7 Weeks Post-Yeet

 I'm just gonna jump right on into it. Typically, after the type of hysterectomy I had, there is a 4-week and a 6-week post-surgical check. However, because of holidays and scheduling and nonsense, my 6-week appointment was pushed to the 7-week mark. That appointment was supposed to be Monday.

But on Monday, the east coast of the US, specifically the mid-to-lower part, got absolutely FUCKED with snow. My area in particular got its shit rocked. I mean, when the weatherman says "12 inches" where I live, you kind of laugh, make a bunch of pornhub jokes, and expect maybe 3 inches. Especially when this forecast is being made on a day where it's in the high 60s. So when the temperature dropped 30 degrees in as many minutes on Sunday night...

Monday morning, the doctor's office called to reschedule all appointments, because they were not going to be open. Which made total sense. After all, a few minutes after I got that call, my partner scared the piss out of me by walking back into the bedroom. He had already left for work for the day, and when the Ring went off, it looked like it was Amazon delivering one of my orders. He had his hood pulled all the way up and was backlit, so I didn't see his face. And to be honest, I wasn't expecting him home, and I was expecting an Amazon delivery, so I thought nothing of it. But I digress. He had gotten about a mile from the house, not even to the main road, and had to abandon his car. The snow and ice were already so bad that even the big trucks with the all wheel drive were sliding back down the hill. There was no way for him to safely turn around, so he left the car and walked back. He did not go to work. Which is good, because he would not have gotten home if he had. By the time the snow stopped, there were so many trees down that it looked like a lumberjack convention had rolled through high on PCP.

You may have heard about the I-95 shutdown that left drivers stranded for as much as 28 hours. One of my friends was stuck in that. We live not too far from that. Plows were getting stuck. It was bad. Tuesday, the plan was that he would take my car (which is an SUV, admittedly without 4WD, but still significantly sturdier than his hybrid sedan) to work. Except the battery was dead. Like, stone dead. Like, barely enough juice to unlock the doors dead. He walked to his car to see if he could free it. He could not. He stayed home Tuesday, too. Tuesday after I finished work, we spent 90 minutes digging out his car before we could get it on the (incredibly badly plowed and completely unsalted/sanded) road. We were originally just going to get a jumper box for my car, but when we couldn't, we decided to just go home, and he would get me a new battery Wednesday. Which he did. And ultimately, we installed it, and the car works again. Hooray.

So this morning, I finally got to go to the doctor. After the customary few questions, he did the exam, and was very pleased. Everything is "fully healed" and the word "perfect" was thrown around. I did mention the fact that the rightmost scar has been causing me some issues. Occasionally, the outer edge of it will catch on my clothes, and it sends a spear of pain down my side. Then it's hypersensitive for a few hours. It's still generally sensitive and tender. That is fairly normal, simply because of the tools used in that particular incision, and will fade. It will just take more time than the rest of the incisions. (Note: if you have this procedure, the incision in question may be on the opposite side. It depends on your doctor's preference and handedness.) I was given the go-ahead to have sex, and I no longer have to worry about becoming a supervillain.

And in case you're wondering, yes, I do still have to go to annual exams. I don't have a cervix, but I do still have ovaries, and having the annual exams will help catch any issues that could arise from them (not that we're anticipating any, but early detection and all that). 

I'm sure there will be more posts in the future. My healing isn't completely done, and who knows what all will come next. But for now, at least, things are settled down and getting back to normal.    

One Month Post-Yeet - or - Great, Now We've Made It Weird

 Well, 32 days, if we're being precise. But we're not, so fuck it.

Before I begin, a biology lesson for you: The human vagina, in addition to being self-cleaning, is something of an ecosystem. Much like your skin or your gut, there is a certain amount of good bacteria. There is also a certain amount of good yeast. These two things coexist in a balance that can be affected by any number of variables. If there is an overgrowth of bacteria (or somehow the yeast gets killed off), a person with a vagina can develop bacterial vaginosis, which has has some unpleasant symptoms (like off-colored discharge, odor, itching, and burning when you pee). This can also be caused by douching or just plain overuse of the vagina.
Oral (or intravenous) antibiotics for other infections will also kill off some of the bacteria in the vagina, which can lead to a yeast infection (called thrush in some areas of the world). Symptoms are similar to BV (odorless-but-abnormal discharge, itching, swelling, pain during sex and/or urination, to name a few). Uncontrolled diabetes, an impaired immune system, and hormone fluctuations can all lead to yeast infections. Some people will get a yeast infection immediately before menstruating. Regularly.
Developing either BV or a yeast infection does not mean that a person is dirty, "slutty", or anything else. It indicates a pH imbalance, or perhaps an underlying illness. If you think you have one of these issues, please seek medical care, and if anyone gives you shit, just drop me their name and address.

