Recovery

Card made by Stephanie

“Just another minute, they’re going to get you a shot.”  Huh? I thought as the nurse prepped the needle and the anesthesiologist held my hand like we were on an awkward date.

    I showed up to the hospital at 6:30am and was extremely dehydrated from lack of liquids combined with the magnesium citrate that I had to take for the bowel prep.  The nurse made three attempts on both of my arms with no success at starting my IV.  The anesthesiologist founda vein near my wrist but thought that it may still be difficult so she gave me a numbing shot before she finally was able to successfully put the IV into place.  At about 8:50am I said farewell to everyone, put on my little hat and they began to wheel me to the OR.  They never told me that they already gave me some sleepy medicine before carting me off and the last thing I remember was seeing the girl who was wheeling me press the button to open a set of doors and then I knocked out.

As I began to wake up it felt like I was trying to climb up from the bottom of a well filled with water. It took me a bit to remember where I was and why I felt the way I did.  People were making a fuss around me and I remember a few times telling someone that I felt like I was gasping for air.  I guess when they thought I was conscious enough they wheeled me back to the prepping/waiting area and had me move to a lounge type chair.  It did not go well.  I was extremely dizzy and everything felt like it was spinning and I began to dry heave violently.  They asked if I wanted my husband to come back and I replied no because I didn’t want anyone to see me yet.  I felt horrible and the nurse explained that I had developed a high fever and my largest incision had been leaking badly.  When I was settled a little more I was able to lay back and close my eyes and that helped the spinning but if I dared to open my eyes the world fiercely lurched and lunged.

The nursed continued to make a fuss over me and at about 1pm I told them they could bring my husband back.  The doctor had another surgery right after mine and then she had to leave for a conference so she wasn’t going to be able to talk to me post-surgery.  She did talk to my husband but I think that doctors need to have a sheet called “what I told your husband” because by the time he was conveying the information to me he couldn’t remember exactly what the doctor said.  He knew that she said my endometriosis was one of the worst cases she had ever seen and that it was a good thing I had surgery when I did.  My left ovary was tangled in my intestine so they removed my left ovary but didn’t have to resection my intestine. My husband thinks that she mentioned removing my right fallopian tube. There were a lot of adhesions tangled in my kidneys and the rest of my organs were cemented together and twisted and tangled so they fixed that.  I have my follow up appointment on September 19^th so I’ll be able to find out all of the information and see pictures.

They nurses, who were patient and sweet ended up bringing in a machine filled with a medication that dispensed in timed intervals.  It ended up making the spinning/nausea stop and then I couldn’t get out of the hospital fast enough.  I had to eat some crackers and drink some ginger ale to prove that I could keep them down and I also had to urinate prior to leaving.  I left the hospital at about 4:45pm with just a slight fever and was overjoyed to relocate myself to the sofa where I’ve remained ever since.  After the first two days I switched to mainly taking Motrin with maybe one dose of heavier pain meds per day.  As long as I don’t move around too much it isn’t too bad though I’m still very tired and continue to nap frequently.  Since I’m sleeping a lot I’m not bored and I probably won’t have to stay out of work for as long as I thought so at this point I’m just trying to enjoy doing nothing for a bit.

Box of Meds

Since I made her get a bath prior to the surgery Lambie insisted on having her picture on my blog.  She is helping me log onto Webkinz to play some games.

Cause we're the six best friends that anyone could have and we'll never ever ever ever ever leave each other!

Liquid Luck

I have the very best friends ever!  Over the weekend they threw me a get better soon potions party complete with a life size Snape and potions which were beakers filled with water and glow necklaces to make them glow different colors. The menu included Black Lake zucchini boats, gillyweed salad and Felix Felicis to drink. 

Of course Stephanie made cupcakes (something she excels at).  They were chocolate with salted caramel centers and chocolate ganache icing. 

Party Favors from Honeydukes

It was beyond awesome, oh and I also got presents!  They are the best.

I got my call today that I need to be at the hospital at 6:00am and my surgery should be at 8:00am.  My infertility doctor called tonight to make sure I was all ready and to let me know that he had a few early morning procedures so he wouldn’t be able to show up until I was already under.  He told me he really trusted the doctors doing my surgery and is hopeful that they will fix my issues. He is such a great doctor that goes above and beyond.  I’m so happy I switched infertility centers.  I met with the surgeon Monday and she was very reassuring about everything so I don’t feel nervous at all, I am all ready.  I cleaned the house, did a lot of laundry and even gave Lambie and the kitty a bath so they can smell good while I snuggle with them.

