Nurse approached me with a handful of bits and pieces and a silver bowel - She said it was time to remove the dressing and leave the wound open to dry out, she slowly pulled the sticky tape off that was holding the dressings on, I felt nothing due to the epidural completely numbing that area.
I almost passed out with shock and horror when I saw what was under the dressings, not a nice little 3-4 inch scar but a 15 inch incision going from just under the sternum down to the left middle of my left hand side hip! it had 34 staples holding this wound together, I must be honest though there was no blood on the dressing and the wound was sealed together very very well indeed.
I was dreading the staples coming out I thought this is going to hurt.