For legal reasons, I must state that you should not provide me the name and/or address of anyone giving you shit for normal biological functions. If you decide to do so anyway, also for legal reasons, I must state that the person in question will receive nothing worse than a medical pamphlet and a strongly worded letter indicating that they need to learn more about biology.

I saw my doctor today. It wasn't a "normal" post-surgical follow-up. Last week, I started to feel like I was getting a yeast infection. I won't go into details of symptoms, but they were mild. As I recalled after making the appointment, when I was on oral birth control (Seasonique? Seasonale? IDK, one of those shits that only gives you 4 periods a year), I used to get a yeast infection for like, a day before getting my period. They almost always went away on their own and were very rarely bad enough to merit a doctor's visit, or even so much as OTC treatment. Under normal circumstances, I would have probably ignored it completely, and if symptoms persisted for more than a day, started off with RepHresh (a specially-designed, vagina-safe product indicated to help balance vaginal pH and gently treat normally-occurring bouts of BV and/or thrush). Luckily, all symptoms stopped on their own, but I still decided to keep the appointment. I did just have surgery, after all, and I wanted to make sure that if I did have some type of infection, it didn't do any damage.

Fortunately, the doctor agrees that it appears that whatever I had is cleared up. He did take a culture just to be safe, but "everything looks really good". He is pleased with how I'm healing, and if I did have an infection (and not just a bad day), it didn't do any damage. He agrees that coming in was the right call as a precaution, but ultimately, it probably wasn't strictly necessary.
But so, um, here's a mortifying thing. Normally, when doing a culture/scraping/pap smear, the swab/brush gets swirled all up on the cervix. There is a myth that the cervix doesn't have any nerves (IT ABSOLUTELY FUCKING DOES, James). It does. For sure. I would argue, however, that the cervix is less sensitive than other parts of the anatomy, and it certainly doesn't react the same way to stimulation as those parts. Generally, when being swabbed, the cervix doesn't experience pain. (We are referring EXCLUSIVELY to swabbing here. Not brushing, scraping, biopsying, or any other procedure. Just wiping it with an oversized q-tip.) Pressure, sure, maybe a little discomfort depending on where the swabbing is occurring, but not pain. It's ideal to swab the cervix. But uh...I don't have one of those any more. So the swabbing was taking place on or around the vaginal cuff...which we have discussed previously is just the top part of the vagina sewn up like an old-timey coin purse. So now I have another gripe about hysterectomy unpreparedness.

NOBODY FUCKING WARNED ME THAT CERTAIN THINGS MIGHT FEEL COMPLETELY FUCKING DIFFERENT AND NOT AT ALL AS ONE EXPECTS THEM TO FEEL.

I'm not going to say I was getting off on it or anything. But the sensation was decidedly not unpleasant, and I was very, very confused. Of course the speculum still sucked (and I imagine always will), but the swabbing was unexpected and had me a bit red in the face.

Once you've stopped laughing, I will remind you that I may have to wait until after the holidays to get the test results back, because, y'know, holidays. But the big takeaway is that everything is healing well and looks as it should. I'm going to go eat my body weight in ice cream to forget about today.

Day 20 Post-Yeet

 Warning: This post is intended ONLY for persons of legal age. It contains explicit descriptions of sex-related bodily functions. Mom, Dad, minors, or anyone who doesn't want to read a quite detailed account should skip this entry.

I had my first follow-up appointment with the doctor/surgeon on Monday (day 17). There was no physical exam, just discussion about how I'm feeling, if I'm having any symptoms, and what the surgery itself looked like. We had a discussion about how smoothly the surgery went: there was very little bleeding, everything was as it was expected to be, and not to toot his own horn, but it was a more ideal surgery than some of the ones that are recorded for educational purposes. We talked about the dysmorphia issues I'm having with the scars, and he told me that over the next 6 months, the ridged, sinewy nature of the scars should drastically diminish. I was cleared to go back to the gym next week, provided I start slow, using no more than 10lb weights for the first week. The last question I asked was, "Can I start having sex again?" And that poor doctor had to say that I need to wait another 3 weeks before having vaginal sex.

