Got a Valentine’s card for both of us from mom and dad and a letter from Bob.

In the car, on our way out to the appointments, I nearly killed Tom with this journal. The sun reflected in his eyes, nearly blinding him.

Actually, I really want to go get some letters written. Typed, I mean, so I’ll come back later and write.

Later...

OK, all about my appointment now. My hearing has increased by almost ½, but it could’ve been better if my ear canal wasn’t squished shut. The inner ear is still looking great and the skin graft has healed well, even though it’s not as thick as he’d like it to be. In 4-6 weeks he does have to operate again to re-open the outer ear canal. The good news is that this operation will take only two hours and not 5. Recovery will be speedy and virtually painless. Nowhere near as rough as the last time. No pressure strap either! I hated that thing. He thinks that that’s what may have caused the plastic piece in the frame to poke through. He had to do it, however, to stop the major bleeding. He’s gonna vaporize the area with a laser. The two reasons he’s got to operate are so I don’t get a deadly infection, which would most definitely happen. Also, so I can hear even better. He bluntly admitted that his territory is the inner ear only. At least we know he doesn’t have an ego. We’re being referred to a Dr. Joganic who does the outer ear stuff. They’re gonna see if they can team up together so they can both do their stuff in 1 operation.

I’ll probably have 3 choices as far as what can be done about the plastic piece that’s exposed. 1. To hack off the upper ear completely. This is probably what I’ll do cuz it seems to be the quickest and easiest thing. So, my ear will be uglier than all hell. Oh well. 2. Is to rebuild it from scratch. Supposedly the doctor can take cartilage from my ribs. Having an incision in my belly area probably won’t tickle, but at least I don’t care about the scar. Not when I already have a million scars and stretch marks and other skin defects. 3. Is to do nothing about it at all if that’s not dangerous.

Dr. Neilson said he’d do another skin graft from the same area under my left upper arm. The scar tissue apparently built up and squished the ear canal shut, so this is why he’s got to re-graft the outer canal. He said there’s a 98% success rate for the second operation keeping the canal wide open.

I had been worried that I wouldn’t be able to get on with my life and that I’d have a million doctor’s appointments a month for the next year or so, but he said not to worry and to go ahead and get on with my life.