Technical Difficulties

 So things have been a bit crazy.  Work has been crazy because we are going to be audited and my primary job is to prep for audits so I've been busy and exhausted during the week.  The left mouse button on my laptop stopped working so it had to be "sent out."  I wanted to ask Derrick (the name I gave him) from the Geek Squad when do they not have to send laptops out because every time I have taken my laptop there it gets sent out.  I was polite however and knew that my grumpy mood was due to me being tired the night I walked up to the Geek Squad counter at Best Buy.  I am currently laptopless and as my laptop and I now share a special bond I feel a little lost without it.  Our Internet has also decided to not work.  We might have it for a few hours and then not have it for two days.  That has been frustrating too makes blog posting rather hard.  I had two nice posts (one about my garden and one about a trip to NY) that I wanted to put up but the Internet hasn't worked long enough and now the pictures for the post are on my broken being fixed laptop.  Okay I'm done whining now.

So this time next week I will be in the midst of my night before surgery bowel prep (fun).  I keep thinking that any day they will call to tell me that they have to reschedule, but so far so good.  I've already done several of the pre-surgery tests and I go in on Friday to have the rest completed.  I must admit that some of the pre-surgery jitters are starting to set in.  Question like, "Will I wake up during the surgery or will I never wake up from the surgery?" creep into my mind from time to time.  It is actually a good thing that work has been so busy because I haven't had too much time to contemplate such things.  Instead I try to find things to look forward to like playing a ton of Harvest Moon during the day and watching my DVDs of Rags to Riches and hopefully finishing The Mistborn trilogy, but I'm also trying hard not to give myself a recovery to-do list and allowing myself to sleep and chill out as much as possible.

Start your Hammers!

I was thrilled to come home this week and find the remnants of our second bathroom sitting in our front yard.  Things are happening, they are finally happening!  We still have a long way to go of course.  The bathroom has to be rebuilt and then the next bathroom has to be completed followed by both bedrooms, but this week it felt like at least some progress was made; progress that will hopefully get us one step closer to Thailand.

This was our weird metal tub with a straight back that made taking baths no fun. It was also a weird shade of pink or tan we really could never tell for sure.

This is what our bathtub/shower looks like presently.

This is the very old vanity and the toilet that had a weird blue marble that always rattled around when you flushed it. Also we disliked both the border and the medicine cabinet.

Here is that space now.  An improvement I think.

Zucchini Pimp

Like me, my zucchini plants are having infertility issues. They seemed off to the races from the moment I planted them in their galvanized tub, and when they started to blossom and grow baby zucchini I was thrilled.  Last year our plants blossomed but no scrumptious zucchini appeared.  This year I could taste the roasted vegetable wraps already as the little green squashes emerged. 

Unfortunately to my dismay, the tiny zucchini began to rot before ever getting past the newborn stage.  A quick internet search told me that I had “Blossom End Rot.”

One of the culprits of Blossom End Rot is a lack of pollination.  We were pretty sure that lack of pollination was the reason we ended up with no zucchini at all last year.

Since I live in a town home complex and am not permitted to house and raise my own honey bees (a future aspiration) and my attempts to attract them with yummy flowers hasn’t quite worked out (or so I assume) I was going to  have to pollinate my zucchini by hand. 

According to the directions I read online, early morning is the best time to hand pollinate as this is when the zucchini flowers are open.  The male flowers are at the end of long thin stems and the female flowers are rounded and sit attached to end of the little zucchini. 

 I cut one of the male flowers from the plant, gently tore some of the flower off so that all of the fertile pollen was exposed and then I gently opened up the female flowers and dumped then kind of rubbed the inside of the male flower into the inside of the female flower (I contemplated using some Barry White music to make everyone more relaxed but seeing as it was early morning I didn’t want to disturb the neighbors).    

There was something about the process that felt very procreative and I logged it as a possible good teaching opportunity for the birds and the bees (though in my case lack of bees) discussion someday (with future child) as the zucchini anatomy is a good initial example of human anatomy.   Once I had paired up all of the squash couples I left the pollen to do what the pollen is supposed to do.  (*note this was my interpretation of the online directions and could possibly be incorrect).

I have to admit that the process made me feel a bit like the zucchini pimp or maybe more like the zucchini infertility specialist.  I hope that next year some bees will be happy to act as the third party.  This of course makes me imagine little bees dressed up in mini purple fur coats and hats with zebra print trim.  Please enjoy that mental picture.

*Just as an update, my surgery has been rescheduled for August 23^rd.  I made sure to “pencil” it in, literally, just to be on safe side.