Some surgical information: the type of hysterectomy I had removed the uterus, the fallopian tubes, and the cervix. For a variety of reasons, you don't want to leave the top of the vagina just...like...open. So once the offending organs are removed, the top of the vagina (which used to be attached to the cervix) is sewn together (like an old-timey coin purse) into a structure called a "vaginal cuff". I got to see a picture of this as taken by a teeeeeeeeny tiny camera from inside my abdomen. It's pretty cool; from what I can tell, it's about an inch and a half long, and was held together by 6-8 dissolvable stitches. By now, it's very likely that those stitches have completely dissolved, and the site is superficially healed. It is vital that the vaginal cuff maintain its integrity. Damaging the stitching line before it is fully healed can lead to a whole host of problems. Infection, hemorrhage, prolapse, and evisceration are all possible impacts of damaging that stitching. 

I about cried when he said 3 more weeks. It's already been 3 weeks since the last time I had sex (because timing and scheduling and sleep deprivation were not on our side). He did say that at this point, oral and anal are back on the table, if I'm into that. And like, yeah, sure, I am, but as I told him, it's not good enough. While I am one of the 20% of women who can orgasm from anal, and I have a partner who can get me to orgasm from oral about 75% of the time, it's just not the same. The most impressive orgasms always come from "p in v" sex for me.

But a less effective orgasm is better than no orgasm, right? And a fair amount of the pleasure of it comes from the physical intimacy of sex (of any kind) with a partner. Now, I'm not going to detail the toys we used, or the positions we contorted ourselves into, or anything like that, but there is a reason I wanted to get into the more graphic bits.

If you remember, I said earlier that my organs shifted a bit. I wasn't entirely sure how or where to, but I very quickly discovered that:

• without a uterus or cervix in the way, anal sex puts pressure (or vibration, depending) directly on the vaginal cuff
• the vaginal cuff is EXTREMELY sensitive
• it is now possible for me to have a vaginal orgasm by having anal sex.

When I say I had an absurd number of orgasms, I mean truly absurd. I mean I stopped counting at 8, then continued to have orgasm after orgasm. At one point, they all blended together, and it felt like I had a single, continuous, 5-minute long orgasm. I'm sure that's not actually what happened, because I'm pretty sure humans can't sustain that, but it sure as shit felt like it. Ultimately, I wound up having to tap out because I was on the verge of collapse. I'm sure the neighbors were grateful. 

Tuesday night was a repeat. We weren't going to, but uh...yeah, self-control is not something that either of us posses an awful lot of. Of course, that meant that we were tired when Wednesday morning rolled around, but what can you do? 

Yesterday, I went into the office for the first time since surgery. I considered wearing real pants, but I ran into an odd problem: the dress pants that definitely fit weren't clean, and the dress pants that were clean were too tight in the calves and thighs, but too loose in the waist. So I gave in and put on a pair of (opaque) black leggings and a very long sweater. Now, this was the most comfortable outfit I could possibly come up with, especially since they weren't work pants, and therefore weren't stiff. I had brought my electric heating pad because my back was sore (gee, I wonder why...), and by the end of my lunch hour, I needed the heating pad on my stomach. The incisions on the right side were sore, pulling and cramping. And despite doing no more work than I usually do, I was absolutely knackered by 3pm. To say it was unpleasant is an understatement.

I did end up taking a bath at the end of the night in an attempt to unwind and maybe work out some of the discomfort, but that didn't work out too well. The bath bomb was unexpectedly unpleasant smelling, so it was decidedly not relaxing, and unfortunately it didn't do an awful lot to resolve the discomfort. 

I'm sure there's more I could add, but I really don't feel like it, so I won't.

A Non-Yeeterine Post

 A warning: This post is not progress. This post is not pleasant. This post is me working through some shit, or trying to. It may or may not be yeeterus-related. It's probably at least tangentially related, but if you're only here for hysterectomy testimonial, you can skip this one. I'm also throwing in a great big trigger warning for body image issues.

It's no secret that over the past 6 months, I've been working on my body. Doing my best to eat better, seeing a personal trainer (which has been on pause for surgery, and fucking weirdly, I miss it), the works. I made some great progress before the wedding, losing about 20lbs and at least one dress size. (This is the first time I've seen that loss in writing. Oddly, it's not helping.) I've managed to lose that much weight while also gaining muscle, which is no mean feat.

