Chapter 25 – Surgery

"Sweetheart, you don't have to share with me, if you don't want to." Maura told her wife as they sat on the couch.

"No, you asked earlier and I said I would share what I remembered about my various surgeries. I know you are concerned since I told you about how from time to time, I feel the pain at my wound sites as if the injury had happened all over again."

"If it is too much I understand. You don't have to share, the mere fact that you want to is enough for me. I don't want you to suffer any pain by sharing your memories." Maura knew that certain memories triggered Jane and she did not want Jane to be triggered. Jane had given her complete access to her medical history and she had read about the surgeries, so Jane explaining about them really wasn't necessary.

"Sometimes, I feel it is therapeutic to talk about it and I have never talked to you about my shoulder surgeries and I know you have questions about when I shot myself. Look woman, I am in a sharing mood, so you better just let me share." Jane told Maura as she pulled her in for a hug. They smiled at each other. Jane kissed the top of Maura's head as Maura settled into her side. Jane told her about her shoulder injury that she incurred while she was in the Air Force.

Jane began, "It was 1998 and I was finishing up my time in the Air Force. I was on a three-month deployment to Ahmad al-Jaber Air Base in Kuwait. We were on night patrol. Our convoy was ambushed and I was shot in the left shoulder. I continued firing and was struck a second time on the same shoulder. I passed out and fell into the Humvee. From there, I had to be told what happened."

The surgeon took Jane to the operating room after talking with the sergeant that had brought her in. He knew that Jane had lost a great deal of blood, he needed to get her stabilized as soon as possible.

He first needed to figure out which wound he needed to look at first. The wounds were so close together, he had another doctor work on one wound while he looked at the other. As soon as they stopped the bleeding, they could work on removing the bullets. If they had time, they could begin to fix the damage. They had limited equipment.

Both doctors were surprised to see tampons in the wounds. The primary surgeon told the other doctor, "The sergeant that brought her in stated that it was her idea to put the tampons in the Humvee's medical kit. She knew the importance of the tampon and shared it with her fellow service members. That thought is responsible for possibly saving her own life."

"We need to get her stabilized, she will be on the next medevac to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. They will finish up with her. If we can see the bullets then I will pull them out, otherwise, we stop the bleeding and get her on that plane."

Jane had been hit with two high caliber bullets. The bullets didn't strike any major arteries in the shoulder. One of the bullets missed the clavicle and hit the trapezius muscle. The other bullet hit the deltoid muscle.

The surgery took longer than expected. The surgeon knew when the plane was arriving and he needed to have Jane stabilized in time to get her on the plane. He worked as fast as he could. The first thing he had to do was figure out where all the blood had come from. He needed to make sure that she wasn't still bleeding internally.

Once he and his associate found where Jane was bleeding, they were able to stitch up the bleed site, then they could go about removing the bullets. Both wound sites had damage to the muscles. The surgeon did not have time to try and repair the wounds. His main goal was to stop the bleeding, which he had accomplished.

The secondary goal, if time permitted was to remove the bullets. Time permitted so the surgeon carefully removed the fragmented bullets. He cleaned up the wounds the best he could and closed up the wound site to prevent infection. He annotated her chart. The plane would be arriving soon and he needed to get Jane ready for transport. He placed the bullets in a zip lock bag and attached them to her chart.

The surgeon felt great, he was able to stop the bleeding and remove all the fragments of the bullets that he could see.Jane was now in the hands of the medics on the plane as she flew to Germany for further surgery.

Jane had no way of knowing that the Red Cross had contacted her emergency contact person, her cousin, Arianna. Arianna was also on her way to Germany. She would be there for Jane and to make sure that Jane was properly taken care of. Arianna had medical power of attorney and would act on Jane's behalf.

Arianna already knew that they would take Jane immediately in for surgery once she arrived. The team at Landstuhl knew that Arianna was coming and would assist her once she arrived. Jane had hoped that Arianna would never have to act in this capacity but she knew that her cousin would be able to do the right thing when the time came.

