comment: >
  
  The liver can to a certain extent. Also the lymphatic system - mine reconnected itself after all the nodes were removed from my armpit.
context: This is a friendly reminder to read our rules.
  Remember, /r/Showerthoughts is for showerthoughts, not "thoughts had in the shower!"
  (For an explanation of what a "showerthought" is, please read this page.)
  Rule-breaking posts may result in bans. >
  
  Surgery can also force a heal where your body erroneously thinks it's perfectly fine >
  
  Isn’t that the premise behind microdermabrasion or whatever it’s called? Basically lots of minor cuts in the skin that has sun damage or something with the hope being that, because of the cuts, the body will heal damaged skin that the body previously “thought” was fine? >
  
  This is also the idea behind lots of acupuncture practice.  You create a small injury or series of small injuries that bring blood and trigger a healing response in those areas. >
  
  Uh, no bro. It works by aligning your chakras with the healing meridians, which dissipates bad vibrations and allows the positive quantum energies to flow while also flushing the toxins from your body. >
  
  r/yourjokebutworse >
  
  Lol it's definitely a joke. >
  
  If it wasn’t r/yourjokebutworse then it was r/woosh >
  
  hey there's no reason it can't be both! >
  
  As someone who just went through heart surgery last week, this is the hope. It's hard to justify the current pain when the previous symptoms weren't that bad. But the long-term, preventative benefits should be worth it. >
  
  Also had open heart surgery and major abdominal surgery about 3 years ago. The long term benefits are definetly worth the first few weeks of suffering. It gets better trust me >
  
  Thanks. I was lucky that my valve repair was able to be done robotically through my side, so it should be a much easier recovery than full open heart. Glad you're better! >
  
  Ah damn, my sister has to get this (she’s 8) and her artery was too flexible so they have to do the full open heart surgery >
  
  I'm sure that's scary for you and her at such a young age. Hopefully that will help her body heal more easily. >
  
  Yeah wishing you a speedy recovery too! At least we have the technology :) >
  
  Surgeon: surgery is controlled trauma. It is often not in response to injury. >
  
  I like to say our trauma surgeons stab people to life >
  
  My orthopaed told me he's a "just a carpenter, but a very clean one".
  (I still got an infection after he rebuilt my hip, though.) >
  
  so, he’s just a carpenter, not particularly clean. >
  
  I had endocarditis and had to have open heart surgery but let me tell you- the second I woke up from surgery I felt A BILLION times better. I mean, getting cut open Fucking hurt, but having a vegetation in my heart valve hurt WAYYYYY more. I’ve never been in so much pain! >
  
  Pain due to decreased heart blood supply is one of, if not, the worst pain anyone could ever feel. Glad you’re doing better now >
  
  I had no idea that’s why it hurt so bad!! It was definitely a terrifying experience. >
  
  Plus if you get steel permanently grafted onto your skeleton, in said surgery as I did, it makes you harder to kill both in life and after, once you join the ranks of the skeleton army. >
  
  Got my stainless steel screws last week. Rebar for the bones. >
  
  Hehehe metal gang! I almost wanted it out because I thought it would hinder my body from repairing itself and because of the giant scar that comes with it. But really...I just look way more badass now. >
  
  Depends what it is. I had ACL reconstruction surgery - there's no way for your body to repair a torn ACL as far as I know >
  
  No, your body will not heal a torn or severed ACL. However, through surgery we can either “tie” the allograft to what is remaining or we will have to completely remove your ACL with an arthroscopic shaver and implant the allograft. >
  
  What happened if, say, an ancient Roman tore an ACL? Did it just hurt real bad for the rest of their life? Could they walk or at least limp? >
  
  You can walk and run somewhat fine with a torn ACL, I had a few friends who tore theirs (one even had no pain). but what you lose is your ability to cut, to turn quickly, and to rotate the knee, to be agile >
  
  Exactly. You would still maintain mobility but you would never be 100%. The ACLs primary job is to prevent the tibia of the lower leg from sliding too far anterior to the knee and femur. 
  Imagine your lower leg being in front of your knee and now imagine the pain you may feel. I’ve seen plenty of people who have torn and nearly severed ACLs who state they have no pain or limited mobility. It varies as much as each individual does. There are tell-tale signs such as instability where the knee will freely move. However, we mostly just go off of what an MRI and physical exam says paired with patient complaint. >
  