I mentioned in an earlier post that post surgery, I had lost 4lbs in a week because I couldn't really eat much. When I called my doctor to get better anti-nausea meds, we discussed the weight loss, and he wasn't entirely concerned. A lot of people lose weight after removing an IUD (which I did, along with the uterus), and in most cases, this is welcome. Since then, I've been able to start eating more normally, and if I'm honest, haven't been eating the most healthy foods. I'm still eating less than I was before the wedding, and I'm not eating frosting straight from the container or anything, so I'm not doing too badly on that front. But I do think I'm developing a problem.

This morning, I decided to get on the scale to see if I had managed to screw things up (that mentality was my first clue that something was wrong). And I've managed to lose more weight. For the first time in I-don't-know-how-many-years, the scale said "175". That should have been a celebration. This is the lowest my weight has been since meeting my partner. And for several years previous. I'm pretty sure the last time I hit this weight, I was on disability for my mental breakdown and had trouble remembering to eat because I was so heavily medicated. And I wasn't going to the gym and particularly strong at that point. But there was no small celebration. There was a mild feeling of relief (that I hadn't gained any weight), and then I immediately felt like shit.
Because my body does not look the way I would expect it to after having lost 25lbs while also gaining muscle. (I'm repeating the gaining muscle for a reason. Fat is less dense than muscle, and therefore, 2lbs of fat will take up more space than 2lbs of muscle.) I look at myself and don't see progress. I don't see the smaller pants size or the shirts that don't cling quite so tightly. I don't feel like I look any different. I feel all the work, and all the struggle, and all the inability to eat, and still feel like a cow.

And then the guilt kicks in on top of it. I have made progress. The fact that my wedding gown zipped up without any struggle at all when it had a solid 5" that wouldn't close at purchase is proof enough of that. The fact that I bought junior's pants (albeit a size 13, but fuck) for the first time since college is proof enough. The fact that the size 12 jeans I bought over the summer are now a little loose is fucking solid evidence, especially seeing as how I've worn them all of once, so I know they're not stretched out. And I know so many people who have been struggling with their weight or who just have bigger bodies than mine, (Who I find both beautiful and sexually attractive, even though they're bigger than I am and yet I'm repulsed by my own body...what the fuck) who would never say it to my face, but who must be looking at this and thinking that I'm a complete asshole. Because if I see myself as a cow, how must I see them? Except I don't see them the same way I see myself. They may be objectively larger than I am, but they're not cows, or disgusting, or repulsive. I see them as gorgeous, Rubenesque, goddesses of women. I am, in fact, very much attracted to larger women, particularly larger women who own their bodies. ("Yes, I shop in the 'plus' section. And I look fucking good in everything I wear. And you know what? I wear fucking comfy pants, and there isn't a goddamn thing you can do about it, because I'm wearing what I want and I don't give a fuck what anyone thinks about it." That's insanely sexy to me. More places for me to caress? Fucking awesome.) The whole "more to love" idiom absolutely applies here. To other women.

Could some of this be related to the post operative weight loss? Yes. Could it be related to my current issues with the scarring? Yes. Will it fade? Fuck I hope so. Could it also be related to my obsession with fitting into that stupid fucking wedding gown? Yes, very much so, and I suspect that's where it started. I suspect that my fear broke something in my brain. This is something I need to work on. Wish me luck.
For anyone concerned about eating disorders: don't be. I have NEVER been susceptible to anorexia, bulimia, or the one where you exercise until you pass out. I like food far too much (and have no impulse control), hate vomiting, and am entirely too lazy to actually exercise more than is strictly necessary (or paid for). I'm just struggling with hating my meatsuit.

Day 15 Post-Yeet

 This morning, all the dermabond came off.

Well, specifically, I removed it. But it wasn't premature, and it's totally fine. I'll explain further:
The edges have been peeling up, as I stated previously. I had been trimming the edges to keep it from pulling. There were some bits that appeared to be...melting...into my skin. For lack of a better description. I was being careful not to dislodge anything too near the incision lines. But this morning, when checking the incisions (which I do multiple times a day, looking for signs of infection, etc.), I realized that one of the incision lines, specifically the worst looking one, wasn't quite attached. Like, as I moved, the incision line also moved, but not in the same way. So I peeled the edges a little, and the whole patch of dermabond came right off. Since that was the worst-looking one, I decided to poke at the other two (non-umbilical) incisions. They had the same situation. What looked like a fresh incision line was basically a scab, held in place by a layer of liquid stitches. So I did the only logical thing and removed the remaining bits of dermabond. The only marginally painful part was when there were parts stuck on hairs. (Before anyone gets all "TMI" on me, kindly remember that we're mammals, and all mammals have at least fine hair on the majority of their body.)

