I had the side of my right toe nail excised yesterday. After several shots of novocaine, they cut my nail from top to bottom, removed it completely and bandaged it up. I went on my way thinking, OK, this is no big deal.
Forward to yesterday and last night. I have never been in so much pain. The pain from neither my knee or shoulder surgeries was anything like what I experienced last night. I suppose it's because I didn't have any pain medication other than OTC Advil and/or Tylenol. I got no sleep and was up wandering the house all night. For some reason, it felt better when I was on my feet.
Today I need to remove the bandage, do an Epsom salts soak and rebandage. I do this for two weeks, along with another antibiotic. My doctor was confident infection would not be an issue. The nail will take many months to grow back in, and the hope (but no guarantee) is that it will not grow curved which is what was causing my chronic ingrown nail.
I'm even skipping the gm this morning, which is unheard of for me. Hopefully, I can get a shoe on later today. Right now I'm unsure of whether I should call and ask for a stronger pain med or wait and see what today and tonight brings. I have some oxycodone left from my knee replacement but really don't want to go back to that.
Anyway, the reason I did the nail excision was to lower the chances of an infection in my knee replacement. After all this, I sure hope it works. I did do some lymphatic massage and massaged the swollen area on the side of my knee and I do believe it helped. So, yay for that.