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.

Day 2 Post-Yeet

 Ow.

Ouchity fuck ow.

Now that that's out of the way, let's talk specifics, shall we? First off, I'm extremely glad my partner and I have been going to a personal trainer, and that she has done so much core work with us. I've been using a LOT of core muscles lately. Also, warning, it's about to get graphic up in this bitch.

I said yesterday that peeing is weird. This is still the case. Quick & dirty anatomy lesson: bladder, colon, uterus, and vagina are all held in place by the pelvic floor muscles. It's common for the muscles responsible for emptying the bladder to be temporarily cranky after a hysterectomy. It's less intense with the type of hysterectomy I had (transvaginal robotic-assisted [meaning they used a robot to cut the cervix and uterus into small pieces and pull it out through the vagina] with salpingectomy [removal of fallopian tubes]), but is still an issue. It's almost like I pee in stages. There's your typical sit-down-and-pee, but it's like my bladder only empties halfway. I then have two choices: push (which feels like a TERRIBLE idea, given that the top of my vaginal canal is no longer anchored to...well, much of anything. I don't know if my doctor stitched the vaginal cuff [the point where the cervix used to be that's now stitched together like an old-timey coin purse] to anything, or if we're relying exclusively on me being young and having a healthy pelvic floor) or just...wait. Thus far, I've almost exclusively waited. I partially empty my bladder, relax, do a few Kegels, then after about a minute, finish peeing. Again, based on the reading I've done, this is perfectly normal and should stop being an issue within a week or two. Just takes a little while for the muscles to stop being in "OMGWTF" mode.

I have not pooped yet. This is not even remotely surprising, for a number of reasons. For starters, I had SUPER fucked up my eating habits before the wedding (completely accidental - I was terrified of not being able to fit into the dress, so I was trying to eat only healthy foods, and then I got crazy busy and kept forgetting to eat) and still hadn't gotten back to eating like a normal person before surgery. Then, there's the whole no-eating-after-midnight-before-surgery thing (I stopped eating nearly 12 hours before surgery just because that's how it worked out) combined with having pooped the morning of surgery before leaving the house. Then let's add in that on Yeeterus day, I ate a grand total of one spoonful of "chicken broth" and 4 saltines because the nausea from the anaesthesia and pain meds made eating not a real thing. I was able to eat yesterday, at least. I had one (exceptionally awful) pancake in the hospital, then came home and ate half of a KFC pot pie (do NOT judge, those things are bomb as fuck) for lunch, half of a New York Steamer sub (from Firehouse Subs) for dinner, and a small dark chocolate ice cream with cherry pie filling and graham crackers (from Coldstone) for dessert. I'm still not eating nearly as much (or as often) as I did pre-wedding fuckery, but I'm working on it, However, the lack of food makes for a distinct lack of need to poop. And the final reason is that even if I did have to poop, the meds that you're given for surgery typically cause some serious constipation. Again, not really concerned, because I'll have had plenty of time to get that squared by the time I've eaten enough.

Now let's talk pain. Yesterday SUCKED. Like, a lot. It was like a constant period cramp (albeit a fairly minor one) in the void that used to house my uterus. That honestly wasn't so bad. Mostly just really annoying. It's the everything else that was brutal. I had pain radiating all the way from my vagina all the way up into my ribcage. My neck hurt like I had a nasty case of whiplash, and my middle and lower back were no better, likely because sitting and/or standing completely straight is fairly impossible at the moment. There are 4 incision sites: one on the left side and slightly below the belly button, the belly button itself, and two to the right of the belly button (one in line and one slightly lower). And they're tiny. Less than an inch across each, held together with dissolvable stitches and Dermabond. At the beginning of the day yesterday, they didn't hurt at all unless pressure was applied (which it is, any time I need to cough, bend at the waist, climb stairs, or just generally jostle in the middle). Unfortunately, as the day went on, they got more and more tender. (I'll ask my doctor about this at our appointment on the 6th, but I imagine this has something to do with the nerve block that was used during surgery. I have no clue how long that's supposed to last, and what nerves it's supposed to block in the first place, but it would certainly make sense.) As a Very Much So Not Thin Person, I have some bulk below the waistline, and there is an amount of pulling on the incisions. Not enough to cause damage to them, I don't think, but enough to be able to feel it. This combined with the After-Surgery Cough makes for a lot of ouch. There was a lot of me manually holding my stomach in place. This will continue for at least a few days. I was intubated, as is common practice for major surgeries, so my throat is very scratchy and sore. As a result, there's also a not-insignificant amount of mucus. This is also an expected phenomenon. 

