surgery yesterday

Well after 5 1/2 hours of surgery that was supposed to be 3 hours I am home.Four incisions on my left shoulder. They reshaped my clavicle by shaving several inches of bone off of it and cutting off two inches of bone in another place and one inch in another place plus they repaired the torn rotators cuff and cut the tendon that goes from the shoulder through the biceps, down the forearm to the hand and then they stapled it off so it won't grow back. Once it heals they will do pretty much the same thing to my right shoulder. Fun, fun,fun.

WOW Mike,
Sounds like a heck of a time. Went through it to when I got back from Iraq after the plan crash.. Took me 6 months to learn how to walk and use my hands & arms again. Hope everything heals well and the other shoulder goes well to. Remember not to try to push your luck.... A lesson I learned!

hope you get well soon take it easy

Get well soon VB

DanTheVanMan wrote:WOW Mike,
Sounds like a heck of a time. Went through it to when I got back from Iraq after the plan crash.. Took me 6 months to learn how to walk and use my hands & arms again. Hope everything heals well and the other shoulder goes well to. Remember not to try to push your luck.... A lesson I learned!

first thanks for service and sorry you were injured. I was wounded four times in Nam. Once by a grenade and three times by mortars. The last mortar hit three feet from me and killed my entire special ops team. Luckily for me I had just sat down so most of the blast went over my head but I still caught over 100 pieces of shrapnel. Two medics came and put me on a stretcher and started to carry me to a bunker but over 50 more mortars started hitting all around us and the two medics dropped me and ran for the bunker. It was then that I heard someone yelling for a medic and I saw a captain on the ground about 30 feet from me suffering from a leg wound so I crawled over to him, had him lay on my back and put his arms around my neck then low crawled about fifty meters to the bunker. After the mortar attack stopped they took me to a forward aid station along with 33 other wounded GIs. I was the most seriously wounded so they wanted to operate on me first. They wanted to amputate both legs just below the hip but I persuaded them to lay me aside and operate on the other 33 people that were wounded first so that they would have more time to concentrate on saving my legs rather than take the quick and easy way out by amputation. I was in surgery for 26 hours and then went into a coma that I did not come out of for a little over six weeks. Woke up in Japan. They told me then that I would be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of my life. I actually spent seven years in the chair then many years on crutches and a cane. I can walk pretty good now although my knees give out on me a lot. What was really crazy was the army and the red cross both went to my wifes house and my mothers house and told them I was killed in action and had been recommended for the Medal of Honor so when I called my wife from Japan she thought my call was a prank and hung up on me three times. Finally I had an army nurse call her for me and explain that I was alive but severely injured. Didn't get the Medal of Honor because I refused it and told the commanding officer that I did not do anything to deserve such a high honor. I ended up getting the silver star for getting that captain to safety, and a army commendation medal for asking the docs to operate on the other wounded first. Also got my fourth purple heart. When I got home I threw all of my medals in the trash except for that fourth purple heart.

Get well Mike!! Prayers for you a speedy recovery.

god speed on your recovery, one brite note- you can still raise a couple of beers with the other arm. - a little laughter helps.

Mike ,good luck on your recovery.Whats a little shoulder surgery after all you have been through. Hopefully you can still handle that knife in the kitchen,Football season is right around the corner.

mike

Thanks everyone. Wish I could have a beer but can't with the antibiotics I am taking. my shoulder is sore but nothing I can't handle. I can't move my shoulder at all yet but at least I can move my elbow,wrist and hand. This is nothing compared to some of the other surgeries I have had but I am a lot older so it will take a little longer to heal. Can't drive my van is the only thing I regret about it. Need to get it to a painter to have the name painted on it and also to the upholstery shop to get the headliner and maybe some other upholstery work done. I will have the same painter do this one that did the tru fire etc. on Vanishing Breed. I decided to name the van "Route 66 Cruiser".

got the bandages off today and there are six incisions not the four like I was led to believe. Still can't move my shoulder but I am working on it. I can't drive my van and that is the worst part of having the surgery.