One of the joys of the post surgical process is coming home with surgical drains. Each drain hangs from a tube just somehow stuck into your underarm area. It’s uncomfortable, feels a bit like you’re being stuck randomly by safety pins, and you get the joy of emptying it out 3x/day and measuring the output. What, you may ask, is actually in the drain? As best I can tell, it’s body gook … the lovely red/yellow liquid that would normally build up internally now drains effortlessly into this little light bulb size Tupperware container that hangs randomly at the end of a long tube from your under arm, like a dysfunctional Christmas Tree ornament.
Like most mothers of teen agers, I struggle to find ways to make my daughters listen to me. I’ve tried all the things they suggest in the parenting book, but somehow, my girls always seem to have the upper hand. UNTIL NOW!!!! Last week, my daughter was acting up a bit, and I was tired of trying to be the perfect parent. As she was sassing it up, I held out my surgical drain as though I were a gun slinger in the wild wild west, and I said, “if you mess with me again, I will squirt bodily fluids at you”. I smiled calmly and just tucked it back into the little hospital fanny pack where it normally sits during the day. Let’s just say I’ve had no sassy talk from my daughter this week 
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