Post surgery!!!!!!!!!!!

Mar 17, 2012

I can't believe that I have already been there and done that! There was a time that it seemed like surgery day would never come and here it is day 5 and I'm back home and everything!

Just for posterity's sake I'm going to talk about my surgery and hospitalization. Feel free to talk amongst yourselves whilst I ramble on.

Tuesday morning we got up early and headed to the hospital. We got there right on time and I was immediately taken back for presurgical prep. I had the usual vitals done and then had to strip and wash my belly with an iodine solution for 15 minutes. (Dip, squeeze, scrub. Dip, squeeze, scrub.)After that I put on the lovely gown, booties, and blue bonnet and awaited the arrival of the nurse. The pre-op nurse came in and started my IV, which was difficult as per my usual, and then she had to take blood out of my other arm because I'm such a pain in the ass. At this point I was only getting saline. I had placed a scopolamine patch behind my ear the night before. She then went and retrieved my husband to wait with me while I waited for surgery. While waiting hubby and I played checkers and chess on the iPad and talked about nothing much. The anesthesiologist came and and talked about his plans and Dr. Fontana (the surgeon) came in and talked about his plans. Both were very reassuring. Shortly before 10 a.m. The OR nurse and anesthesia nurse came to load me up with something fun and fetch me to the OR. I remember going into the OR, the anesthesia nurse telling me she was going to give me something that would make me forget.....and that's what I did!

My first memory after that is waking up with excruciating left shoulder pain and some pretty bad upper abdominal pain as well. It took a while for the Dilaudid to really help but my nurse was awesome. It was the end of her shift but she told her (hovering) supervisor that she was not leaving until my pain was under control. I was surprised by how difficult it was to get my pain to a reasonable level given that I'm usually such a light weight with stuff like that. Anyway, it finally settled down to something less excruciating and I was taken to my room where hubby was waiting. I'll admit, I was pretty miserable! My throat was so dry and sore and I couldn't really talk. I was still in pain but also high from the Dilaudid. They gave me some mouth swabs to use since I was NPO at this point and they were somewhat helpful. A few hours later I was able to get out of bed and do some walking that was wonderful! It was slow going but I was just happy to change positions and to do something. All the tubes trailing out of me were a giant pain in the ass, but not much I could do about that. That night I barely slept at all so I did my incentive spirometer and swabbed my mouth whenever I woke up. Hubby slept in the recliner in the room and didn't really get much sleep either.

Day 2 dawned bright and early with the radiology dude coming to take me for my leak test. Transferring to the gurney sucked ass, to be quite frank, but the dude kept pushing my PCA button for me so it was cool. When I got off the gurney in radiology I realized that I had started my period at some point during the night and didn't even realize it. It was kinda gross, but just one of those things. I had my leak test, which was pretty cool, and even though the stuff tasted nasty it was nice to actually swallow something! The test was good and I was sent upstairs where my catheter was removed (yay!). Hubby cleaned me up from my period mess and I put on a pad and underwear (sorry for the TMI, but this is for posterity, lol). Then I was able to start sipping. I was so happy to have one less tube and to be able to actually sip. Of course, sipping was way more difficult than I anticipated. But I did pretty good and was able to be taken off the PCA later that night, which made my IV lighter (yay again) and I was switched to liquid Lortab which worked way better than the Dilaudid had. At this point I also started needing Zofran IV because I was having some nausea, but nothing unbearable. Through all of this hubby and I were walking the halls and making our laps. And that night the nurse was able to find a cot for hubby to sleep on, for which he was eternally grateful! My shoulder pain peaked this night and I thought I was going to die, although I admit I didn't call for the nurse or anything. I did some shoulder exercises and deep breathing and that seemed to help.

Day 3 was discharge day and things went pretty quickly. In the morning the NP from the doc's office, wonderful, fantastic Valerie, came and pulled out my drain which was weird but not painful. She patched me up and gave me some instructions. After she left I even washed my hair in the sink because I felt so disgusting that I needed to do something! At 9:30 a.m. we had a mini-meeting in one of the patient rooms with all the discharge patients and the bariatric nurse coordinator, the equally fabulous Jeanne. She went over the rules and expectations and took questions. Then it was back to my room for IV removal and finally I was untethered for good! It was so nice to have no tubes coming out of me!! I got dressed and got my discharge instructions and was wheeled down to the entrance where my husband swept me away in my silver chariot. I mean Durango. It was awesome. Except for the bumpy roads, of course!

Now I've been home for a few days and it's been mostly okay. I'm having a hard time meeting my protein goals but the doc said to focus on liquids this first week and worry about protein more later. I've been faithfully walking and doing my spirometer. I stopped taking Lortab yesterday as well as the phenergan. Actually, the phenergan got stuck last night and I will never take that again even if I'm dying. Shudder.

So this is my story so far. Overall my experience was good and I think I'm happy to be where I am. I am very tired all the time and somewhat emotionally drained. I think that 3 days without my Zoloft had more of an effect on me than anticipated, but hopefully that'll be corrected soon. I know that my hormones are out of wack too and that I just went through major surgery so my emotionality is expected, but a little exhausting. I feel like it'll be better when I move onto purees. And, of course, get further out from surgery.

Well, time to put this novel to bed. Nothing but good times head!

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