Now that I have them, I've been taking my prescribed painkillers pretty much as soon as I can. Getting into bed last night was dicks. That pain radiating up into my ribcage made it difficult to get into a comfortable position. I'm a side sleeper. I cannot sleep on my back. Positioning myself with a leg draped over a body pillow that was also tucked halfway under my belly to try to keep everything in place was pretty awful. There was a small amount of crying. Please note that I'm pretty good about pain. I've worked through dislocated joints, danced on severely damaged ankle/knee/hips, and more than once had doctors ask how I was still walking, nevermind doing the other things I was doing at the time. I sprained my frickin chest back in January, and it took me almost a month to see a doctor about it. When he offered to prescribe heavy duty painkillers, I turned them down and continued on with my naproxen. (I had really only gone to the doctor to make sure I wasn't having any heart problems. It wasn't painful enough to need Rx meds, but, y'know, chest pain for the better part of a month...probably worth seeing someone about, right?) But even with a higher pain tolerance, and some pretty fucking hardcore meds, I began to rethink my planning. (I probably should have waited until I lost a bit more weight, had less of a belly, etc.) At one point, I even said that the way my ribs hurt, I wouldn't be surprised to find out they had to perform CPR on me at some point. (They didn't. Or at least, they didn't tell me. But I imagine that's something that they would tell, and probably also something that would prevent me from going home a mere 24 hours post-surgery.)

Today the pain is less severe. It's still there. My neck, back, and ribs in particular have eased up significantly. I did need help getting out of bed (which is fucking embarrassing, really) and I did immediately take the narcotic (I fucking hate narcotics, but you do what you gotta do sometimes), but even before getting the meds onboard, I was feeling less like I'd been hit by a semi. The fleshy bits are definitely more painful today, but there's no sign of infection at the incision sites. They're not any warmer than the rest of my torso, there's no real swelling, and there's no redness or other discoloration. They're just sore. The discharge paperwork did recommend wearing a waist trainer or similar clothing item as support, so I busted out an old shapewear tank top, and that's doing a fair amount of work. Compression is apparently my friend. Talking with my parents, the neck/back thing is something that gave them problems, too, when they've had surgery. My mom thinks it has to do with tensing up whether we realize it or not. Dad didn't comment on the why of it. I think Mom could be right, but it could also have something to do with the way the surgical team transfers an unconscious chub like myself from gurney to gurney. Regardless, it is starting to go away, which is a huge relief.

Circling back to something I said earlier: I have been doing Kegels pretty much non-stop. I know I have a healthy pelvic floor, but everything is swollen, and I want to make sure everything stays in place. There has been absolute minimal bleeding, which is awesome. I obviously can't have any kind of penetrative sex (gods that's just an awful phrase) for at least 4 weeks, probably more like 6, but I want everything to be in absolute tip-top shape when I do get the green light. Because I'm going to want to give this sucker a test drive pretty much immediately. Is it going to feel different? Are certain spots going to have migrated because there's no uterus to hold it up? Is it possible to get effectively turned inside out? (Spoiler: yes, medically that is possible, and it's called a prolapse. It's not extremely common, but it's also not uncommon, and Kegels can help prevent it.) They're also just good for the health of your entire pelvic region, so everyone, particularly people with vaginas, do your fucking Kegels.

Ok, that's all I've got for the moment. Stay tuned for more updates.

