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Diaries of a Spontaneous Pneumothorax

An honest account of corrective surgery, consisting of a bullectomy and pleurectomy, undergone in order to prevent future spontaneous pneumothorax. As a subject which seems to be lacking information online, the purpose of this blog is to focus on my own personal experience of surgery and my post-operative recovery, in the hope that it will help answer the questions of others who may find themselves in a similar situation to my own.

Dressing gone!

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Finally felt brave enough to spend a day without the dressing on the chest drain wound. Looks pretty good so fingers crossed heals well :)

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I hope that these accounts are of some help to those of you out there in the same situation as I was a week ago. Please feel free to leave a comment, whether it is an experience of your own or a question you would like to ask and hopefully we can encourage more people to discuss this issue. Thank you

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A afternoon update

Another good night's sleep which is nice to report. Only issue once again was the arm. It is still sensitive to the touch and although this is improving it seems the pain is becoming more muscular. I have been trying to do my stretches to prevent frozen shoulde, however I am unable to raise my arm up by my side whilst keeping it straight. It feels like the muscles want to tear, mainly under my bicep. I hope his fades soon and will keep an eye on it. On a positive note I don't seem to need quite so many painkillers these days. Taking them a little les often and trying to alternate between paracetamol and dihydrocodeine. Excersie wise, I advise walking in good shoes as when I walked in a pair of flip flops yesterday, my feet had no cushioning and the steps could be felt in my chest. Without painkillers this was a bit much and had to really slow down the pace.

How I got here

How I came to end up needing surgery. First things first I will introduce myself. My name is Emma and I am a 25 year old female, about 6ft tall and around 67kg. Seems a strange number of statistics to include, but if you have found this blog because you have, like myself, suffered a spontaneous pneumothorax (SP), you will probably also know that your height and weight are about the only things doctors can point to as to why you have ended up in this unfortunate situation. So there you go, tall and slim, fit the bill perfectly. Just another thing to add to the list of things that make it a pain in the arse being tall....but everyone will still tell you you're so lucky! So...I am pretty new to blogging, in fact I have never done it before now, however I have found myself doing nothing but reading blogs these past few weeks. Why? Because for some reason there is very little information anywhere else (including from the doctors) as to what I should come to expect once I have

Globulus hystericus.... or That lump in throat feeling

Ok, so this is really starting to get on my nerves now and has been brought to my attention after experiencing this feeling quite badly during a short walk to the post office today. It made me feel quite unfit and a little panicked. I have a feeling in my throat (not sure if I have mentioned this before) and it feels like a ball or a small tablet is just lodged in my throat and won't go down. It feels as though it is in the back of the throat and feels worse when I press the part of the neck at the base which dips inwards between the collar bones. It isn't painful at all, just a really unpleasant feeling which makes it feel like you can't swallow or breathe properly (even though I can). As you can imagine, feeling like you can't breathe after lung surgery isn't so great! From what I have read online this is due to an inflammation of the muscles in the throat and is likely due to anxiety or stress . Another possibility is that it is reflux acid. The strange thi

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Globulus hystericus.... or That lump in throat feeling

Ok, so this is really starting to get on my nerves now and has been brought to my attention after experiencing this feeling quite badly during a short walk to the post office today. It made me feel quite unfit and a little panicked. I have a feeling in my throat (not sure if I have mentioned this before) and it feels like a ball or a small tablet is just lodged in my throat and won't go down. It feels as though it is in the back of the throat and feels worse when I press the part of the neck at the base which dips inwards between the collar bones. It isn't painful at all, just a really unpleasant feeling which makes it feel like you can't swallow or breathe properly (even though I can). As you can imagine, feeling like you can't breathe after lung surgery isn't so great! From what I have read online this is due to an inflammation of the muscles in the throat and is likely due to anxiety or stress . Another possibility is that it is reflux acid. The strange thi

Anxiety and A&E

January 15, 2016

So... the past few days I have been having quite a lot of anxiety surrounding some pain and sensations in my right hand chest. I have written about this in a bit more detail in some of my pages, however wanted to share a quick update to my posts. I had an intermittent pain between the right shoulder blade and my spine...a common pneumothorax symptom, and I had a dull ache in my side with a very persistent grinding sensation in my chest, which was quite familiar in feeling to the bubbling sensation I had during a collapsed lung. I went online as you do to seek some reassurance and kept telling myself it was probably just a dull muscular ache. The spirometer level looked good and I had a lot of messages from people on Facebook groups who responded to my concerned post and told me it was probably nothing and quite normal. Despite all this however, I found myself in A&E yesterday to get checked out. The anxiety was causing me issues, probably more than anything else, so I figur

More wound worries

So I am awaiting the results of a swab from the wound site which was taken yesterday. They should be with me by Wednesday. This morning the wound felt a little more tender than yesterday and I removed the dressing to take a look as I noticed a small part looked a little damp. There was not a lot of fluid on the dressing, but what there was had dried slightly yellow and the scab had also decided to fall off at last. What is left is a circular pit in my skin which has a think white opaque fluid in it. I'm pretty certain it's infected and am more convinced after looking at the photo of it a couple of weeks ago. Now I am wondering whether to just wait for the swab results, or if I should go to the walk in centre (I'm visiting family so no access to local GP) and have a doctor there take a look. The benefit of this is some antibiotics two days earlier, but of course they may not be the right ones I'm which case I may as well have just waited. Also it's a walk in centr

Day of the surgery

Please see the full page (link at top of page) for an updated version Nil by mouth by midnight A horrible phrase and one I hope not to hear all too often again. This was the first hurdle to overcome, and as someone with IBS who needs to eat regularly to avoid stomach upset, a huge challenge...or so I thought it would be. I awoke on the morning of the surgery with no hunger pangs and this continued for most of the day. Whether my sub-conscience had mentally prepared my body for this I'm not sure, but I was hugely grateful nevertheless! Drinking Water I would also like to add that my anaesthetist was kind enough to point out that although 'nil by mouth' includes water, I was allowed to drink water up to 4 hours prior to surgery. I urge anyone who is unfortunate enough to have an afternoon surgery to check if this is ok for you as being hydrated certainly helps evade the hunger and at least allows for better veins for that anaesthetic. Im an advocate of reading

4 weeks since discharged!

So it's been four weeks since I was allowed to go home and just under five since the surgery. All in all I think I'm doing pretty well, especially when I consider that after reading a lot of blogs pre-op I was expected up to a three month recovery of hell! Today was quite a good milestone too, no painkillers until 6:30pm!!! And that was only after quite a fast paced walk that I think rattled the ribs a bit. The arm is still giving me some grief but I often don't notice it for a while at a time....usually worse on an evening when I'm more relaxed. Anyhow....just wanted to say, one month on and feeling pretty good :)