It was also fairly uncomfortable scrubbing the last bits of residue off of my skin, because bruises are still a thing.

I'm also dealing with a bit of body dysmorphia from the scars. Ok, I knew there would be some scarring. It's inevitable with any kind of major incision. Unfortunately, I hadn't really prepared myself for how...intense...they might be.
They're not large. Each one is, on the surface, about half an inch long, and quite very narrow. They're not terribly dark. So it's not a visibility thing. I have no reason to expect that they won't lighten even further as time goes on. So what's the problem? I can feel them. Very easily. Just brushing over the area, I can feel a thick ridge under the skin. It feels 3-4 times the size of the incision. And it's upsetting me. It shouldn't; it's not a big scar, it's not terribly visible, and it's not like I have any problem with other scars. I have plenty of them, and I've never been upset by any of them. So why are these different? Excellent question. I don't know. So this is a new feeling.

Day 11 Post-Yeet: A Recap

 Alternate Title: I'm Really Bad at Updating Consistently

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I said I'd be updating regularly and then I didn't. This one's going to be a long(er) one to make up for it/explain why I dropped off the planet.
Allow me to preface this by saying that in a conversation with my doctor, I was told that my surgery was "one of the least eventful" he's had. Nothing noteworthy happened. The removed organs were sent out for pathology, as is standard practice, and when the results came back, there was nothing noteworthy. Everything was the right size, shape, weight, color, and texture. By all accounts, everything that was removed (including the cervix that has had abnormal cells in the recent past) was completely and utterly healthy. There is no explanation as to why my uterus has tried to kill me every time I've had a period. Apparently, she was just a bitch. A perfectly normal-looking, healthy bitch.

As one might expect from an encounter with anesthesia and narcotics, there is a certain amount of fuzziness to the surgery, the immediate recovery, and even the first few days of at-home recovery. Add to this my standing memory issues (from my mental health disorders) and you've got a bit of a jumble. Dates and times are not likely to be accurate. Deal with it; I have to.

For reasons, I'm going to go back to immediate post-operative recovery for this next bit. My chest was sore as hell for the first couple of days. Almost alarmingly so. To the point that I (vaguely) recall musing that I would not be surprised to find out that I had needed chest compressions at some point. I did not need chest compressions at any point; the pain was a result of a normal part of the surgery - inflating the abdomen with CO₂ for purposes of visibility. In hindsight, this likely also accounts for the neck/shoulder/upper back pain. From research, this gas can take up to 2 weeks to fully dissipate from the body. More on that later.
Also, shoutout to Cameron, who was good enough to bring my stuff to the hospital after I was brought to a room. I wasn't terribly coherent when they were there, and while I'm pretty sure I thanked them, it's still worth mentioning. Having a support system is important.
On a related note, my partner was amazing the day of the surgery. I mentioned that he had to leave before I got wheeled to the back, because work. What I forgot to mention is that as soon as he was done with work, he went home to check on the doggos, then immediately came to the hospital. And he stayed in my room for a fairly impressive chunk of time. How long? I don't know; I was too busy being completely out of it from anesthesia. But while I was in and out of wakefulness, I saw him at the table on the other side of the room, playing some game or other on his laptop. And before anyone comes at him for playing a game, shut the fuck up. I was asleep, or at least mostly so. And when I did wake up, the few times that I was coherent, seeing him there and hearing the ticky-tappy of the keys was incredibly comforting. It was a small bit of "normal" in the middle of a severely fucking weird situation, and honestly, it was huge. I don't know how long he was there, but it was long enough that I felt totally fine with him heading home when he asked if it was ok. (I'm pretty sure he asked if it was ok, not just told me he was going.)

Ok, moving forward to Day 5 Post-Yeet: After an unreasonable amount of nausea and misery, I finally got my ass in gear and called my doctor about getting some better anti-nausea meds. It took most of the day to get them, because I was NOT good to drive, and I had to wait for Lee to get home to pick them up, but they were definitely a big help. I also discussed my failure to poop with my doctor. He thought part of it was because I just didn't have much in my body because of the nausea, part of it was that many of the meds (anesthesia, narcotics, and zofran) could cause constipation, and, as was pointed out by a friend, part of it was likely because my goddamn intestines were physically shifting inside my abdominal cavity. That's gonna throw your system into all kinds of turmoil. (Note: I have since pooped. My body is finally figuring out how eating and digestion work.)

