Week One

Well I made past seven days.

Guess I didn't really have a choice. The Lord did, but not me.

Each day has had a life of its own. Many varying degrees of emotional and physical responses and reactions.

The first day of surgery you are so medicated that everyone is your best friend and this is the greatest thing ever. Until they won't give you a damned sip of water or an ice chip to save your life.

Seriously, I felt like I had French-kissed a wool sweater for several hours on end.

The problem is, they can't give you anything to drink. They would love to if only to shut up your perpetual whining. But your stomach just met the butcher and needs a bit of rest before you subject it to some marinade.

Relief comes, sort of, soon. On the second day they wheel you down to CAT scan hand you an impossibly small bottle of vile tasting chemical that you suck down immediately because in all seriousness you are so thirsty Pine-Sol would look like the most satiating artesian water right about now.

Once they give you the good to go, you go back to your room and inhale about all the water you can. Blessed, cold, liquid, wet water. Then and only then are you able to pull the wool fibers off of your tongue.

The first meal looks like you'd expect. Chicken broth, a Popsicle, decaf tea, water and a straw. Have at it girlie. Right. You cannot truly understand that you don't have a stomach now until you think you can actually consume all of what is before you.

Several sips in to the warm delicious (yes, delicious) broth and you are FULL. Hurting full. Like you've spent several hours at the Chinese Buffet full.

The next few days are spent rather as if you had the flu. You become cold, (nice feeling actually) you are tender, you get hot, you run to the bathroom as often as you breathe, and you sleep.

Home is a welcome, yet scary sight. Scary because there are no professionals here. Just me and the family and the dogs. And they get real food.

For me the hardest days, both physically and emotionally were my first two days at home. My husband had to work, my kids were at school, I was scared, depressed and not sure of what to do with myself.

In retrospect I am glad I shopped for the vitamins and the liquid diet items before hand. It was wise to do so since you are not to once you get home. That is unless you have the constitution of a California Redwood.

A couple of shopping tips:
Don't get the usual. You will have had chicken & beef broth for breakfast, lunch and dinner for all of two days and will feel quite ready for a change. Not to mention it isn't enough, nutritionally or otherwise.

Do go to a store that has more than your usual groceries. A store such as Central Market or Whole Foods. There you will find more nutritious options as well as variety of soups that are a wonderful addition to beef and chicken bullion routine.

Do get skim milk, fat free and almost sugar free yogurt, apple or grape juice, crystal light and sugar free popsicles. These items will be great in between soup and such.

Do keep whatever protein shake powder you have. Yes, I know, after two meals a day for fourteen days of the not-so-delicious stuff you will never touch it again. But you will. And if you use skim milk to make it instead of water (even though Isopure calls for water) you will find it is actually a bit more palatable. Besides, loaded with protein and vitamins that you are not getting anywhere else.

Don't disobey. This is critical to success in all areas of this life change. But especially now when you are one, just beginning and two, your digestive track has just been traumatized beyond what you can imagine.

Do walk, walk, walk. Walking is beneficial for so many reasons, digestion, circulation, activity, family time and just plain ol' mental stimulation.

I know it is almost week two, and I am just a little behind. I will write soon, I promise!

The "S" Word

Surgery.


The big day cameth...ith.

I wasn't nervous, scared or second guessing this decision. The day was here and it all seemed so routine or methodical. Surreal is probably more what I was actually feeling. I kind of just went through the motions, no excitement, no chit-chat, rather calm and ready for whatever.

They sign you in. Take you back. WEIGH you AGAIN. Put you in your gown, your socks and lay you on a slice of cardboard big enough for Barbie and maybe, just maybe if Ken sucks it in, him too. Definitely not wide or long enough for you to relax. Go figure.

The pre-op nurse asks you a thousand questions, most of which you have answered already. Questions such as...Any allergies? How do you react to them? When was your last period? Anyone with you today? What's his name? Does he have a cell phone?

She takes your blood pressure, your temperature, and so on. And then she shivs you with a needle as big around as your finger. Don't let that little piece of pink plastic fool you. There is nothing cute or dainty about starting an I.V.

As soon as the I.V. is started they bring back whoever is with you. They tell you this a thousand times. The person who walked me to the pre-op check-in area, the receptionist at pre-op check-in, the nurse who walked me to a room to get dressed for pre-op (pre-pre-op?) and the pre-op nurse all said "Anyone with you? We will bring him back as soon as your I.V. is started."

What they don't realize is, a husband/wife/sister/mom whoever is going to wait for the next few hours with 50 strangers and their misbehaving children and or screaming babies while you go under a knife in the hands of strangers will need their caffeine.

What they also don't figure is, the cafeteria is about 10 miles away from pre-op & surgery center. NO coffee in the waiting room. WHY? Who knows. But someone needs to consider it. Because when they called my husband oh, 50 times, he was walking back from beyond-far-Egypt with his precious thimble of $2 coffee. And he ALMOST missed seeing me before surgery.

Then another person comes and asks you...Any allergies? How do you react to them? When was your last period? Anyone with you today? What's his name? Does he have a cell phone?

Then the doctor comes. I don't know what your doctor will talk to you about, but my conversation went like this:

Dr. F: Are you ready?
Me: Yes, are you?
Dr. F: I am always ready. See you in a few minutes.
Me: Okay.

That was it. We don't dance around our conversation. No small talk for us. Just down to the nitty-gritty and we're off.

Then the anesthesiologist comes to visit. He asks you a couple of questions. Questions that seem VAGUELY familiar. Repeat after me: Any allergies? How do you react to them? When was your last period? Anyone with you today? What's his name? Does he have a cell phone?

Can they NOT read a chart? I am sure it was written down somewhere at some point. See, I think they are trying to trip you up. They want to see if they can catch you in a lie or find a bit of new information you hadn't divulged in the last 6000 times you were asked these very same questions.

But I held firm. I gave them nothing they could use against me. My offish-ee-al membership in the Harriet the Spy Club was worth every one of those 83 boxtops of cereal I ate at the age of 10. Yes it was.

At this point things go a little fuzzy. Having told the anesthesiologist that anesthesia has, in the past, made me deathly ill he came in with a little happy juice for my veins. He injected it into the gaping hole that was my I.V. and I was out. Okay so fuzzy wasn't a good word for what I fest at this point. Blackness. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Lights out. I was a goner.

Woke up in my room. Okay, so here is where it is appropriate to use the word fuzzy. People came to see me. Talk to me. Called me. No memory of it. Any of it. Apparently I am quite the funny girl on pain meds. Who knew?

So that was my surgery day in a nutshell. Or in a post or whatever. I cannot promise yours will go the same. But my hopes are that it would. Uneventful and successful are good outcomes for surgery.

The hospital completely followed through with my original expectation, I had surgery. The Head Nurse/Ring Master would be so incensed to know I answered right.