Post Surgery Report

Well, I survived! My hysterectomy surgery was Friday, check in time at 12:30PM. My surgeon's prior surgery that day went longer than expected so I was 2 hours late getting into the Operating Room. Which meant a lot of sitting around and waiting. When they finally took me to the pre-op room to prepare me for surgery, I was kind of tired already so it was easy to nap on the gurney while I waited. The pre-surgery team got me ready by giving me a gown and some socks, taking my vitals and inserting my IV tube. We talked about anesthesia and what to expect there. Since this was my first surgery, I had no idea what my reactions to anesthesia would be so they thought they would give me some anti-nausea medicine in the IV when I started to come around. When I finally got wheeled into the OR it must have been about 4:30 PM. They moved me from the gurney to the operating table, and I got positioned on the table. Next they put an oxygen mask over my nose and mouth and they told me to breathe it in deeply. It was at this point that the anesthesia starts coming thru the IV. I remember breathing deeply and looking at the big while light above me. Then nothing..... OUT COLD!

When I woke up I was being wheeled into the recovery room. The clock on the wall said 9:10PM. Whoa - that was a long surgery! I got transferred into the hospital bed and they hooked me up to the IV machine. They gave me my options for pain meds and of course they offered vicodin. I told them that the vicodin doesn't seem to work for me, the last time I had it just made me wide awake and still feeling pain. The nurse said "well let's try it and if that doesn't work we can switch it up. Fine. I was still out of it so I couldn't really argue. I had my first visitor at 10PM. I remember her being there, but I also remember not being able to keep my eyes open. Weird. My mom was by my side until I made her go home around 11PM. I told her I would be fine and she needed to get some sleep too.

Around midnight I was still unable to sleep. The vicodin definitely wasn't working. I was wide awake and now getting hungry, since I hadn't eaten in over 24 hours. I asked for something stronger - and some apple juice. The nurse brought me apple juice, apple sauce and vanilla pudding. I ate it all! Next they added Morphine to my IV. That started feeling better and I thought I was going to sleep finally. By 2AM, I woke up again. This time it was because my bladder was so uncomfortable. I had a ton of pressure to pee, but I was on a catheter, so wasn't sure why. I called for the nurse, but she was unavailable so the tech on duty came in. This guy was a character! An older, gruff & grumbly man with more aches and pains than me! He checked the IV and saw that it was working, but he did notice that the tube was taped to my leg wrong, so it could be preventing flow. Sure enough, as soon as he fixed it, I think I filled 2 bags. Ahh!

By 4:30AM, my tech dude, who now has nicknamed me "trouble" came in to take vitals. After that, I swear someone was waking me up every hour for something... blood draw, IV check, remove IV, remove catheter, get up and walk down the hall, etc. By 7AM I could order breakfast from a menu. I was sooo hungry I ordered a little bit of everything! I ordered pancakes, scrambled eggs, sausage links, blue berry muffin, pears, banana, apple juice and a diet 7UP. By the time breakfast came, it was 8AM and I was pretty uncomfortable. I asked for some pain meds and hoped they would bring it soon. As a result I could barely eat any of my breakfast. Bummer!

My surgeon came to check on me and he recapped what had happened. He said it was a tough surgery as my uterus was the size of a large honey dew melon and hard to get around it with his laparoscopic tools. He said there were a few times he thought he was going to have to cut me open and he wished he had been more persistent with me in getting me on that drug to help shrink the uterus. But I am glad I didn't take them! And he was able to do the whole surgery without cutting me open. Yeah! He showed me some pictures of my uterus and ovaries. Weird. The pictures looked just like the ones I had seen on the Internet! Luckily the ovaries and tubes looked good so they didn't need to come out. My bladder and appendix also looked good. So there were no surprises! He asked me if I had any questions and I had only one: where were the pain meds?! He said he would go check with the Dr-on-call and give him a push.

Around noon, I had another walk up and down the hall and had attempted to go to the bathroom on my own. A couple of friends came to visit and they brought me flowers! So nice! The Dr-on-call brought me my prescriptions... the paper ones. I said thank you, I will get these filled when I leave here..... uh, but could I please get something NOW? Like right now? Come on! So I finally got a oxy-codone right at the time they said I could be discharged. My mom arrived and my 2 friends helped get me, my flowers and stuff to the car.

My mom drove me to her house and got me settled into her guest room. Then she headed to the pharmacy to fill my prescriptions. She came back shortly and said that the pharmacy didn't recognize the doctors name so they couldn't fill the prescriptions until they could confirm with my Dr's office on Monday. What?? Noooo! So I asked her to call the surgery center and explain that I just left there and that the Dr-on-call should still be there. He was still there and was able to fax in new prescriptions to the pharmacy. My mom headed down there again, only to find that the pharmacy was closed and wouldn't open again until 11AM on Sunday. Crap! So I spent my first 24 hours without pain meds and no sleep! Irritating. When I got the oxy-codone on Sunday afternoon it was like heaven! The pain in my abdomen disappeared and I finally fell asleep.

I have been home that last couple days and feeling better and better every day. I haven't had a pain pill since Friday so I think I am healing nicely. I got my pathology report yesterday and it confirmed that the tumors and tissue they removed were all benign (no cancerous cells)! Yay!