Yeeterus Completerus

 Well, yesterday was the day. I got up at 4:45am, took a shower with Hibiclens, dried off, and got dressed. I pounded 40oz of Gatorade, per instruction, and took my meds (on an otherwise empty stomach, which sucked). Got to the hospital at 6am, checked in. Got into the pre-op room, got naked, wiped down with Hibiclens wipes, got into my (extremely uncomfortable) gown, put on the (awful, hideously uncomfortable, seam-across-the-toe) rubber grip slippers, and got into bed. A few dozen questions, a couple of pee breaks (damn Gatorade) and one IV later, Lee had to go to work, and I was given a whole mess of drugs. I was loopy LONG before I hit the OR, didn't have to do any countdown, and don't remember anything of the surgery.

The OR was booked for 2 hours, but I was told the surgery itself typically only takes about 60-90 minutes. When the doctor called Lee, he said the surgery went "better than textbook" and took all of 45 minutes. I was brought to recovery.

I woke up in a panic attack. I'm not entirely surprised. The only other time I've even been remotely knocked out like this, I woke up much the same way. (To be fair, that time, the anaesthetic wore off before the paralytic, and I could tell exactly what was going on, but I wasn't able to move or speak to alert anyone.) When I say I woke up in a panic attack, I mean I couldn't open my eyes, I was whimpering, sobbing, and unable to speak. I could move, but couldn't get my mouth to work. The nurse I was with was trying to get me to talk, but it was slow going. While I was trying to get my head and mouth in sync, I somehow remembered that I can almost sign. So I started trying to finger-spell "panic attack" and "clonazepam". Unfortunately, when I caught the nurse's attention, she didn't understand ASL, so I was out of luck there. (To be fair, it was probably really sloppy, so even if she did, there's no guarantee it would have been coherent). It took me a few minutes to calm down and choke out that I was having a panic attack. Very shortly after, I was given something to help. No clue what it was, but I calmed down and was brought to an actual room.

I was asleep for quite a while. I woke up around lunch time, whereupon I was given clear liquids - two bowls of "chicken broth" that tasted more like somebody emptied a bedpan into a Campbell's soup can. I took one spoonful and gave it a hearty "fuck that". I was still very much nauseous, so I wasn't too upset. I slept for a while longer. I got a call from food services to organize my dinner and breakfast. I slept some more. I received my dinner, which was some kind of fish, carrots, and brown rice. It sounded like it was going to be good, but I opened the lid, and nearly threw up immediately. I was too nauseated to be bothered even trying to eat. I drank half of my tea, and the nurse brought me some ginger ale and crackers. I spent most of the evening bitching about the catheter. I felt like I had to pee the entire time, to the point of pain. It wasn't supposed to come out until 6am, but I made enough noise about it that the nurses called and got the go ahead to remove it well before midnight. I was able to pee on my own twice before 2am, which was all they needed to keep the catheter out. I took a walk around the ward, which was much to the pleasure of the nurses.

Around 2am, there was a blood draw to check CBC, specifically looking for a high enough RBC and any signs of infection. At 6am, the doctor came in. Blood count was basically perfect, incisions look good, and I was deemed free to go home.

Unfortunately, the insurance company was kind of a dick about the meds. I was ordered a narcotic (not my first choice, but...) for 8 days, but the insurance company requires prior authorization for any narcotic prescribed for more than 7 days. So because of a single additional day, I had to wait until after 2pm to get any real pain meds. I was doing ok earlier, but 12 hours without pain control has me hurting.

Peeing is weird. Pain is radiating up into my ribcage. Right now, things are quite uncomfortable. But I'm mobile, and the pain isn't so bad that I'm rethinking my choices. I'm aware it's going to be a bit of a road for recovery. There are 4 tiny incisions, and none are particularly painful unless they're pressed on. Coughing sucks, burping is worse. Hiccups are fucking deadly at this point. Because I was intubated, I've got a ton of mucus and a quire sore throat, but nothing abnormal.