  When I got my wisdom teeth removed I remember thinking it truly felt like "controlled trauma" and honestly that's kinda what all surgeries are, I mean getting cut open is pretty traumatic for your body, regardless of context. >
  
  Just had an abdominalplasty, aka a tummy tuck. Lost 115lbs and had a lot of loose skin to remove. I thought, being quite desensitized and already working in healthcare, that watching the surgery be performed via YouTube videos wasn't gunna effect me.
  Yeahhhhhhhhh it did. Shouldn't have done that. Went in to the procedure with a LOT of anxiety after watching videos of people literally skinning someone alive, sticking/tightening the stomach muscles, and then just casually yanking the remaining skin down and stapling it together. It's so fucking weird. It's SO traumatic to the body and yet here I am, alive and well, despite being skinned alive.
  Oh I also watched a ton of knee replacement surgeries. Goddamn the human body is amazing in what it survives. >
  
  Oh my gosh my Aunt just got a very similar surgery and that poor woman could barely move, and she's usually very spry and athletic so it's rough to see.  I hope you are recovering well, it seems very rough on the body to basically be flayed as you said lol >
  
  FAR worse than I expected, not gunna lie. And having watched the videos, I understand why 😆 I'm 2 1/2 weeks in and just now able to walk around again. It also fucks with you for a bit -- not being able to move at all. I give major props to people who end up hospitalized for months on end and gotta do rehab to get their basic functions back. It's terrifying to lose control like that. >
  
  One of my favorite Cardiac ICU attendings during training started a lesson on post-op management with "Is heart surgery good for a heart?" and the answer is "Of course not! It's terrible, here's how we fix all the problems the surgeons just caused." 
  Of course, for non-medical folk, the main indication for congenital corrective heart surgery is not to help the heart but to keep the heart from killing the body. Because yeah... it's nothing you'd do without a damn good reason. >
  
  I tell my trauma patients this all the time. “Your body has been through 2 traumas. It doesn’t know that the 2nd was highly planned and organized, it just says WTF all over again” >
  
  My surgery was way worse than the situation I had. Yeah, there was a tumor in my leg that at times was annoying. Holy fuck is getting your quadriceps cut into and sawn back together much much worse in the short term. I have never been in as much pain as the day after surgery when my leg swelled up against adhesive gauzes and sutures.
  If everything goes right they should fix me up for good today as the surgery wound did not heal properly and left me with a sizable hole on my leg for the past month and a half. At least that does not hurt right now and the leg is just weak, let's see after they are done with me again. >
  
  Huh, not going to lie, the comment section is actually a lot tamer then I assumed it would get. >
  
  I'm getting knee surgery next year. I've always been wary of surgery, I have an unfounded fear of anesthesia, but now being in constant pain and unable to live my regular life, I am very excited to be sliced open and repaired. >
  
  As someone who is just now getting to the 90%+ recovery stage of a completely obliterated ankle (think bones of tibia, fibula, and ankle = dust) it’s so worth it. I know your injury is probably a bit different as it sounds like you’re living with debilitating wear and tear rather than experiencing an acute injury, but I went an entire week praying it was just a sprain. Deep down I knew it wasn’t a sprain because my shit was like jello and my entire leg was purple. 
  Anyway, You’ll go from thinking you’ll never have a properly working joint ever again to wondering how the hell modern medicine can completely reverse what seems like a life altering injury. Surgery when necessary is one of the greatest human feats. >
  
  This is just reinforcing my belief that ankle sprains are more painful than ankle breaks because I did something similar a few months ago and also thought my ankle was just sprained until several doctors were like “buddy look at the X-ray.” >
  
  It need not be injuries. Many diseases require surgery to prevent further harm. And not all injuries require surgery. >
  
  Precisely. There are many procedures that are simply performed to minimize the possibility of “unforeseen” complications. 
  Imagine a river that experiences immense flooding that is causing significant deterioration of the shoreline. Deciding to put up a dam isn’t going to fix a river that’s already running well. However, it will control the amount of water until, hopefully, there is less damage to the shoreline. Weird analogy but it was the first I could think of. 
  As you said, surgery is often the last resort when it comes to injuries. Physical therapy and rehabilitation are always going to be first in a patient’s prognosis. >
  
  I had my first hip scope in 2011 and second on the other side in 2019. I knew what happened the moment I started feeling that familiar pain. My second labral repair has not healed as perfectly as the first but still it’s far better than the pain of the tear. Good luck! >
  
