My Hospital Stay

Jul 25, 2010

I'm back from surgery everyone. I survived! Anyway, I thought I would take the time to tell you, and to record it for myself, what my hospital stay was like. After the video in the previous blog, I didn't get much sleep. I was too anxious. I slept for three hours and then I was wide awake. My best friend came over in the morning to take me to the hospital where I checked in and changed clothes and laid down on the gurney. My surgery took place about an hour and half after I came to the hospital. The first time I met Dr. Atkinson, face to face, actually speaking to each other was about five minutes before the surgery. I was so nervous that my blood pressure was sky high. He asked me if I was ready and I said, I wasn't sure. Of course, he gave me a look like, it's going to happen anyway, and it did.

When I woke up from the surgery, I had an oxygen mask on my face but I was gasping for air. I tried to take the mask off my face, instinctively, and I was saying, "Help," of course there was a nurse screaming at me to move...move up I guess, but I didn't think I could breathe. I thought to myself, I'm in excruciating pain, I can't breathe and Nurse Ratchett is screaming at me. I couldn't really move my arms or my legs and my torso was on fire, literally. I had to psych myself up with things like, "You survived, Michaela..you did it...you're ok." I finally got the nurse to stop screaming at me because I moved up the bed. Then she said she was going to take me to my room and I was thinking, "Wait a minute, you're not going to give me pain medicine?" 

I was wheeled into my room and my mom and another friend, not my best friend were there. They wanted to make small talk. I was in no mood for small talk. I was in too much pain to be polite. My friend had brought me a gift she wanted me to look at but I couldn't concentrate as my pain level was at about a 12. I'm not going to lie...it was the worst pain I have ever felt. They don't tell you that in the commericals when they want you to have it. I had gastric bypass surgery by the way. I knew it would be painful, and I'm sure if you've had kids you are used to pain, but other than one other surgery, this is the biggest surgery I have ever had. I don't even remember my first nurses. They said that my blood pressure was so high that they had to wait to give me pain medicine.

The nurse that came in at 7pm though, I do remember. Her name was Anna. She was so cool. She was very attentive and answered all my questions and helped me walk. When you are in that much pain and you know they want you to walk around the building you think they are crazy, but it is possible, tough, but possible.

It used to be that when it was going on 2 1/2 hours I started asking when I could have pain medicine, but now, I haven't had pain medicine in like two or three days. It is really painful, but by like day 5, you learn what you can cope with.

The next morning, the nurse did just enough. I mean, she was good, but she wasn't Anna. I could tell right away. I didn't hate her, but you know, but I thought I could use more help than what she want to give.

I was scheduled to go home but I really didn't feel good. Dr. Atkinson said it was ok if I needed another day in the hospital, but I really wanted to go home. I probably shouldn't have, but I wanted to go home. I came home that Friday night and my best friend spent the night. She was really concerned about me. She knew I was out of it. I was basically strung out on pain medicine. My whole personality changed when I needed medicine and when I was feeling better I was 'normal.' Anyway, I had a slight fever that night, and she called Dr. Atkinson. He basically said it was normal that I just need to drink more water and walk around the house more. I did. The next morning my friend left and my family came to watch me. I slept a lot on Saturday. I was really tired. I slept most of that day away. My fever went even higher that night and Dr. Atkinson wanted me to come back to the hospital to have a blood test. The hospital found out that I had pneumonia, non-surgery related, or so they said, and my oxygen level was 45% when it was supposed to be 95% to 100%. I don't know how it got so low, but I figure that's why I slept so much on Saturday. Anyway, I was admitted back into the hospital where I had lots of breathing treatments and antibiotics flowing through my veins. I had a CAT Scan in the meantime of my stomach, and there was no infection there, everything looked good. They told me my lungs almost collapsed. Most interesting stuff that's happened to me. lol Anyway, the respiratory doctor finally discharged me on Tuesday afternoon and I've been taking antibiotics ever since.

Since this last Friday I haven't had any pain in my stomach or around my incisions that I would take pain medicine for. Oh, and I've lost 21lbs so far.

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