Mary Mary Quite Contrary

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Quite Well, Thanks For Asking. (Except for the Zuchinni but that's for another post)

...and waiting

I had been having pain in my left leg for two weeks.  I assumed that it was some kind of pulled muscle either due to an overzealous yoga move or just uncoordinated clumsiness.  I kept telling myself, if it doesn’t get better by ____ then I should probably go see the doctor.  On Saturday June 2^nd the pain began to amp up considerably.  I took Motrin before bed. It didn’t help.  By Sunday morning my left calf was red, warm to the touch and there was something sore and swollen underneath my skin.  My leg felt like it was on fire and every time I stood up and walked a sharp pain shot up my leg. I decided that it might be a good idea to go to the Urgent Care just to make sure it wasn’t anything serious.  The urgent care doctor examined my leg for a few seconds and informed me that it was a blood clot and that I had to go to the emergency room right away to have an ultrasound of my leg.  The nurse gave me a big dose of aspirin and sent me on my way.  I have to give the Cross Keys Urgent Care a big thumbs up.  I was in and out quickly and everyone there was polite, professional and super nice. I would definitely go there again.   

Off to Kennedy in Washington Township I went.

At the hospital, I was moved through triage quickly, partly to my dismay because a girl had come in who had gotten into some kind of fight at a concert and I wanted to hear more about her shenanigans, partly I was relieved because there was a girl sitting near me with two trash cans next to her indicating that she was feeling barfy and I didn’t want to be witness to said barf.  The triage nurse asked the usual questions and then a rather handsome med tech escorted me to my room.  I went through the regular drill of changing and having an IV placed.  They asked me if I wanted any pain medication.  I always have mixed feelings about how I answer.  I have a high tolerance for pain and pain medication tends to make me throw up so I have to decide if the pain relief is worth the upchucking and in this case it didn’t seem worth the risk.  I hate declining the pain medication however because I feel like they don’t take you quite so seriously (or at least that has happened in the past).  A nice attendant wheeled me down to ultrasound where the compassionate ultrasound tech kindly wrapped me in pre-warmed blankets. I was fascinated since I have never had an ultrasound that wasn’t of my abdomen.  The part that I didn’t like was when she turned the sound on and you could hear the blood moving through my leg; for some reason that gave me the willies.

After the ultrasound I was transferred to the “results area.”  This was something new, to me anyway.  It was a small waiting area with lounge chairs.  You sit in the room with several other ER patients waiting for test results.  Every so often a pretty smiling nurse would pop in to let each person know at what stage their results were (“the doctor is reviewing your CT scan right now...your ultrasound hasn’t come back yet”…etc.).  I couldn’t decide how I felt about the results area (I realized the purpose was to free up rooms for people who had more important things going on than just waiting).  It wasn’t very HIPPA friendly as the other people knew which tests you had done. The nurse was as discrete as possible and other patients didn’t seem to mind letting everyone else know why they were there, but if you were there for something embarrassing it might not be fun.  I also felt self conscious because everyone else had CT scans of their heads so they didn’t have to change into a hospital gown.  I was the only one having to sit there wearing hospital garb and my warm blankets soon turned cold.   Once my results were back and reviewed I met with the doctor in a little private room.  I did have a big blood clot in my leg but it was only a superficial clot and they “rarely” kill people, said the doctor.  The thought was that the clot was caused by being on Lupron for an extended amount of time. The ER doctor advised me to start taking a low dose aspirin once a day to keep my blood thinned and follow up with my other doctors.

   I was still in a lot of pain when I got home so I kept my leg elevated and put heat on it.  I stayed home from work Monday and Tuesday (Law and Order SVU marathon day, hooray) and probably would have stayed home on Wednesday but I really can’t afford to use up time.  I called my endometriosis doctor/surgeon Tuesday.  She decided that I shouldn’t do the next Lupron shot and that I need to allow the current dose to wear off completely before my surgery to ensure that I won’t be at a high risk for the sort of blood clot that can kill you.  So, my surgery has to be rescheduled again.  I have to wait at least 12 weeks to be sure the Lupron is out of my system.  I can’t lie, between the pain that I was in (and the inhibited mobility since it hurt to walk) and the knowledge that I would have to wait at least 12 weeks now to have surgery and I would have to do all of the paperwork and reschedule all of the pre-surgical appointments AGAIN, I was feeling quite discouraged.  The pain has now lessened and I’m feeling more positive though there continue to be moments where I start feeling sorry for myself and dream of something really good happening to me instead of all of these perceived misfortunes.