Day 8 Post-Yeet: Lee had been talking about needing to go out and buy some new cold-weather clothes. Ideally, a coat, some long-sleeved shirts, some decent gloves. We talked about where to go. Target was an option, but not a great one, Kohl's was somewhat better, but ultimately, we decided on the mall. And I was going with. Yes, this was the day after Black Friday. Yes, we realized this. But the mall had more options, and so the mall was the best chance to find what we were after.
We found a coat. No shirts, no gloves, nowhere near enough people wearing masks. Our trip lasted all of 35 minutes before I was far too tired to continue and his knees were too painful to want to. We went home and crashed. Hard. Typically, on Sunday mornings, we go to the local farmer's market. It's less than a mile away from the house. But we both decided we were too fucking tired for that shit. So we didn't. Sunday (day 9) was spent doing absolutely fuck-all.

Day 10 Post-Yeet: After another night of piss-poor sleep (woke up 3x to pee, stayed up from about 3:30 to 7:30), I decided to take a couple of hours of sick time so I could get a nap in and take a shower. I had just started trying to get my work computer to behave when I got a call from Lee. Since I don't know what he's comfortable sharing, I'm going to be vague, but suffice it to say there was a medication mix-up, and he ultimately wound up in the ER for the better part of the day. Somehow, he got incredibly lucky and had no major/lasting effects - seizure and stroke were possibilities - but suffice it to say, I was running on 4 hours of sleep and a metric fuckload of adrenaline. (Note to self: look for studies that show the effects of adrenaline surges on surgical healing.) At least I slept reasonably well last night.

All of this leads us to...

Day 11 Post-Yeet (fucking finally!)

I'm still pretty tired, and though most of the nausea has abated, I still get occasional waves of it. They're much less intense and much shorter-lived, but they do still happen. Most notably, they happen when the edges of the dermabond peel up and catch on whatever I'm wearing. It doesn't hurt, mind you, it just feels very weird, and for some reason (maybe because it's in the stomach/intestinal region, maybe not) that feeling just makes my stomach do flip-flops. I'm not entirely sure when the peeling started. The dermabond was applied in pretty massive patches, so as it's been peeling up, I've been (very carefully) snipping the peeled edges off with (very sharp) tiny cuticle scissors (that have been rubbed thoroughly with alcohol). Today is the first time I've gotten within half an inch of one of the incisions, and only then because the dermabond is already coming off on its own, and trimming the free edges is keeping it from catching and getting pulled further than is ready to come off. As a note, some of it seems to be...melting into my skin? It's weird. And because fabric is a thing, it's quite discolored. I would very much like to take some exfoliant and scrub at those areas, but scrubbing is not a thing right now, because although everything appears to be healing well, it's still tender. And it's not just discoloration from fabric. I'm bruised all to hell. This is normal and expected; they did cut into me and ram (steel?) tubes through the layers of my skin/fat/muscle into my abdominal cavity. I'd be more concerned if there wasn't bruising and tenderness. (Because that would appear to indicate insufficient blood flow and/or nerve damage.) 

The general pain is gone. If I sit in the wrong position for too long (stretching in certain ways) or press directly on the regions around any of the incisions, there is still pain. Again, normal and expected. Peeing seems to be more or less normal, which is nice, though I did still buy a Squatty Potty for each bathroom, which was an excellent investment. I'm trying to get back into "normal" eating habits, but that's still a struggle. I just can't eat as much or as often as I used to, which is good, but not the healthiest way to lose weight. And seriously, when I go for my follow-up next week, I REEEEEEEEEEEEALLY hope the doctor clears me for sex. For reasons, it's been roughly 3 weeks already, and I'm climbing the motherfucking walls. I am not good at abstinence. At all. Not even a little.

All in all, things are progressing as they should. I'm healing as I should, with only minor (bizarre, non-threatening) setbacks. (Over the weekend I did have a brief panic over a sharp, stabbing pain in my chest that lasted about 40 minutes. After discussion with my doctor, it was most likely just a fluke, possibly as a result of the last of the aforementioned CO₂. Since it passed and has not come back, there's no reason to worry about it.) I will, however, say this: I wish to hell someone had warned me about all of this going into the surgery. I'll clarify:

