I severed most of my right hand in 1989 in an accident and had to have it surgically reconstructed by doctors at the Campbell Clinic in Memphis. There was no pain at the time of the accident because nerves were severed, but after surgery I had to stay at the old Baptist Hospital on Union Ave. for about a week with my arm in a box that kept the hand pointed upwards, and the room temp had to stay above 85* for the week. They hooked me up to a morphine 'drip' machine where I could give myself a dose no more than 3x hourly.
I was really concerned with this because I fought heroin addiction for awhile after I got out of the military in 1972, but in the end I went with it as the feeling, and PAIN, begin to come back into my hand, along with the misery of the really hot room.
It was all I could do after the first 3-4 days not to push that toggle switch and release a dose of morphine whenever it was available, but I slowed the doses down because I did not want to again go through the fight to kick it that I went through in the 70s.
And then afterwards I had to go through a year of occupation therapy with therapists literally torturing me so that I could learn to use my right hand again, and not going to lie, there were times I wished I was back on that drip machine because the pain involved in the therapy was much greater than any pain I experienced at the time of the injury or the hospital.
Therapists are sadists.
I kid, I kid. I never got the full use of my hand again, but considering when I first got to the emergency room they were going to amputate it, at least having partial use of the hand was better than the alternative.
And a large shout out to those sadists for giving me at least most of the use of my hand again.
.
Just Sign him.