  Got to say this have given me a bit of anxiety about having my second one done haha. Are you UK based? Thanks for the well wishes >
  
  Absolutely, it’s normal to have anxiety about surgery! Outcomes for this procedure are generally really good though and from what I understand surgery is the only option to fix this type of injury and the deformity in the bone that causes it. Located in the US- it was tough to find a surgeon in 2011 but hip labral tears are much more recognized and diagnosed now than they were 10 years ago. >
  
  So what you're saying is surgery is the bodies equivalent to going over permanent marker with a dry erase marker to wipe it away? >
  
  My dad had a double lung transplant, which requires a lifetime of any rejection treatment. He traded a disease they had no idea how to reset for one they know a little more about treating. >
  
  It can also excise and/or remove an injury that won't heal (bullet,  cancer). >
  
  Sometimes it replaces an injury that is going to heal wrong with an injury that’s going to heal right. >
  
  A cesarean section isn’t replacing an injury necessarily, although it sure creates one. >
  
  The growth would kill you left untreated.  I’d count it. >
  
  I call surgery “controlled stabbing “ >
  
  Chemotherapy is is killing your entire body slowly enough that maybe that one problematic part will die before the rest. >
  
  Just had surgery 3 days ago to remove hardware I had in my ankle from a high-speed crush injury last year. The hardware was starting to bother my tendons and I had substantial scar tissue in my ankle that needed to be removed. While it doesn’t hurt near as bad as the surgery after the initial injury, it still definitely hurts. Lots of nerve pain and numbness which I expected but I forgot how much it annoys me. Recovery will be a lot faster this time(hopefully) so I just have to wait it out. >
  
  I’ve had a couple of surgeries recently and it’s definitely worse before it’s better. The depressing stage. Yea >
  
  Yeah I mean you think we know how to "heal" anything? It's all just optimization of our bodies >
  
  My pops had a triple bypass on the 8th.
  His surgery was not to repair an injury. But they did crack his sternum open. >
  
  I hope he's healing up well >
  
  Depends on the surgery. With good cauterization you can pretty much stand up and walk out of the hospital after intensely invasive surgeries like bone cancer being removed from a femur and replaced with an implant. >
  
  I read somewhere that a doctor's primary and most powerful tool is your body's own miraculous healing powers. So yeah, sounds about right. >
  
  Yeah. The metal plate in my leg was much easier than the broken bone. >
  
  In many cases surgery has absolutely nothing to do with injury, or trauma of any kind. Consider genetic disorders, anatomical and developmental abnormalities, illness or even to facilitate diagnosis. >
  
  As someone currently waiting to get admitted into surgery, this is a really nice way to look at it. Thank you for that shower thought. >
  
  I was pooping my pants. The one thing I can say is: with proper anesthesia, you won't feel a damn thing and it's glorious, I was awake and merrily (more or less) chatting with the surgeons: "wait, what do you mean 'it ain't there, we are going deeper', dude".
  The recovery sucks, but hey... the scary part is actually not bad at all. Better than the dentist's actually. You go and show them. >
  
  I agree. I'm currently on day 5 of my hemorrhoidoctomy and I am going through freaking hell. Idk what was worse tbh either way nomore bleeding >
  
  If you make a statement broad enough anything can be applied to it. May as well make phycic predictions next. >
  
  Except for electives like a boob job where the only injury is insecurity and it can never be healed.. >
  
  I'll be sure to tell both my aunts that had double mastectomies that they were just insecure 🙄 >
  
  I'm pretty sure no one uses "boob job" as a synonym to mastectomy. >
  
  .... They both received reconstructive implants after their mastectomies >
  
  I'm pretty sure no one uses "boob job" as a synonym for reconstructive implants either. 
  Pretty sure you know "boob job" is commonly used to describe getting breast implants to look "sexier". Not when describing cosmetic surgeries for removing/restoring breast as a result of fighting breast cancer.
  Cancer isn't a joke. Hope your aunts are doing great 👍 Stop being a twat. >
  
  My one aunt (and a couple other women I know who've had double mastectomies) refers to it as a "boob job"; sometimes people who've experienced severe trauma use humor as a coping mechanism.  My aunts (and the other women I know) are doing well thanks, no cancer return more than ten years out for both my aunts, 30 for one of the other women. And thanks for calling me a twat, I definitely deserved it for offering a different perspective based on my experience 👍 >
  
  You're assuming that your body would heal from the original injury by itself. >
  
  If only the body could actually repair any kind of damage on its own.