• I knew there was going to be pain. Someone was going to take a sharp metal object (or four) and stick them into my abdominal cavity. An entire fucking organ (and several related bits) were going to be removed. There were stitches involved. It's going to hurt. Pain is to be expected. And honestly, I can deal with pain. If I need to, I'll take medication to handle it, but ultimately, I figured there was no way that this could hurt much more than a bad period. And ultimately, I was extremely fucking right. From a pain standpoint, the absolute worst of the pain was not as bad as the worst PMDD pain, and was managed with the prescribed medication. Hell, I was off the painkillers entirely by day 4. I think I took an ibuprofen that day. I have had days when period pain was so bad that I genuinely wished for death. As someone who has suffered from mental illness including suicidal ideation and intent for over two decades, I don't say that lightly. The pain related to this surgery was a moderate inconvenience. 
• I knew there was going to be discomfort, especially when standing and/or sleeping. I wasn't aware of the type of discomfort (mostly pulling, and just fucking weird feelings), nor of how long they would last, nor of how to combat them. If someone (like, IDK, my doctor?) had warned me and recommended a belly band, I could have been better prepared.
• I knew there was likely to be some nausea for the first day or so after surgery. Nausea is common after surgery, and it's why he sent me home with zofran to begin with. But I read dozens of testimonials (and heard secondhand ones from friends who knew people who had hysterectomies) and none of them mentioned weeks-long nausea, or extreme nausea. This could very well be because I'm weird, but I can't imagine that I'm the only person with this issue?
• I forgot entirely about the potential fallout from removing the IUD along with the uterus. That's on me.
• I was completely unprepared for the whole teaching-myself-how-to-pee-again thing. Not a single soul warned me of that. Not my doctor, not the accounts I read, nothing. There's absolutely no way that I'm in the minority on this one. Shit, I imagine people who have had cesarean sections have to deal with this to some extent. Why the fuck does nobody talk about this?
  
• I didn't know about the inflation situation and the possible effects (pain, discomfort, etc.) associated with it. I found that out after surgery was completed. Not a huge deal, but still would have been nice to know. Would have been particularly nice to know that there was a possibility that it could cause symptoms that mimic pulmonary embolus. 
• Nobody warned me that there was a chance the incisions, particularly the umbilical incision, could leak a brownish fluid (called serous exudate or serosanguineous exudate) days after surgery. It's basically your body trying to get rid of fluid that got trapped in the area of the incision, most often as a result of IV fluids. The color is from the small amounts of blood that end up between the incision and the dermabond. It's normal, and can be aided by applying heat to the affected area 72+ hours after surgery. I was completely in the dark about this and terrified that I was getting an infection. (Infection was ruled out without even a visit to the doctor's office, because there were no other signs of infection - no fever, no excess warmth in the area, no swelling, no redness...)
• Nobody warned me that my goddamn organs would shift! A uterus doesn't take up that much space, and most of your organs are at least partially held in place by muscles and tendons and shit, right? So it didn't even occur to me that my fucking intestines would wriggle themselves into the fist-sized hole all awkward-like. That is a very fucking weird (read: uncomfortable) feeling, and it took several fucking days for it to settle down. *shudder*
• Nobody talks about post-operative fuzziness, either. I'm at day 11 now, and I still have moments where I realize that my brain has been on power save mode. I'm still having difficulty keeping track of things unless I strongly focus on them. Details are getting lost, my attention span isn't great, and my train of thought gets more easily derailed. This is on top of my typical memory and/or concentration issues. "Jumbled" is the word that comes to mind most often. It is less and less each day, but again, it would have been nice to have been given a heads up. (In retrospect, it's well within the realm of possibility that this is something my parents have mentioned in the past, but that I've written off as an issue for older people. I'm 34; their surgeries all happened after age 50. One expects the brain to have an easier time picking back up at younger ages.) 

In the long run, I will most likely forget the nausea, the fuzziness, the discomfort, the weird-ass body changes, and the emotional upheaval that has been associated with this surgery. And to be fair, there's a decent chance that's why I wasn't warned. By the time people get around to talking about their surgeries, the secondary issues have subsided, and they're focusing on finishing healing, or are too busy being excited about the results. And in the long run, the couple of weeks of shit as compared to the years of freedom I'm going to have? Yeah, I'm going to focus on the good, too. Ultimately, even if I had been warned about everything, I would have gone through with the surgery. Would I have waited a few months longer? Possibly. Would waiting have made any appreciable difference? Probably not. 