Jane had carefully thought about who she wanted to act on her behalf in case of emergency. She knew her mother would be beside herself and would not be able to perform the duty. She wasn't sure how her father would act, but she knew how Arianna would act so she chose her. Arianna was nervous when Jane asked her to be her emergency point of contact and next of kin. After a short discussion, she agreed to do this for Jane.

When Arianna arrived at the hospital, a nurse met with her and explained that the doctor would be out to talk with her as soon as he could. The nurse couldn't believe how much Arianna looked like Jane, they could have been twins.

Jane's body had been under duress from the gun shots and then the travel to Germany. The doctor knew he needed to bring Jane out of the medically induced coma as soon as possible. They took x-rays and then brought Jane out of the medically induced coma. Jane was still very groggy and probably wouldn't remember much as she had to be put back under two hours later so that the team at Landstuhl could operate on her. The team prayed that two hours was enough time to give Jane's body a little reprieve from its ordeal.

The team at Landstuhl were repairing the damage to the trapezius and deltoid muscles. It would take a few hours as they had to prepare the muscles to position themselves for the satellite cells to regenerate properly. They also had to remove some smaller bullet fragments that were not removed in the field. Jane wouldn't be able to use her shoulder until the muscles had time to regenerate and heal. Then she would need physical therapy to rebuild the strength in her muscles.

The team of Landstuhl were pleased with the fact the field surgeon had been able to remove the bullets and clean the wound sites. That meant that they didn't have to take time to extensively clean the wounds. They still had to clean the wounds but not as extensively as they had thought.

After several hours, the surgeon closed Jane's wounds and went out to talk to Arianna. He explained to Arianna about the surgery and how Jane's body would take over and begin the healing process. He informed her that Jane wouldn't be able to move her shoulder for quite some time as the muscles needed time to heal. Jane would have to stay at Landstuhl for a few weeks so that he could monitor her recovery.

Maura knew that they had almost lost Jane in Kuwait. The blood loss was extensive and if the sergeant hadn't used the tampons to slow down the bleeding, Jane probably would have died. Maura hated that Jane had gone through that. But what concerned her most was the trauma that she saw Jane go through when she shot herself in front of BPD.

"Jane, I hate that you had to go through that. Our body is an amazing … well it is just amazing. If you didn't have a scar on your shoulder, I wouldn't know that you had an injury as your range of motion doesn't seem to be affected by the injury."

"It took me time in physical therapy to strengthen my muscles. I had to wait to begin physical therapy as I had to give the muscles time to repair themselves. Arianna was a huge help, she kept a positive attitude and kept reminding me of my dream about joining BPD. I had to stay on track with my PT if I wanted to achieve my goals."

"I love Arianna, she is a very positive person."

"That she is and she loves you also. Now let me tell you about why I shot myself and how learning about the body from watching all of those autopsies with you helped me survive that ordeal." Jane went on to explain to Maura why she felt the need to shoot herself and that she knew that if she was able to angle the shot correctly, she could take out Bobby in the process.

Maura had been so upset when Jane shot herself and a huge part of that was because Jane wouldn't talk about why she did it and that bugged her. Now that Jane explained and answered her questions, she could finally let that trauma slip into the background of her thoughts.

Maura loved how over the years Jane was more open about her feelings and was able to share them with her. She loved her detective but it had taken years to get her to talk about things that she didn't want to talk about. Jane was very stubborn and Maura felt the best way to react to Jane's stubbornness was for her to be just as stubborn.

When Jane felt that she had shared enough, she took Maura in her arms and started kissing her. She would rather kiss Maura then talk, so she continued to kiss her wife. Maura knew that Jane was finished sharing and found that she rather enjoyed kissing her wife, so no more talking was necessary. She would enjoy this version of what her wife wanted to share with her.