One More Surgery

I had a lumpectomy in February, and then radiation until the beginning of June.  About a week after finishing radiation I went into the Payson hospital to have a hysterectomy.  It was Travis' birthday (my son-in-law). My Mom and Derek's came to the hospital along with Derek and me.

Me and my Derek before my surgery

I generally try to handle these kind of events as if I were really brave, and I try to be cheerful, and talk to the people who are poking me, or taking my vitals, or whatever.  This time they put me in a bed to get me ready for surgery and someone came to do the i.v..  She hit an artery and was upset and I kept trying to tell her it was ok.  She cleaned that up and left and another nurse came and tried.  That vein apparently collapsed.  She was very apologetic.  Derek was texting my girls and my sons-in-law.  The bright spot in all of this is that my sons in law texted back things that made me smile.  Then another nurse came and tried -- twice.  By then, Derek had turned pale and had to leave, and I was done being brave and had tears running down my face.  Last of all the doctor tried, and succeeded without much difficulty.  He asked if I wanted a spinal block in case they had to do the hysterectomy the hard way -- but I just cried because I didn't want to be poked any more and so he assured me that was fine and pretty soon I was headed to surgery.

I found out later that a friend of mine always goes through about 5 tries every time she needs an i.v..  I feel so sorry for her!  Ouch!

They put me out for surgery, which was able to be done laparoscopically, and when I woke up I cried again (that happened with my lumpectomy too).  I asked for Derek, but he wasn't there.  They told him he had time to go home and have lunch.  We only live two blocks from the hospital.  He was quick, but he was waiting for my Mom who, it turns out, wasn't planning on coming back and therefore wasn't hurrying!  I was up in my hospital room when he came back.  At least his story made me laugh, and even though Derek hates hospitals he stayed with me so much that the nurses were really impressed with him -- and I was just really, really, grateful.

The day of surgery was hard.  I felt like I had to think in order to keep breathing and so I was afraid to go to sleep.  All of my alarms went off once.  My blood pressure dropped and it scared Derek.  I just didn't feel so well that day or the next.  I ended up having to stay a day longer because my blood pressure was low and I felt lousy.

Me and my elephant after surgery.  Dan brought elephant from home for me.

One tender mercy in all of this was that during the nights, which are notoriously long and miserable at hospitals, were actually peaceful and calm.  Even after the disappointing day when I didn't get to go home, and Derek offered to stay with me, the night was good.

Elephant, me, and my Derek home after surgery.

Recovery has gone fairly well really, but I feel like it has been difficult to recover emotionally.  I will think I'm doing fine and then some pain, or the inability to move my left shoulder as well as I could before, or getting tired easier than I want, will remind me of everything that has happened, and I usually have to talk it out with Derek again and remind myself to be patient, and to be grateful it wasn't worse.
The good news is that this one more surgery should be my last.