Before the surgery, my doc told me I wouldn’t have to have those screws I’d been readin g about. “I don’t leave anything in your foot.” Sounded good to me. So it was so strange on that first visit last week when I saw these little thingys protruding from my feet (in between my big & 2nd toe) – what on EARTH could those be?

“Those are your pins.” Ah yes – the Pins. No screws – but pins.

Well, I suppose that makes sense, given that they are breaking your feet- your bones gotta know how to grow back! Such detail was not really where I wanted to “go” before the surgery, but now that it’s done, bring it on. They broke the bones and reset them. Yippee. No wonder my feet are all black & blue. Suffice to say that when I cognitively was *aware* of the pins, that I became very very clear as to why I had that sharp kind pf pain in a triangular area at the top of my foot. Before learning this, I chalked it up to an amorphous sort of “healing” in “that area” – well now it was crystal clear. And made this day all the more meaningful: the pins were going to be removed! No more pin pain!

Tobee, unlike Kelly and like most people we know, opted not to sit in the room and look. I took one last picture of my feet with pins in them and then thrust my head back while the doc went to work. And it WAS work: it was not a gentle removal of an acupuncture-thin needle. It was a YANK of a strong, thick, sturdy needle that had made its home inside my foot for a while. It was not fun. It surely could not have been pretty.

Once that painful ordeal was done, the prickly pain of pulling out the stitches was NOTHING – heck, it was only skin deep. And the doc then confided that he hates doing the pin thing. “I dislike it more than you, trust me.”

Glad he told me when it was done.