First post-operative day today. Felt strangely apprehensive about going to bed last night as I didn't want to end up lying on the operation site in my sleep but in the end tiredness got the better of me. I finally got off to sleep in the early hours and in fact did wake up lying on the side that had been operated on and I was surprised turning onto it hadn't woken me up. The dressing seems to be staying in place fine which is good, I really want it to stay there until next week's review appointment so that it has the best possible chance of healing and staying infection free.

In terms of pain I have had some discomfort, nothing more than that and I have not felt the need to take any painkillers at all and that's not down to bravery for sure! One real surprise to me today was when I looked down at my legs this morning, I found that a large area of my right upper thigh has been shaved and was a bare as a baby's backside! Nobody had mentioned that this was going to happen and my assumption is that is was to allow the connection of the diathermy (monopolar) to stop bleeding during the operation. Had quite a laugh when I saw it!

It's quite surprising to feel just how much scalp movement there is related to facial expression. I find when I move the muscles of my face, especially by raising my eyebrows, that this causes quite a bit of discomfort around the operation site. This will subside over the next few days I'm sure. Simple answer to the problem, don't raise eyebrows!

Have to confess to having been feeling a bit sorry for myself today. As things stand I've taken what feels like a step backwards as I was managing Ok but now I feel that I've got all the disadvantages of being deaf and I've now also got the discomfort of the operation site and the peg in my skull to go with the deafness. If things are much improved when everything has settled down and the processor is fitted it will of course all have been worth it but as things stand just now I have the worst of both worlds.

So, apart from that there has been no real change, I had expected to feel really +ve with the operation now behind me and I guess that feeling a bit low about things may also be in part due to the anaesthetic but who knows, I am sure it will pass. For the moment I'm just looking forward to the time when the processor is fitted and hoping for the best, it's great to at least have been given the chance of an improvement and I'm very grateful for that.