And in case anyone still doesn't get why I'm writing this... Look at that list of things I wish I had known going into this surgery. It's not short. Like I said, knowing it wouldn't really have changed anything, but I might have been slightly better prepared if I had been forewarned. I might have had less worry when certain things happened. And I know damn well that my experience is not the be-all-end-all. It may not even be the average experience. But either way, it's an account of what is possible, and if that helps even one person make a decision on how they want to handle their reproductive issues, or helps just one person not completely freak out about post-surgical experiences, then I've done something good.

Day 3 Post-Yeet

 Well, the last 24 hours have been something of a shitshow. 

Last night, I was feeling unwell. I was having pain and trying to avoid taking the narcotic painkiller, there was itching and pulling in my umbilical incision (there still is. It's fucking weird), I could feel my intestines shifting to fill the void (it's a real thing, look it up), and then I coughed. Now, in general, my pain hasn't gone much above a 3. But when I coughed, I didn't have a chance to brace my belly, and the pain fired all the way up to BEES! (https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/6y2tgn/an_improved_pain_scale/)

That led me to doing the thing that I always do. I started to overthink. This was a bad idea. I should have waited. I should have held off until I had lost more weight so I didn't have the belly pulling on the incision. I should have just dealt with it. I made a bad call.

None of these things are true, necessarily. It may not have been the worst idea in the world had I waited a little longer and gotten rid of a little more pudge, but ultimately, I know myself. Even at my skinniest, I had enough of a pooch that it would have pulled and been uncomfortable. Luckily, I have a great partner who is both very supportive and very logically-minded. He reminded me that this is something that I've been trying to get done for years, and that once I've healed, it's going to be a far cry better in the long run than it would have been if I had just kept going with the IUD. He's right, of course. And he held me while I whined and complained, didn't judge me for being crazypants, and didn't try to rush off. He's good people.

Sleep was shit. I have to do all kinds of horizontal gymnastics to get myself into a comfortable position, with the use of a body pillow that makes getting under the blanket complicated. Lee is afraid to get too close for fear of accidentally bashing into a tender spot, so cuddling is out. And once I get into a "comfortable" position, that's it. No movement. Because movement is uncomfortable at best. I got into bed at, I don't know, maybe 11ish? And woke up to pee at 3:30. And then didn't fall back to sleep until well after 7. And woke up again at 9:30. Ugh.

Eating was also shit today. I had about 2 tablespoons of the taco/sloppy joe beef that Lee made last night, and when I couldn't do any more because my stomach started to protest the protein, I grabbed a donut. That took a solid hour to eat, which is sad as hell. Around 1:30, I was finally hungry enough to make another food attempt. So I busted out the leftover pho I had...well, the broth and the beef, anyway. I left the noodles out because that would have been far too substantial. Again, took me well over an hour to eat, which is just absurd. It's broth and a couple of strips of bland-ass beef. And then I started to feel unwell. The nausea built up from about 3:45. I took a painkiller and a zofran at 5pm when I couldn't take it any more. I ate some crackers. And then I got to googling. Because again, overthinker. I checked for fever (temp is perfectly normal), I inspected the external incision sites for any signs of infection (there were none), and finding no obvious cause, I began to look up what's "normal" following a hysterectomy.

Now, my surgery was robotic-assisted and left the ovaries in place. So I wasn't looking at what to expect from complete hysterectomies. Everything said that the nausea is typically anesthesia-related and goes away within 24 hours. We're well past the 24 hour mark, and there's neither anesthesia nor narcotic in my system. Fuck. Keep reading.

And then I accidentally read about what to expect after ovary removal. Nausea lasting up to two weeks is one of the symptoms. Because your body basically goes cold-turkey from the hormones your ovaries produce. The article recommended taking an estrogen supplement. And that's when it hit me right between the fuckin' eyes.
I've had an IUD for the last 7ish years. My body hasn't had to figure out how and when to produce which hormone, because it had a piece of plastic taking the wheel. When the uterus came out, so too did the IUD. Know what the number one side effect of removing an IUD is (save the pain of actually, y'know, pulling half a crucifix through your fucking cervix)? Yeah, it's nausea. (This also explains my sudden emotional outburst last night. Go fucking figure.)

So what do I do now? I could call my doctor tomorrow during office hours and see if there's any medication he can give me to take and then wean off of so my body can figure out wtf is going on. But that requires calling, probably getting an appointment, and driving to the office. Which I can't do quite yet. So that's out. But there are a whole mess of foods that have plant estrogens, and they're easy to get. Chick peas, garlic, soy, green peas, dried stone fruits, cruciferous vegetables...so we'll start there and see what happens. Granted, this is going to be complicated, because nausea, but it's something.