Thursday 1 October 2015

September 15 - October 1: Hickman Line removal.

During September, I came to hospital a couple of times for blood tests and for my Hickman line to be cleaned. I had a clinical appointment with my doctor on the 21st who said that things were looking good.
Hello ladies.

I was originally scheduled to have my line removed on September 28th. To have my line removed my platelets must be 50 or higher. This is because there can be a lot of bleeding during its removal. If my platelets are too low, I could be at risk of losing too much blood. I had blood tests to check that my levels were good, sadly there were some issues that day and due to this my Hickman Line removal was delayed until today.

I arrived at hospital around 1:30. My bloods were taken and after an hour or so the results came back with my platelets at 56. This meant that I would be having my Hickman Line removed. I had to lay on a bed with a curtain pulled around me. To have my Line removed, part of my chest had to be shaved, as usual. Hairy problems.

#Buzzing
After my shaving, local anesthetic was applied which can sting. I had my face covered so that I couldn't see what was going on. The nurse asked whether I could feel the incisions being made. There's no pain, but similar to when it was inserted, I can feel it. There's lots of pressure applied and yanking. Because it's been in me so long, my body had started accepting the line and tissue had grown around it. The nurse continually forced to cut and tear tissue which makes its removal slow. Because it's taking so long to remove the line the anesthetic begins to wear off, so I had another injection to numb the area. Once removed, I had several stitches put in.

It was me! SURPRISE!
I was then allowed to see the line that had been pulled out. It was surprisingly long and on one part was a fairly large chunk of red tissue. I assume that this was the reason for some of the yanking and pressure. The nurse seemed surprised that I wanted to take the Hickman line home, it is pretty weird to be fair. I wasn't allowed to take all of it home as the part that was under the skin has to be medically disposed of. But I can keep all the tubes and stuff, there's still some blood inside the line which is pretty funny. Not entirely sure why I decided to keep it now that I'm home, nothing I can really do with it. Might frame it for the bantz.

Its strange not having it in anymore. I've had it since June 9th, which was over 100 days ago. I keep going to touch my chest and being surprised not to feel wires hanging there. It's as though I've forgotten or lost something. But I am glad its out and am really looking forward to being able to shower properly and be able to wear t-shirts without my line being visible. 

I'll be going back to hospital next week to have my stitches out, and the following week for blood tests. Blood tests and clinical appointments will continue for a while to ensure that my ATG treatment is still working. I'm really pleased by how well everything seems to be going, none of it could have been done without my family, friends and most importantly our brilliant NHS. 

It's gone!

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