Compression Stockings and Bathroom Vodka

A little less than a week ago, I underwent round two of Operation: New Legs, having the faulty little (or not so little, as this case was) veins removed from my left leg to provide me with pain-free, throbbing-free, and bulging-vein-free legs again. Back in September 2008, I had Endovenous Laser Surgery performed on both legs to remove Varicose Veins which had formed, rather grotesquely, at a relatively young age. I was told, repeatedly, whilst I was in hospital the first time that I was far too young to be having my veins removed, that it is something for old ladies to suffer from. You can therefore imagine the surprise when I turned up to the American Hospital on Monday to have another set removed on my left leg, to find several of the same staff in the Operating Room recognise me again and question why I am such a faulty example of veinal plumbing!

I did a bit of digging around, and have found out there are several types of occupations that, due to long periods of time spent on your feet, encourage Varicose Veins to form; teachers, nurses, chefs, hairdressers and flight attendants. Apparently, quite common in cabin crew, the amount of time spent walking around, bending up and down, combined with cabin pressure from the altitude is a recipe for problems to occur, quite a lot earlier than perhaps what may have occured later in life. Left untreated, and depending on the amount of reflux in your veins (backwards flow of blood), the pooled blood (what you see on the outside as 'varicose veins' or bulging veins) can form into a clot, which can then be life threatening.

The Doctor knew when he did the first operation, that I would probably need a follow-up procedure to close off the Short Saphenous Vein in my left leg, but until the first operation had been done (where he closed the Long Saphenous Veins in both legs) he would not be able to see the extent to which the other vein would be suffering. Using ultrasound technology, he could then see the vein had dialated to close to 1cm wide, which is about four times the width it should have been, allowing quite a severe amount of reflux. So, more laser surgery, more anaesthetic, more beige compression stockings, and another two weeks off work!

Part of the post-op care plan that I am on, I have a cocktail of 5 different medications to take each day for a couple of weeks, and a part of this medley is a self-injection to help thin my blood. Once I was discharged from the hospital, I realised that I wasn't given any sterile wipes to prep the area to inject, so the kiwi inginuity in me tells me to make do. Henceforth, I have a lovely bottle of Finlandia Vodka sitting on the bathroom benchtop for me to use the alcohol to steralise my tummy with! I can assure you, this is the only time I will allow booze in the bathroom, but I know that if the self-harm thought of injecting myself gets to much, I won't have to reach to far to forget the pain!

I really should probably stop flying one of these days, but I figure that it is a job that I love doing, and I don't think I have many veins left in my legs to deform, so I don't see the harm in flying for a few more years yet!