First, SORRY! Wife and I both have had that experience.
It hurts at first and so does the therapy afterwards. And that crappy designed foam pad they put under the arm sling you'll have to wear for a few weeks was designed by a sadist. BUT, you'll live. When the pain finally goes away you'll be glad you had it done. The pre-surgery pain has to be pretty bad before most of us agree to have it done so the benefit is going to be significant even if you never fully recover 100%.
The small incisions won't be a problem but you better keep the incisions clean, dry and uncontaminated; those cuts go to the bone and you sure don't want an infection in there. Immediately after the surgery you're going to have a good bit of internal bleeding that will gravity infiltrate into your fore arm. It can't be drained so it will have to be absorbed naturally and that will require a few weeks; a large portion of your lower arm will be colored like an egg plant! Until it's gone you'll have tissue irration and forearm swelling to the point of being significantly painful by itself; you'll live.
Main thing - the MOST IMPORTANT thing - is to NOT STRESS the arm at all immediately after the surgery nor during the healing so the new attachments can heal properly. IF you don't, you can rip them from together as I did one biceps attachment when I rolled on it in my sleep the night of surgery and now, 5 years later, fully half of my unattached right bicepts has atropied away. Remember all that attaching stuff is done on the very ends of raw flesh and there's NOTHING you can do to speed the required healing that has to occur before you can safely stress it. (My original shoulder injury was so severe I had a complete joint replacement about four years later. Then I slept for two weeks in my den recliner chair so I wouldn't roll over - doing that may help you too!)
The weeks of therapy are a mixed blessing - it hurts but you can have the delight of watching your own improvement! They will likely give you a list of exercise to do at home; do them. And do them as they say, don't play tuff guy and do them excessively, it will be weeks before you can safely stress the tie points. Do as you're told and eventually the attachments will heal and likely be as strong as ever - try to macho hurry it and you may never get back to 100%.
My surgeon wasn't a shooter and had no idea of when it would be safe to shoot again so I waited a full year before I subjected me to the impulse loading of recoil. And then it was a .243, and another 6 months before I fired a .30-06 - and that was for both surgeries.
After the pains subside, the worst things will be taking care of yourself. Forget showering until the incisions heal but if you have a hand held shower you can at least do your lower body with it, otherwise expect to sit in a tub. You'll get to experience things an infant has to learn when you feed yourself, shave, brush your teeth and wipe your butt with a clumsy left hand; just do everything slow and expect to get a lil' poo on your elbow at times!
Hope all goes well for you, you WILL be in my prayers for at least the first weeks of recovery. Give us a report on how you're doing?
