Surgery experience

Jun 27, 2011

I thought I'd write a bit about surgery and the first few days post op. I'm starting to enjoy this blogging as an outlet....

The day of surgery. It wasn't hard getting up at 430 in the morning. I really didn't sleep the night before. I didn't really expect to, so it didn't bother me too much. I watched tv, went online, just passed the time. I think I did get an hour and a half of sleep that night. Drove myself to the hospital. My husband had to stay home with our daughter. She doesn't go to daycare until 11am, so I knew it would be awhile before he could get to the hospital. Got there and immediately recogized one of the nursing assistants. We'd worked together on the cardiac floor that I used to work before I transferred to the NICU. This whole time one of the things that bothered me the most was that my coworkers, former or present would know and gossip about my surgery. But I don't think I really need to worry. He did my intake stuff and then the nurse came to get blood, course I knew her too... not really well, but she worked in the cardiac ICU before going to the surgical admissions department. She was super nice, bad at drawing blood, but nice. We talked about the RNY, she said she had started looking into it but chickened out. I hope she looks into it again...

I got up to the surgery floor, kinda the main room where I got on the gurney and waited to have my IV started. I met the nurse anethetist and the student that was working with him, as well as the anasthesiologist and the surgical team. They were all super nice, let me know they'd give be versed before I went in to help me relax. The nurse anesthetist got my IV started really quickly and they stayed around and chatted a little after they found out that I was a nurse at the hospital.  I don't remember them telling me they were giving me the versed, I'm sure they did, but I don't recall. I just remember getting really relaxed as they started wheeling me to the OR. They asked me to scoot over and said "here breathe in a bit for me" and then I was out. I was so nervous the whole time. I didn't really believe them when they said it would be like blinking. I thought for sure my inner consciousness would be alert and  waiting. Nope. Just like blinking!

I woke up in the recovery room and was really, really nauseated. I took the oxygen mask off my face and the nurse was like "no honey you need that on" I took it off a few inches from my face and told her I was nauseated. They gave me some IV zofan which really helped. She told me everything went well and kept asking me if my husband was here yet. How the heck would I know!?!? I stayed in recovery for about a half an hour, maybe 45 minutes. My oxygen saturations kept dropping when I dozed off, but that resolved after a little bit. The surgeon came and told me that all went well. The recovery room nurse told me that I woke up smiling! I think it was because I was dreaming something funny! Who knows!

I finally get transferred up to the floor for the rest of my stay. I was so worried about my husband because the nurse kept asking me if he was there and kept sending someone out to check for him. I was so worried that he somehow hadn't gotten to the hospital or something was wrong with our daughter. No worries, he was waiting for me at my room. It was such a relief to see him. From there things get hazy again. I just wanted to sleep. My throat hurt like hell. I was so dry but could only manage teeny tiny sips, the nausea came back hardcore again. Bleh. Plus I was in a double room. I really wasn't a fan of that. You just never know who you're going to get stuck with... Pain was semi-tolerable. The IV medication that they gave me helped a little. I sent my husband to get something to eat, since he kept saying he had a headache and admitted he hadn't eaten yet. That's when I realized it was much later in the day than I thought it should be. My surgery ended up taking about an hour to hour and a half longer than it should have. I was a bit confused, but everyone said things had gone well.

While my hubby was eating, my nurse (who was incredibly amazing) came in a let me know that a private room was available and they moved me right away. The room was amazing. One of my friends who works there came to visit me at the end of my shift told me that my room was the best room on the unit. That make me feel good - a little  perk of being an employee I guess!  From there on out I slept a lot. Had my husband go home around 2 to beat rushhour traffic. A few hours later the surgical resident came in to check on my incisions. He told me that while they were in they found a hiatal hernia, where part of the stomach goes thru the diaphragm, so they fixed that. The surgeon told me I'll never have heartburn again. I sure hope that's true - I've fought heartburn for as long as I can remember! I got up and walked a little, not much since I would get really light headed because my blood pressure was low.

I didn't sleep much that night. The IV pump I had was really irritating, it made a CLICK CLICK sound every 3-4 minutes. Felt like everytime I dosed off it would wake me up again. I have no idea why I didn't ask for a different one... fuzzy brain I guess.  The next morning I was up quite a bit more. I had pretty much counted on going home that day. I was feeling decent all things considered. Pain was mostly controlled on oral medication, the IV stuff just never seemed to help. I was able to "eat" a few sips here and there. My IV infiltrated around 10am. Got a golfball size swlling of fluid at my elbow. Yikes that hurt!
Got my discharge teaching from the bariatic nurse and from the nutritionist. I was really disappointed in the meal that they brought me for breakfast. The brought a Mighty Shake, which is something we would give dialysis patients a lot. I took a sip and of course it was nauseatingly sweet. I looked at it and it had 14 grams of sugar in a 4 oz serving!!! WHAT! I didn't drink it for fear of dumping. I told the NUT when she came and she told me that they had muscle milk too and she went and got me one of those. Hmmm, would have been better to start off with that. "well, not everyone has the same experience" she told me, I"m assuming with regards to dumping syndrome. I was really disappointed in the NUT. I asked how much protein I should be taking in and she told me that they don't really take that into consideration, that I should just eat the foods on the list per the guidelines and I'd be getting enough. Mmmmmmm. Really? I highly doubt it. Slim fast and carnation instant breakfast, or yogurt smoothies. 4oz, 6 times a day. That's not much protein. Thank goodness I have this site to find help. I plan on letting them know that I feel like they're doing patients a disservice by simply telling them what to eat, as opposed to HOW to eat.

But anywho... I was discharged uneventfully and slept in the recliner the first night, since I couldn't stand the thought of laying even somewhat flat... I'll post more on my first week post op in the next few days.... But all in all, its gone okay. Lots of pain, lots of pain meds but absolutely NO REGRETS!
~m.

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