It’s been quite an interesting week around here, from ice storms to big progress on our house to birthday parties and dinners with friends. However, the biggest theme of our past week has been healing from my burn incident last Saturday.
I feel very fortunate that I’ve had very little pain and that everything seems to be healing well so far. I’ve begun seeing a wound doctor. (And, yes, that’s really a thing apparently!) I had difficulty figuring out the right type of doctor to see initially: I started by booking an appointment with a dermatologist, who then told me that I needed to call a plastic surgeon, who told me I needed to see a wound doctor. It was a little frustrating being bounced around the medical world for five days before finally being able to schedule a visit with someone to see my burns, but the wound doctor I finally landed with is awesome. Truthfully, I expected her to have some magical serum or technique to help my healing, but the reality was that she told me to ditch the Silvadene (something about “metabolic derangement” — which is a phrase that scary enough to convince me haha), and I’ve been using Bacitracin on my arms and face ever since. The wound doctor’s other instructions were pretty simple: Keep the wounds moist and covered, eat well, and drink lots of water. Oh, and she also told me not to shower or get any water on my wounds…to which I simply laughed. Did I mention I have KIDS?!? I have been minimizing my showers and wearing these crazy rubber gloves that go up to my shoulders while bathing the girls, but I haven’t gone totally unshowered as she ordered. #badpatient
The wound doctor sent me to the plastic surgeon because she said I’ll definitely have scarring on my arms. So I went, of course, although the plastic surgeon couldn’t really do anything for me at our first appointment. In fact, the general consensus among all the specialty doctors I’ve talked to is “heal first, then come see me.” However, it was good for me to hear from a second source exactly what the wound doctor had told me; plus I got a little education on scars and scar creams. I also got a good talking to about sunscreen, and so it seems that I’ll be uber pale and wearing a swim shirt for at least the next year. (Maybe not the year for us to venture to the beach as a family? Ha!) In fact, the doctor told me to wear SPF 100, which I immediately asked if he was exaggerating — and he replied with a chuckle, “Of course. Well, not really. But kind of.” Yeesh.
So here are my burns eight days later:
Getting better, right? I woke up on Saturday and felt like overnight I had turned a corner in my healing, like some major improvements had been made while I slept. I still have to see the wound doctor twice a week for a couple of weeks, and I’ll go see the plastic surgeon once those scars begin to form, but other than that, I see a tiny light down there at the end of the tunnel.
This is somewhat unrelated, but the morning before I went to see the plastic surgeon E.V. and I did a little art project. It’s been so cold and miserable that we’re trying to keep busy (and keep her from climbing all over my burned arms), and I thought it would be a good idea to include her in my venture into painting fondant. I had thought I would paint Cricket’s birthday cake next month but wanted to try it out first. The result? Totally doable (really it’s just like painting), but not worth the after-effects — namely the staining! My hands were hot pink and green and it took a TON of baking soda and scrubbing to get them somewhat clean. Let’s just say that they were still bright and crazy-looking by the time my appointment rolled around, so when the surgeon first looked at my arms (and hands), he had a look of silent confusion on his face. What, you’ve never seen bright green burns before, doctor? ;)
Thankfully E.V. was much neater than I was (surprisingly), and Cricket — well, Cricket always manages to keep herself entertained either in my lap or exploring on her own. ;)
