buggered as a boy

This will seem as though I’m being side-tracked at only my second post, and I do promise that I have a lovely long list of things to write about, BUT…

If we’re talking about surviving horrors, I can proudly announce that I have just managed to survive another.

I woke up during surgery.

Yesterday I had the second round of scalpel-testing and ‘osteogenesis’, or bone-growing, to fix a top jaw that has been shattered twice. (see – ‘survivors of abuse and risk-taking behavior‘, soon to be seen somewhere on this blog)

The exciting thing is that I woke up for a bit, and duly experienced a pain of such deity-fucking intensity I had never though to imagine it before. But you can try: picture the sensation of someone scraping a bone graft from the back of your lower jaw, or doing something equally joyous like pulling out a wisdom tooth so that they can get at that bone. Charmingly enough, they had the temerity to keep yelping at me to keep my hands down as they – with a fairly inappropriate insouciance – boosted the anaesthetic dose. Mind you – this happened several times…

I thought I may feel better after sobbing in the car as The Wife drove me home. Sobbing, that is. Like I have only done a handful of times in my life. Real life sobs – as opposed to the happy, gutwrenching cathartic skrike I’ll offer up after a film like Ararat or Jack & Jill.

But last night – the nightmares! I kept reliving the bloody thing in nightmares! I now have to replay surgical procedures in my sleep? I thought I had enough pain medication in my system to stop Rush Limbaugh, but it looks like I’m in for a minor dose of the old PTSD.

I mean… COME ON! I spend years getting myself over the attentions of my Overly Affectionate Godfather (a.k.a. El Pedo); I start a brand shiny new blog to talk about what it feels like to finally be almost past all the shit… now I have to have another Scarring Experience?

We’ll see. I may just call my superstar former shrink: the wine-lover, gardener, and literal life-saver Dr. Richard Golden, and find out how to avoid those dreams again. Simple.

Or I may keep this one. Because SCARS ARE SEXY. Sure, mental scars aren’t as sexy, at least not to others, but I do like the idea of being tormented by something that doesn’t involve unwanted access to my willy and that won’t make me cold-sweat when The Wife surprises me with a hug. I mean, I do have a DEEP LOVE AFFAIR with any and all kinds of emotional pain.

Okay – maybe dental pain (oral surgery is just fancy-guy dentistry, really, isn’t it?) isn’t quite as glamorous and brooding-loner-worthy as being buggered, but I tell you one thing – if El Pedo had ever hurt me like that I can assure you it wouldn’t have happened twice. Even as an eight-year-old I swear I would have ripped out his oesophagus, Swayze-style…