I go back to the doctor to get checked in 3 weeks. We'll see what happens then.

OMGWTFBBQ

 Oh hey, so we're less than 5 days away from surgery now. 

Surprise.

And I'm not ashamed to admit that my anxiety is THROUGH THE FUCKING ROOF. Not about the surgery itself, mind you. I'm not remotely concerned about that. My doctor is one of the best; he's one of the pioneers of the DaVinci robot for use in gynecological surgeries. His whole shtick is minimally invasive surgeries. The actual slicing and dicing part is not even remotely a concern. So what is it that's got my knickers in a twist? Well, everything else.

This is the first real surgery I'm having. And because of unfortunate PTO and schedule balancing, I'll likely be waking up alone. My partner will be able to bring me there and sit with me for a bit before surgery, but he will have to leave moments after I'm scheduled to go in. This is in no way his fault, and I'm certainly not upset at him for it. The situation does suck, though. I've only had one experience with any kind of anesthesia before, and it ended poorly. (I'll spare you the details, but suffice it to say, it ended in a panic attack.)

Then there's this whole situation regarding narcotics. See, the hospital wants to pump me full of them, but every time I've been on them, I've hated the way they made me feel. They killed the pain in the area in question, sure, but I wound up nauseated as all hell, with a screaming headache, brain fog, and just otherwise feeling like turbo trash. I would like to avoid this if at all possible, and at my pre-surgical appointment at the hospital, requested as much. And was told that it wasn't an option, because "not giving you narcotics would be cruel." 

I beg to differ. 

Fortunately, during my appointment with my doctor/surgeon today, he said it would be cruel to not have them available should I need them. He then listed off 3 different, non-narcotic medications that were viable alternatives. I was told to bring it up to the anaesthesia team on Friday before we go in. He's got my back, so there's a decent chance I'll be able to get a fuck-off large dose of Naprosyn, which happens to be a personal favorite.

I'm also concerned about the whole being knocked out thing. I'll be intubated, because that's required. Anyone who is a vocalist is fucking TERRIFIED of being intubated. The whole concept of cramming a relatively rigid plastic tube into one's singing hole is...Let's just say it's safe to assume that nobody wants to be post-surgical Julie Andrews. And if that wasn't enough of a freaking-out point, there's the whole being-put-under thing. Barring the possibility of waking up early (or the extremely unlikely possibility of failing to wake up at all), there are reports of people having horrific nightmares while under. It's my understanding that most people don't dream at all, or at least don't remember anything, but I have heard reports of nightmares. I'm prone to them to begin with. Now, in normal sleep, I've gotten pretty good at shaking myself out of them. But in a drug-induced sleep state? That could be hairy.

And even if everything goes swimmingly (read: I get knocked out, stay asleep, have no nightmares, surgery goes smoothly with no surprises, I don't get narcotics, and I wake up in a normal timeframe), there's the afterwards. Pain is to be expected, and frankly, I have difficulty believing that it could be much worse than the most horrible period issues I've had. I believe I have a pretty high threshold for pain. (Save headaches. Headaches and nausea I'm a great big baby about. I'll admit it.) But for AT LEAST a week, I can't carry anything of any substance. No lifting, no carrying, nothing. Which means that I'll be relying on someone else (read: my partner) to help me with laundry, trash, groceries, the dogs, everything. It's one thing to be part of a team and expect one's partner to assist with things. It's another thing entirely to have no choice but to rely on them completely. I've been pretty fucking independent for the majority of my life, so this is...not fun. (Thanks, it's the trauma.)

All this means that today, my blood pressure was 136/80 when it's usually 118/60, and my resting heart rate was averaging about 95 when it usually hovers around 62. I did not sleep last night. I will be medicating immediately following this post in hopes of being able to sleep tonight. Probably also tomorrow night. And every night until the surgery. But I keep reminding myself that this has to happen. It'll be a week or so of anxiety, pain, discomfort, and reliance on others, but in the long run, the benefits will be worth it.