I decided I would start the days by showering and washing my hair so that my hair would not be the reason for a bad day. Not just a bad hair day, but a bad day overall. I have started to get less bothered by it being straight and flat as long as it is clean. Before my implant I was focused on how I would manage my hair and I thought it was a coping strategy to avoid thinking about other things, and that after the implant my hair would be the least of my worries. As it happens my concerns about my hair being a significant part of my recovery has turned out to be spot on. How my hair look affects the whole day.
There is little else causing problems at the moment. I am pleasantly surprised how little my clothing is bothering me at the site of the wound, other than my bra straps and I am managing well with my little summer tops which have much softer straps. It's not perfect but it is acceptable. At the moment I worry that normal bra straps will be too tight and I may need to adapt for the future. The end of my scar will always be under the strap and thus could be a problem. I have spent a lot of time on the internet and I have found a site in the US which does padded pads that fix to the strap over the wound site and help protect the skin but I haven't been able to find anything in the UK. Maybe that's because long term, it's not actually a problem, I'll find out over the next few weeks.
Reaching across my body is still uncomfortable but the tip my boss gave me of keeping my left elbow tucked into my waist is actually working very well to ensure I don't use the arm too much. I am finding I can do quite a lot with just my right hand and when I do get my left hand involved remembering to keep my elbow in stops me risking over-stretching and dis-placing the leads.After the difficulties getting them in place I really worry about them getting displaced. Once the leads have been in place a few weeks and have taken a good hold I will be able to forget about them. In fact, before the operation it was one of my biggest concerns, if the leads failed at some point after implant how did they change them. Once the heart tissue had grown around the pacing wires making a good contact how did they get them out to replace them if it was necessary. The answer? They don't. They just disconnect them from the pacemaker, put new leads in leaving the old ones in place and connect you up to the new ones. Simple Once I knew that I had few worries about the technology. 30 years ago I worked for a company that imported and sold pacemakers to the medical section in the UK. I knew how they worked. Other than being slightly smaller than the ones we used to sell, and becoming more reliable, there was little change.
I had a relaxing day and finally felt my pacemaker. I'm surprised how big it feels considering how small it is. It's a bit like when you have a broken tooth and it feels massive but in actual fact is tiny. It's very close to my collar bone and only just under the skin, I thought it would be deeper. I can see the lump in the skin when a look at my profile but I'm fairly sure that other people will not notice it unless they are looking for it. The scar will be the main give-away, and once it's healed fully I'm going to start using bio-oil to try and reduce the scarring.
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