Nurse Rossi

Apparently John picked up an infection. We're not sure where it came from - Costa Rica, the gym - who knows. All we knew was it was getting worse and worse and not magically disappearing like John was hoping for. It started as a small red mass on his side that grew and grew. A few days before Christmas he finally caved and went to the ER. Five hours later he came home with a chunk of his love handle missing. He downplayed everything, and it was all bandaged up when he got home so I didn't even see it before I took off for my mom's for Christmas. Well, the sucker wouldn't stop bleeding, so when he got to Syracuse the next day his mom took him straight to the doctor. They did some more poking and prodding and determined it was okay, it just needed daily attention and he needed pain meds. All I have to say is, thank goodness he was home with his momma - a real live nurse! Every day she had to pull out the packing, clean out the wound, and re-pack it. It was about a 45 minute process in order to get a sterile environment and enough helping hands to execute successfully. John's sister Karen was there to help each day. When I finally made it to Syracuse a week later the wound had healed significantly, but it still needed to be packed and cleaned each day. The first morning I stood there with his mom to learn the procedure. She took off the bandage and it was pretty gross - but tolerable. The more you look at it the more comfortable you become. She then pulled the packing out - it looked like a 6 inch long shoelace. Okay, breathe Lisa. No problem. You just pulled that out of his side. Could be worse. She cleaned the wound with saline. Going well. The worst part seemed to be the pain that John was in. The final step is to re-pack the wound. She started to stick the end of the packing in and all of a sudden the room started to spin, everything was going dark and OH MY GOD THIS IS WHAT IT IS LIKE TO FAINT! I pulled myself together before hitting the floor and left the room to catch my breath. Apparently I wasn't prepared to see that. The next day I watched as Karen went through the process at the New Years Eve house and I was okay. I better be, because it was going to be my turn soon. We've been home for a few days now and the wound has almost healed to the point where it doesn't require packing. It will probably be a few more weeks until it is completely healed. What an adventure! An extremely painful one for John Buss.

The pictures are pretty graphic and gross so I won't include them in the post. But if you want to take a peek, here are the links. John took these when he went to the doctor in Syracuse, a couple of days after the doctors in the ER removed the infected area.

Picture 1

Picture 2