruction.
36: G.I.F.T (gammete-intrafallopian transfer) to get pregnant. This is no longer done on women.
37: C-Section.
54: Placement of 5 inch plate with 6 screws on one side(tibia) and 2 screws on the other(fibula) when I triple-fractured my left ankle, all permanent. Third fracture healed without added metal.

__________________
Don't blame me. I didn't vote for either of'em.

Crack

Sex reassignment surgery - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

twice so far.

__________________
Crack, you and I are long overdue for a vicious bout of mansex.

~Halx

Cernunnos

I had all four wisdom teeth removed at the age of 18. Aside from a case of anaerobic bacteria invading one of the sockets, the experience was free of trauma, though one of the nurses shot me a peculiar glance after I returned from anesthesia.