Movie and Medical Madness

So, it's been a short period of time and I have a small window of writing ability ot take care of a bit of story telling about my last few days. I blame typos on my little medi-collada I took five minutes prior to attempting to write this.

I spent last weekend hanging with Alex, that was awesome, per usual, and we watched a whole mess of awesome movies, which was pretty sweet. We caught Watchmen, which I enjoyed thuroughly. I made it home on Sunday and spent a few days there before my surgery on Thursday morning. Nothing special happened at home, but I was in a whole mess of pain. That I do remember.

Wendesday Dorien and I drove down to Norfolk. We went to Moe's for a late lunch. We sat around the apartment for a while and I took a nap before eating my last pre-op meal around 9 that night. I didn't consume anything after 10:30/11. I went to bed not too long before midnight. I slept like shit because I didn't take any tylenol. Woke up a few times during the night, and dreamt that my surgery would have to be pushed back because I kept forgetting I couldn't eat, and would eat stuff.

I woke up around 7:44am and got ready. I left the old bandages, but changed the ones from the groin area because those were straight up foul, and not taped to me, like the ones under my arms. Dad got here literally right when we were going to leave and I got to the hospital around 9:47, when they were calling me to make sure I was on my way. I checked in and we hung out in the waiting room until about...10:15 then I left the fam. and headed for pre-op. I got an IV placed in my left hand, and changed into a gown. I was nervous, but tried not to be, I was also cold and said as much.

From the pre-op I was asked a variety of health related questions such as the likelyhood of my being pregant and the last time I had imbibed anything from food, to booze to cigarettes and the frequency. I answered truthfully, not reason not to. Well, aside from how much tylenol I took, that I lied about.

Dr. Reed came in during the second round of the questions and marked me up with a purple pen so they knew where they were going to cut and what not. That was interesting. Mildly awkward...thankfully only mildly. I saw Dorien and Dad one last time, Miguel didn't arrive until I was in my 24hour post op room. I got wheeled into the operation room. It was cold in there, they gave me some warm blankets and had me slide from the first bed to the operation bed. That was a skinny little bed. I laid on it and I think they ran something through IV I think. I remember them putting the mask over my face, the air in it was cold. I was out and I have been told that the surgery went fine. I feel fine two days later.

I remember waking up in the recovery room. It was cold there, and somehow between the surgical studio and the recovery room my IV fell out, so tehy had to try to give me another. I was fine with the first few attempts, but by the 5th attempt to give me an IV from torunaquette all the way to them stabbing me and failing I was getting annoyed and whiney and fidgity. I told them I was cold and after tehy warmed me up a bit they were able to get an Iv into me, in my left arm. And at one point they tried my foot. That one annoyed me. My friggin' foot. I got a few doses of morphine, that was sweet. No pain, and I wanted to sleep.

Terry, my man nurse, kept telling me to breath deeper, I have a penchant for shallow breathing apparently. He was also awesome and gave me some ice chips and apple juice after I was out of surgery for a few hours. He asked me how tolerable my pain was. At it's worst I was only at 6, and at the best in the recovery room I was at about 2. He also got me a bedpan. That was pretty embarassing and awkward, trying to use a bed pan. I was sure that I had peed in the bed and not in the bedpan, but I had to pee. I had to pee a lot.

I was moved form the recovery room to the post-op 24 hour stay around 5 or 6. I was in the room for a few minutes before Dad, Pattie and Dorien got there. I told them about the IV and how I was feeling. I made it to the bathroom again at some point, and I did have fun telling Dad to close his eyes or what not when the doctor's were looking at the bandages or when I went to the bathroom.

Oh, aside from Dr. Reed remember me and the fact that I fenced, my post op doctor I met back in September, Dr. Noorbakhsh also remembered me and my fencing. Weird, seriously. He was nice still, so my stay in thehospital was bearble. I slept terribly that night, and that it the conclusion of the story for now. My next post will tackle Friday and Saturday which will recant my being doped on pain killers and watching TV and trying to type and do things on the computer. Nothing too crazy, but I do want to remember this time, and this is on the internet for the fuck of it. It's not so personal that I need to save it to my HD, and if you think it is, fuck off and find something else to read.

Jasmine P.